The City Government of Davao, through the City Sports Development Division (SDD), is calling on all sports event organizers and venue owners, particularly those operating pickleball courts, to ensure they have proper permits and coordinate closely with the City Business Bureau.
Michael Denton Aportadera, Head of the SDD, said, in an interview with the Madayaw Program over city-owned Davao City Disaster Radio (DCDR), that the SDD has received several complaints from pickleball enthusiasts that there are organizers and venues that fail to provide important safety provisions and certain inclusions required for the sports event.
There were also venues with no business permit posted visibly within their vicinity.
Aportadera emphasized the need for organizers and venue owners to be in close coordination with the Business Bureau for the updating of their permits.
“We highly encourage the pickleball court owners to coordinate gyud with the city especially sa business bureau kay ubay-ubay na mga tournaments na ang mga ginapangbuhat karon unya daghan na kayo ang mga naga-apil (We highly encourage the pickleball court owners to coordinate with the city, especially with the business bureau because we’ ve been seeing a lot of tournaments and a lot of participants to these tournaments),” he said.
“Nalipay mi, but ang amoa lang kay syempre if you conduct events like that which requires each participant to pay a hefty amount or a certain amount for them to be included sa tournament syempre dapat naa pud tay accountability ana dapat (We are not against this, in fact, we are glad that we have these events. Our only concern is that if you conduct events like that which requires participants to pay a certain amount for them to be included in that tournament, we need to be accountable for their safety),” Aportadera added.
He reminded all organizers and venue owners that ensuring participant safety is a top priority and that securing and updating permits with the Business Bureau is a fundamental part of that responsibility. CIO
