Little League President Joe Coulter Seeks Volunteers, Field Help at Kiwanis Club

Joe Coulter, president of Los Alamos Little League, appealed to the Kiwanis Club of Los Alamos for volunteers and paid umpires to shore up field conditions and staffing ahead of the league’s spring start. Coulter made the request during a Kiwanis Club meeting on Feb. 3 at Trinity on the Hill.

“Coulter became the president in 2025.” There are 300 to 350 kids aged 4 to 16 enrolled. One hundred volunteers work as coaches and perform all the other myriad jobs required. The league is seeking paid umpires with baseball experience.

Coulter framed the league as both a community institution and a development pipeline. “Although baseball and softball are competitive sports, the focus of the league is to help build good human beings, promoting and teaching resiliency, teamwork, patience and perseverance, Coulter said.” He also told the club that “Los Alamos Little League is the least expensive youth sports league in the community,” and that “the league is healthy but looking to grow, hopefully back to pre-pandemic participation.”

The league traces its roots across generations. The local Little League was founded in 1952 and is the oldest league in New Mexico. In 2016, the league merged with the White Rock Little League to create a countywide league that competes with other teams in northern New Mexico.

Operations hinge on community facilities that are currently strained. Coulter warned that “The biggest challenge the organization is facing is the condition of the fields it rents from the County.” He added that the fields are “unsafe and unplayable due to the large number of gophers and gopher holes.” To address that immediate hazard, Coulter said “Volunteers are needed for two field gopher abatement events on March 7 and March 14.”

Those dates come just ahead of the scheduled season opener: the season starts this year on March 12. The countywide scope of the league means delays or lost practice time could ripple to school programs; Los Alamos has baseball and softball programs in the schools. This is important to the Little League as they act as a feeder to provide interested and more experienced players to the school teams, Coulter said.

For local residents, the ask is concrete: field work volunteers and experienced, paid umpires remain in short supply as the league prepares for play. The condition of County-rented fields, the timing of gopher abatement events, and the March 12 season start make this a near-term civic need for Los Alamos families and volunteers. How many volunteers step up for the March 7 and March 14 workdays will help determine whether the league can open safely and keep its momentum toward restoring pre-pandemic participation.