The purpose of this petition is to respectfully request that you consider allowing outdoor sports to resume along with the current Tier 1 easing of the COVID-19 restrictions on Oahu.

Athletes in the State of Hawaii have had their worlds turned upside down with the COVID-19 lockdowns at a major cost to their emotional and physical wellbeing. With youth sports, coaches are also reporting at alarming rates that many children on Oahu are losing interest in their respective sports and giving up on training on their own because they feel there is no point in doing so.

You have the power to bring some normalcy back into an athlete’s life and to support healthy child and adolescent development.

We believe a decision to resume outdoor sports due to low incidence of COVID-19 spread would be data driven. During the period between June and August 2020 when sports were resumed, there were very little cases of COVID-19 attributed to outdoor sports activities, even during the peak of the COVID-19 rise in overall cases on Oahu.

The reason for this was that outdoor sports organizations strictly followed the CDC guidelines and the City & County of Honolulu guidelines for sports to resume the first time, including coaches wearing masks at all times, athletes wearing masks at all times when not playing on the field, social distancing during water breaks and before and after practice, not shaking hands or giving high fives at any time, regular use of hand sanitizer by the players and coaches, and limited spectator presence (as specified per guidelines) on the fields. It is also well documented across the country that outdoor sports have very little transmission risks.

Unfortunately, residents on Oahu will have to live with COVID-19 for what could be another year or two. We cannot keep the athlete’s physical & psychological health suspended in the meantime. Please consider the long-lasting effects of your decision on the mental and physical wellbeing of all athletes and allow outdoor sports to resume as part of the current Tier 1 easing of restrictions.

Mahalo!