BAGUIO CITY – Elderly members of the Baguio Tennis Club (BTC) on Friday remained positive amid calls that they vacate the four-tennis court under their care and management which the city turned over to them in 1976.
Despite negative remarks against their club as alleged during a dialogue held on the first week of August by City Administrator Bonifacio dela Peña, the good they do and are still doing in the past 43 years for the sport and its athletes may outweigh the “perceived negative reaction.”
“We have done so many good things for the athletes and the sport per se,” former BTC president Tony Domes-ag told the Philippine News Agency (PNA) which several old-time members, including retired Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center (BGHMC) director Jesus del Prado, agreed to.
“We do not disallow athletes from any school in using the club courts,” insisted the 66-year-old former mayor of Penarrubia, Abra, who took upon himself to speak in behalf of the group after negative reports on local papers including restricting student-athletes from using the facility were publicized.
Domes-ag said that court 4 has always been open to student-athletes, adding that they can use all courts if the other three courts are free.
“The players, mostly senior citizen, start playing at 6 a.m. until 10 a.m. only, but after that, all the courts will be free for use of the kids,” said Armando Marasigan, an engineer who had been playing tennis for decades.
“They can only use court 4, that is theirs, then they get the whole facility afterward. Many of our regular players are senior citizens,” said the 51-year old engineer, one of the younger regulars at the tennis club.
Aside from the student-athletes’ use of the facility, Domes-ag said the BTC members are also generous to them during competition time in other places.
“We will always open our wallet for them to help them defray expenses when they compete in other places,” he said.
The BTC is practically the lone venue in the city where student-athletes improve their games and where proper training can be given by its “resident coaches”.
The BTC is also a free venue for sports events of the city and the Department of Education when hosting tennis competitions.
It is the only public tennis court that even retirees can afford to pay, not having income aside from their pension; it is also the only “rest and recreation” facility that the elderlies go to for their physical fitness and socialization.
Justices Reynato Puno and Narciso Nario, Domini Tordesillas, former Quezon City Congressman Nannette Daza, and Governor Pakong Mangudadatu, in their annual visits in Baguio always include a tennis game at the facility. Grandmaster Eugene Torre and his wife Marlene are also members of BTC, they also play at the court.
As proof that the court is not exclusive to the senior citizens and BTC members, one of the regular campaigners in the Philippine tennis series, Jimmy Tangalin grew up in the clay/shell tennis courts.
The current Philippine’s number 23 (highest seeding was 16th), who started as a “pulot boy” (ball picker), could yet be the most successful product of the BTC whom they helped to reach competition level tennis.
“It is because he is family, his father, and name sake, had also worked in the club,” Marasigan said.
Another second-generation player, Monica Cortez, was able to finish college at the University of the Philippines (UP) as a varsity player for tennis. She also plays at BTC.
Monica’s father, Jun, works as a coach at the BTC and is one of the coaches of 14-year old Angelyn Trisha Mae Toliver Atos, one of the country’s top young players who recently went to a two-week tennis training program/scholarship at the Rafa Nadal Academy in Mallorca, Spain.
Rafael “Rafa” Nadal is one of the greatest tennis players with 18 Grand Slam titles including 12 French Open crowns, his last came in last May.
Trisha Mae is a fourth-generation BTC player. His great grandfather, Dr. Gregorio Atos, is one of the founding members of the group in 1976 with 24 others including the late fiscal Jose Basco and Dr. del Prado, who at 88, is the last remaining of the original BTC members..
“We worked hard for this. We put our efforts to making the three courts that were given us to four courts with the shell being imported from Bocaue, Bulacan,” said the retired doctor, who could still make a vicious drop shot to the consternation of his younger co-members.
The city government does not provide for the operation of the tennis courts but the members’ fees sustain the needs of the facility.
BTC spends an average of PHP60,000 annually for the shells aside from the monthly water bill of PHP11,000 to regularly water the court to maintain the good bounce of the ball. Repair of the facility including the roofing for everybody’s safety is from the club’s funds.
Former city councilor and retired judge Edilberto Claravall, who was the principal author of Resolution 106 signed on October 12, 1976, that effected the care and management of the tennis courts to the BTC in a conversation on Facebook’s messenger said “the BTC on its own initiative took care of the upkeep of the place and later on, Fiscal Jose Basco, as president of BTC, and I saw each other and he then told me that they could put in their resources, improve the facilities of the tennis courts should the area be placed under their administration.”
“So as chairman of the Parks in the City Council, I submitted the proposed ordinance considering that the City did not have a budget for the upkeep of the tennis courts and its premises,” he added.
Retired bank executive Rolando de Guzman, 69, expressed sadness over the possible take-over of the facility, saying it will derail the improvement of young tennis players.
“The project if it takes off will take years to complete, what will happen to our players,” said de Guzman, one of the stalwarts of the Bishop Golf Cup and Bishop Cenzon Foundation, that was able to put churches in far-flung communities in Benguet.
“That is my fear because the court will be placed atop the building,” he said. “I have three other friends who I used to play with here. They all stopped and all are dead now,” said retired pilot Jose Castro, 73.
P300-M sports facility
The tennis court as well as the Philippine Army Reserve Command 14th Regional Community Defense Group and the RnR Comfort Rooms are expected to be removed when the plan to put up a multi-level sports complex in the area is pursued.
Originally, the plan was to put up the facility at the open space between the track and the swimming pool, but it was recently paved for open courts for basketball, volleyball and other ball games.
Instead, the city is eyeing now the area occupied by the three entities for the sports facility which will house indoor and allied sports.
As early as 2015, the city government has already allocated PHP60 million for the construction of a multi-level indoor sports facility but the project never took off.
The facility eyed may cost around PHP300 million. **Pigeon M. Lobien/ PNA
