When I heard the story about a firefighter deliberately flooding a baseball field in advance of a kids’ game, I had several reactions. What were they thinking? And it was the station captain, no less. How could this happen?
The reported facts are these: While warming up for a scheduled youth baseball game, a player hit a ball that struck a firefighter’s vehicle parked in the lot adjacent to the field. The station captain then pulled the engine out of the station and shot a master stream of water onto the outfield, flooding it and making it unplayable.
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When members of the team tried to talk to the captain, “things got a little heated from that point on.” The department issued an apology for the incident, which was reported in both local and national news outlets.
When I gave this situation a bit more thought, I realized that it is a classic example of a structural problem that was made personal.
A structural problem is one that is created by conditions beyond the control of any individual involved. It might include factors of logistics or timing, or legal or policy mandates. In this case, a baseball field and a fire station parking lot were in close proximity and had been for some time. Not surprisingly, some problems occurred due to this situation. Fly balls sometimes cleared the fence and hit vehicles in the parking lot. This was understandably upsetting for those who were affected.
It seems unlikely that at the beginning of this co-location the firefighters hated the kids on the team and the kids playing were deliberately trying to antagonize the firefighters. But that is the direction things seemed to go over time. The first time a ball hits a car, it’s an unfortunate accident. The second time, it’s an accident but …. The third time becomes something akin to “those damn kids.” And it just escalates from there.
After the flooding incident, one person commented that the players might have been deliberately hitting balls from second base to have a better chance of clearing the protective fence. News reports stated that the captain responsible had told a team representative that he “wanted to get their attention” through his actions.
Neither party was responsible for the underlying condition that led to this situation — the proximity of the properties — and neither party individually could completely resolve it. But if both sides could have recognized early on that they needed to work together to make the best of less-than-great logistics, compromises could have been made and consideration given on both sides. The team could have notified the firefighters about scheduled games — some reports said they had done so. Firefighters could have moved their vehicles to an alternate lot during those times. The two parties could have worked together to lobby for a better fence or net to protect the parking area.
Structural problems can best be solved or managed by different interest groups working together, but this often doesn’t happen. Instead, those who are affected blame the other for the problem. It becomes a matter of us vs. them.
Another example of this is when women were first hired as firefighters and came to work in stations that were designed to accommodate only men. There were conflicts over sleeping arrangements, lockers, and access to toilets and showers. What should have been recognized from the beginning as a structural problem with facilities sometimes became personalized, leading individuals to act out, sometimes with malicious intent, and further dividing the groups. Instead of immediately recognizing that anyone who works in a fire station should have equal access to facilities, and working together toward that goal, the factions often found themselves pitted against one another to the detriment of themselves and the organizations they served.
There is no justification for a fire officer (or anyone else) deliberately flooding a baseball field with the intention of causing harm to the players assembled there. As has been pointed out, some of those present had driven hours to attend or participate in the game. The captain’s actions did nothing to resolve the situation — it only made it worse.
If only representatives from both sides could have sat down together much earlier on to consider the question, “What can we both do for things to get better?” Then they could have seen themselves as allies in addressing the underlying problem rather than adversaries in dealing with the effects of that structural problem.
