Gold Hill is still recovering from New Year’s Eve weekend incidents that included the reported theft of a city vehicle and a fire at the city sports park that destroyed a shed and heavily damaged equipment used by Little Leaguers.

As the town of just over 1,300 was settling in for a three-day weekend, things would prove to be anything but quiet.

The utility truck was taken from the city’s water treatment plant, off Highway 234, between last Saturday night and last Sunday morning. City officials, who discovered the theft just after 8 a.m. last Sunday, said the would-be thief, or thieves, cut a hole in the cyclone fence at the plant and then cut a lock on the facility’s gate. 

The truck was found — with city logos covered by spray paint — on Table Rock Road in Medford.

The fire at the ball field was reported just after 6:25 p.m. Sunday at the Little League fields by a neighbor of the park. A storage shed containing the majority of the equipment for the Gold Valley Little League, which leases the fields from the city, was a total loss.

Aaron Lewis, public information officer for the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office, confirmed both cases were reported New Year’s Eve and are still under investigation.

Megan Droesch, president of the Gold Valley Little League, said the league lost a majority of its equipment, stored inside the 10-foot-by-20-foot storage shed, which was owned by the city.

“We had equipment, practice gear, our pitching machines — baseball and a softball pitching machines — items for chalking the fields and prepping the field,” Droesch said. “We had rakes, trash cans, umpire equipment, two sets of bases, controls for our scoreboard — basically everything for our softball field.”

Droesch said the fields are no stranger to vandalism and theft. Tucked on the outskirts of town off Highway 234 with poor lighting, the field has struggled with security for years. This past spring, a concession stand was vandalized, and a number of items were stolen.

Droesch said the league’s insurance might cover part of the lost equipment but not the storage shed.

“We provide our own insurance for our gear, and we buy additional crime and theft policies because we are subject to crime and theft at our fields, because of our location,” she said.

“I don’t know what we’ll do for a shed. We’re just hoping the gear is covered. This was definitely arson. It wasn’t that we left something plugged in. The fire department was pretty confident it was intentionally set.”

Droesch said the league is gearing up for the season — registration opened Jan. 1, and the season starts in February.

City Manager Lily Morgan acknowledged it had been a busy holiday weekend. A former state senator who marked her first official month as city manager this week, Morgan said the city was awaiting additional information from law enforcement on both incidents.

“As far as the stolen truck, I am grateful for Jackson County and Medford police for recovering it,” Morgan said, noting that city officials discovered marijuana, a torch and pipe inside the truck after its return.

Morgan said an additional fire occurred over the holiday weekend, in a trash can at the Odd Fellows lodge off Fourth Avenue.

“Today is my one-month anniversary of working with the city, so it’s definitely been eventful,” Morgan said Thursday.

Anyone with information on either case is asked to contact the sheriff’s office at 541-774-6800 and refer to case numbers 23-7359 (stolen truck case) or 23-7390 (sports park fire).

For updates from the Little League on replacement of gear or equipment, check the league Facebook page at  https://www.facebook.com/goldvalleylittleleague/

or send an email to goldvalleylittleleague@gmail.com

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to clarify that the city vehicle was reportedly stolen from the Gold Hill water treatment plant.