Serving Up a Conflict

The staid townspeople of Danbury, Conn., have diagnosed a cancer on their city's body politic. Formerly upstanding houses have degenerated, residents say, into raucous dens of illegal alcohol sales, gambling, even prostitution. "This used to be a nice place to live," laments schoolteacher Corlis Ward, who has been on the same quiet street for 30 years. "It's sad, but now I'm thinking about moving."

What's to blame for the moral rot? It's not drug dealing or gang wars. In Danbury the vice, according to local officials and longtime residents, is volleyball. Specifically, "ecuavolley," a form of the game so beloved in Ecuador that when Ecuadorians began migrating en masse to this small working-class New England city, they built backyard courts all over town, some big enough to accommodate up to 150 fans and players.

Neighbors complain that the games are overrunning residential areas--and that some organizers are running prostitution rings on the side. The Ecuadorians deny such charges, defending what they call harmless relaxation after a hard day's labor. "This is an overreaction about other issues," says Wilson Hernandez, a leader in the Ecuadorian community. "Volleyball is just the excuse."

As Hispanic immigrants spread beyond their strongholds in New York, California and Texas, summer sports--and the spectators that cluster around them--are turning up the heat on already simmering ethnic and class tensions, according to Princeton University sociologist Douglas Massey. "There are complaints in parks and fields all across America. Volleyball just happens to be the local version in Danbury," he says. "But if you know anything about Latin cultures, this is pretty innocent stuff. They bring their families. The men aren't getting totally drunk because, really, they are there for the sports."

Danbury's problems, of course, go deeper than that particular game. Over the past decade, the number of undocumented workers, many drawn to the city by landscaping or construction jobs in more affluent surrounding towns, has swelled to as much as 20% of its population. The influx, officials say, has also led to overstuffed apartment buildings, milling crowds of day laborers and legions of uninsured patients.

Volleyball, however, is the biggest sticking point. Mayor Mark Boughton tried--and failed--to get local cops deputized as federal immigration agents, but he's still urging the passage of an ordinance banning "repetitive outdoor group activities." Boughton insists that the ordinance is crafted broadly enough to prevent rowdy Wiffle-ball games, for example, and not just volleyball. "We're not singling out Ecuadorians or immigrants in general," he says. "It's the illegal immigration that is hurting our town."