In L.A., playing ball in the streets is illegal. A city council member wants to change that

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Set us as preferred In 1936, there were no video games keeping children inside.Most households didn’t have televisions.

Amid concern that kids playing in the streets would get hit by cars, Los Angeles made it a misdemeanor to play baseball, basketball, soccer or any other ball game on a street or sidewalk.Nearly a century later, when kids spend half as much time outside as their parents did, City Councilmember Bob Blumenfield wants to cut the obscure law from the books.

Blumenfield, who authored a motion to start the process, called the law, along with its punishments of a $1,000 fine and up to six months in jail, “uncommonly silly.” It’s illegal for a parent to play catch on the sidewalk with a child in front of their home, said Blumenfield, who represents the southwest San Fernando Valley.Nor can a group of children kick a soccer ball on a quiet residential street without violating the law.The law also prohibits throwing a “stone, pellet, bullet, arrow or any other missile, in, over, across, along or upon any street or sidewalk or in any public park.” It prohibits playing ball games in public parks, except on designated courts or fields.“Let kids play,” said Olsen Ebright, who is on the Los Feliz Neighborhood Council.

“Why in God’s name would we be having the city try to curb playing soccer or throwing a football? “The benefits of exercising on public land, when done safely and under supervision, outweigh the risks of injury or property damage, such as a baseball going through a neighbor’s window, Ebright said.Blumenfield’s motion, introduced last August, was supported unanimously by the City Council in a January vote, for which only Blumenfield was absent, as well as by the Los Feliz Neighborhood Council.For it to move forward, the city attorney’s office needs to draft language codifying the c...