Thing: Hoop nightmares

>>

The deplorable state of streetball in many Montreal neighbourhoods

Okay, so Montreal's not much of a basketball town. We aren't known for all the local players who have made it to the show. The best-known Montreal-bred NBA player was probably Bill Wennington, the bearded seven-foot-tall third-stringer who rode some championship pine for the Chicago Bulls in the early '90s.

But is that any excuse for the city's parks department to leave its 50-plus outdoor basketball facilities in disrepair? Sure, the kids make lots of noise and are pretty aggressive with the installations--but that's what parks are for.

Decommissioned sites: It actually costs the city $3,000 to install a pole (cemented into the ground) with a backboard and a rim. So once you've spent that kind of money, why would you leave a pole sitting there with no rim, like this one at Devonshire Park on Clark just above Pine? The answer is noise. Devonshire used to be a great spot for pickup games, until neighbours complained about the racket. The backboards came down five years ago, leaving local hoopsters to find another place to play. Which would be fine, were it not for all the...

Bent rims: The two courts behind Jeanne-Mance High School (on Marie-Anne at Papineau), which are maintained by the city's parks department, have seen some good games. But of the four hoops, only one is playable. This bent, rusted rim hasn't been fixed in at least four years. Ballplayers in NDG tell a similar story over at Benny Park, where a twisted, grisly rim has been out of commission since early last summer. It only costs $75 to replace a bent or broken rim. Parks officials finally replaced the Benny Park rim last week. But even this happy story is confounded by...

Bureaucratic snafus: Next door to Benny Park are two rimless backboards in the schoolyard of St. Monica's Elementary. Principal Teresa Germano says the school doesn't have the money to fix them. NDG parks superintendent John Richardson says the city used to have an agreement with the school, just as they have with Jeanne-Mance High. But the agreement disappeared when the school boards were restructured three years ago. Adds Richardson: "You run into all sorts of questions, such as whose blue-collar workers will actually do the work."

Final factoid: Few rims in the city have an actual net. And no one knows exactly how many hoops are broken because no one's keeping count. The local parks authorities wait for someone to complain, then they requisition a new hoop from downtown headquarters. If your local outdoor court is damaged, send an e-mail to mtlhoops@excite.ca. Include your name, phone number and the exact location of the broken hoop. :