Established  1983 Website last updated 9/28/11

Sports Manager

For question or comments please email: ssyslregistrar@gmail.com For Game Cancellations/Info call: (508) 673-6423 Do not leave a message since it is NOT checked regularly

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Online Photo Registration now available!
This year in addition to paper order forms, we've decided to move photo sign-up and purchasing online. Please click on the Sportography logo below to be taken to their secure Online Photo Registration system. Inside you will find detailed instructions for how to use this simple and easy to navigate application.

Questions? Visit Sportography

 

Opportunities To Get Involved With SSYSL

SSYSL is a league that has succeeded for over 25 years due to the parents who have volunteered their time to help make this league what it is today. Year after year we consistently have around 1,000 children playing soccer in the fall season and none of this can be done without the help of parents stepping forward to volunteer their time to be coaches, board members, team Mom & Dads, and referees. Soccer is a very easy sport to learn, teach and coach. We offer coaching clinics to show new coaches and parents fun games and skills that they can use with the children to teach them the game of soccer. You don’t have to be an expert in soccer and it doesn’t matter if you never played the game as a kid. All you need to do is be able to relate to kids and be organized. By learning some simple games, the kids will learn the skills practically on their own. You just need to guide and mentor them. If you are willing to volunteer your time to this great game and league, please contact one of the age group directors of the league since they would love to talk to you about how you can help. Call the league at 508.673.6423 and let us know that you want to help and someone will contact you.
 

 Sponsorship Opportunities

Our league also has a team sponsorship program where local businesses can sponsor either a single team or multiples. SSYSL is a non-profit/charitable organization where your contributions are tax deductible. As a sponsor, we will place your business’s name on the front of a team’s game shirt and we place you’re the name on the back cover of our fall booklet with a Thank You to all of our sponsors. Last year we started a new program for our sponsors to allow them to get more for their support. It’s simple, the more teams your sponsor, we give your business additional teams for FREE. Here is how the program works: if you sponsor one team, we will place your business name on one team’s shirt. However, once you sponsor two teams or more, you get additional teams for FREE. If you are interested in our sponsorship program, please visit our website for more information. With the help of local businesses in our community, through Donations and Sponsorships, we are able to offer affordable registration fees to all our soccer families. Sponsors enable many young children of our community to enjoy the great game of soccer, and more importantly they learn sportsmanship and team values.

New Soccer Field Advances Towards Goal
By Jay Pateakos Herald News Staff Reporter

SSYSL President Fred Booth stands proudly on the Swansea property that will become the league's new home

After years of growing pains limiting the operations of the Swansea-Somerset Youth Soccer League, a new home for its more than 1,000 players is within reach.

But the journey has been a long one, and it's not over yet.

The Planning Board recently approved the site plan for 16 acres of land currently owned by the Furtado Family Trust off Oak Street. Town Planner Steve Antinelli said the plan calls for the construction of eight separate soccer fields for U5 to U12 co-ed players, 251 gravel parking spots and a right-of-way leading from Oak Street to the field, which also abuts wetlands leading to the Kickemuit River.

Valued at more than $1 million, the land owned by the Furtado Trust will be sold to the soccer league for $300,000. Antinelli said there are plans to sell two house lots off Oak Street separately, adjacent to the road that will lead back to the new fields.

The site plan's approval has been dogged by delays for much of the last three to four years, according to SSYSL president Fred Booth. The plan was held up for nearly two years at the Zoning Board of Appeals alone, due to abutter concerns.

The soccer league has played at the Somerset North Elementary School on Whetstone Hill Road for the last 15 years, land it does not own, comprised of six fields with limited parking that has caused numerous problems over the years for parents and players alike, forced to park on the grass around the school or elsewhere — sometimes receiving parking tickets.

Jim Hall of Mount Hope Engineering, who designed the field plan, dispelled any rumors surrounding the league's move to Oak Street. He said there will be no stoplights or stop signs at the site, there will be no snack shack and the fields will not host any professional leagues. Hall said he’s had people ask about having the New England Revolution playing there, something he said won’t be happening. “All boys and girls are welcome, ages 4 to 13,” said Hall, a former soccer coach. Selectmen Chairman Kenneth Furtado, who is part of the Furtado Family Trust with his brothers Derek and Mickey for land originally owned by their great-grandfather, said they will receive tax benefits in selling the land to the soccer league, but that their main intentions were to see the long-abandoned fields stay green and see them get used.

“The opportunity to build Swansea-Somerset Soccer fields there help to fit both objectives and Fred Booth has been tremendous. We have both worked on this for a very long period of time,” said Furtado. “With over a 1,000 kids going to be on the property, they will be able to use the property to its fullest.”
Booth said the league has been looking for a new field for more than a decade, never finding one they could afford that could sustain the traffic or size of the league, first formed in 1980 as the Swansea Youth Soccer League.

“With the new USA soccer changes, there are now three age groups that have to play on the same sized field, and that complicates things where we are at in Somerset,” said Booth. “Where we are now doesn’t have enough parking and who knows what would happen if the town decided to expand that school. Our biggest concern is that we don’t have a dedicated place to play.” Booth said that over the years, the nonprofit league has been able to raise $150,000 toward a new field through its fundraising and league fees, meaning that the league will only have to finance half of the site’s purchase price.

But covering the costs surrounding the development of the field, is a different story.
The property sale should be closing within the next couple of weeks and Booth said his goal is to be playing on the fields within three years, but by the look of the property, totally overgrown and filled with trees, Booth said he realizes there is still a steep hill yet to climb. “I figure it will take a year to raise the money, a year to build it and a year for the grass to grow, but the big problem right now is we don’t have the money to develop it,” said Booth. “And we’ve done traffic studies, redesign plans and reviews — spent more than $60,000 so far — and we don’t even own the land yet.”

Although there have been no definitive cost estimates on the construction of the fields, Booth said he figures the field construction total will be somewhere near $300,000. “We’re hoping that a lot of the work can be done through donations and that we can get grants for the next stage from USA soccer,” said Booth. “We’re hoping to get an irrigation system paid for. We’re looking for companies to come forward and help with the actual construction, grading and looming and tree removal. Our goal is to have everything paid for and be debt free when we get done. It’s a high goal and I understand that.”

http://www.heraldnews.com/news/local_news/x2075846544/New-soccer-field-advances-toward-goal