What will come first: The eight tennis courts at Woodward Park or a pickle ball complex at Marion Elliott Park?

Some might view that as an academic question given they are part of $425 million worth of park and recreation amenities priced in constant 2025 dollars that the Manteca City Council on Tuesday officially adopted among its spending targets for future projects that can be funded with park growth fees on new construction.

Those “targets” include:

*converting the Marion Elliott baseball field into a pickle ball complex plus additional parking for $6.5 million.

*replacing the Morezone baseball field next door to the golf course with an events center for $18.3 million.

*building eight tennis courts at Woodward Park.

*and a list that includes everything from a second (or replacement) senior center and community center to a community park in north Manteca

To be clear, this is not a concrete decision.

Nor is it mere fantasy as some believe it is that will argue Manteca is far from making a real commitment.

They could easily offer the new police station breaking ground in the first week of October as evidence it’s a long way from the day two perfectly — and the City’s only bona fide baseball fields that also happen to be lighted — are in danger of going the way of new tract homes in Manteca starting in the low $110,000s.

City leaders in 2002 — elected and otherwise that have long departed from positions of authority except councilman Charlie Halford who was part of the police command at the time — officially started efforts to build a new police station based on pressing space and security needs.

They will also tell you the city needed to identify targeted needs to justify the park fees under state law and that ravages of inflation and shifting wants and needs as the years unfold alter such plans.

And — the big “if” — even if construction costs froze for the next 20 to 30 years and every projects new housing unit the fees were based on were built — the city would only have $260 million to cover the $425 million tab for the identified community-wide related parks and recreation facilities.

However, none of that negates the fact the list is of projects the city is not just considering but is planning for at least to justify fees until such time items are derailed.

City leaders might think a serious discussion about the future of Marion Elliott and Morezone baseball fields is premature at best, but they are the ones that have advanced the possibility.

Besides, there are community members that have a stake in both complexes as well as future Manteca residents that view recreational baseball as more than just a passing fad.

And, please, no notations about the number of participants and how time the fields are actually in use.

If that was the case, the city should be considering converting the Center Street tennis and pickle ball courts into a downtown parking lot.

Assurances that “nothing is cast in stone” are greeted — as they should be — with suspicion from those that believe recreational baseball has a future in a city that is basing current park facilities objectives on a population with 60,000 or so people more than the 97,000 that live in Manteca today.

In what world does it make sense if the city is preparing to grow by two thirds, to tear out two perfectly functional baseball fields? It is a lot safer assumption to assume baseball won’t grow that much to require additional lighted and bigger baseball regulation players for older teens and young adults.

It’s ironic given not too many election cycles ago some at city hall were pooh-poohing a suggestion by a council candidate named Ben Cantu who suggested in a letter to the editor the current golf course’s location could be better used for other purposes and a better replacement golf course could be developed in east Manteca.

The reaction was it was crazy to get rid of a perfectly good golf course and spend millions replacing it. The same goes for the city’s two honest-to-goodness baseball fields.

With limited resources, the is also the question of what should be pursued first — tennis courts or pickle ball courts. The fact doing both would cost almost $20 million and there a lot of other recreational wants that aren’t kissing cousins competing for limited funds makes that a legitimate question.

There are a lot of reasons why baseball boosters need to take the threat to Lincoln and Morenzone fields seriously now and not later.

If for no other reason to work together to provide more opportunities to offer baseball endeavors that expand on Little Leagues, competitive baseball and the city’s own Little Giants efforts.

To do nothing but complain opens the door wider for the baseball fields at either Marion Elliott or Morenzone, or both, to be repurposed.