Maitland City Council will this week consider launching a statewide push for harsher penalties against people who deliberately drive vehicles onto sporting fields.
Councillor Mitchell Griffin will move a notice of motion at Tuesday's ordinary meeting to take the issue to councils across the state.
The motion, slated to be put to the August 18 meeting, would seek stronger legislative penalties for people who use motor vehicles or motorcycles to vandalise sporting fields and recreation venues.
It would also seek dedicated grant funding to help councils pay for infrastructure that reduces the risk of such attacks happening in the first place.
Cr Griffin said councils across NSW are grappling with a rise in deliberate vandalism involving vehicles being driven onto playing surfaces
"These incidents cause extensive damage to playing surfaces, irrigation systems, fencing and other infrastructure, often rendering facilities unusable for weeks or months," Cr Griffin's motion states.
The financial burden of repairs, the motion notes, falls "almost entirely" on councils and ratepayers, with bills that can run into the tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars, while clubs are left to cancel training, competition and community events.
While such offences can be prosecuted, the motion argues the available penalties fail to reflect the scale of the financial loss and community disruption caused.
"Stronger penalties would send a clear message that the intentional destruction of public sporting facilities is a serious offence that affects entire communities," the motion states.
Prevention is treated as equally important in the motion.
Many councils have identified measures such as protective bollards, vehicle barriers, improved fencing, access controls, surveillance cameras and other security infrastructure as effective deterrents.
"However, the cost of installing these measures can be substantial and often competes against other essential community infrastructure priorities," Cr Griffin's motion said.
Maitland's director city services Jason Linnane backed the push for tougher penalties in principle, but flagged that enforcement of driving offences, including those involving e-bikes, sits with NSW Police rather than council rangers.
Mr Linnane also noted that CCTV footage does not always lead to an offender being identified or successfully prosecuted.
Council staff said they considered prevention the most effective approach, and supported advocacy for dedicated state funding to install bollards, barriers and gates at sporting grounds.
If passed, the motion would go forward as Maitland's submission to this year's Local Government NSW conference, where councils from across the state vote on which issues the peak body should prioritise in its advocacy to the NSW government over the coming year.
Maitland's motion lands amid a string of vehicle-related vandalism incidents at sporting grounds reported across the Hunter region in recent months.
In the Upper Hunter, an allegedly stolen vehicle was driven through locked gates and caused extensive damage to several ovals and parks in Scone, forcing council crews and volunteers into a scramble to have grounds ready for weekend sport.
In Newcastle, Hamilton Azzurri Football Club called on the City of Newcastle to do more to protect Smith Park after a car was driven onto one of its soccer fields, leaving deep tyre tracks from donuts that were expected to put the ground out of action for the rest of the season.
It was one of several incidents , also including damage at Lambton's Kentish Oval and the theft of cables from electric vehicle chargers at Hamilton and No. 2 Sportsground, that prompted the City of Newcastle to publicly express its frustration, while noting the scale of its network of more than 150 sports fields and 250 parks makes it unrealistic to prevent every act of vandalism.
Wallsend MP Sonia Hornery has separately launched a petition calling on the City of Newcastle to install fencing and CCTV at its sporting grounds, arguing volunteers are too often left to clean up after vandals.
Maitland's own move follows council's decision to fence future playgrounds for safety reasons, and comes as it separately progresses drainage and irrigation upgrades at the Lochinvar and Morpeth sports complexes.
