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09/27/2016 04:45 PMPerhaps you’re a Youth Football team parent watching a game from a grass field’s sidelines and wondering why the team can’t play instead on the high school’s new artificial turf field. Or perhaps you’re a parent watching a high school field hockey game played on a grass field and wondering why it wasn’t prioritized for play on the turf field.
How are athletic fields and school facilities assigned? The Board of Education is now weighing adoption of a draft procedure that would make the reasons for those field assignment decisions perfectly clear.
The draft guidance was developed by a committee led by Operations, Facilities & Finance Director Julie Pendleton. Membership included representatives from the schools and stakeholder groups including the high school athletic director; two members from the Track, Turf, Tennis Project Committee; the assistant director of Old Saybrook Parks & Recreation; and leaders from the Touchdown Club, TICKS Lacrosse, the Old Saybrook Soccer Club, and the Old Saybrook Youth Football League.
The proposed community use of facilities procedure was unveiled at the Board of Education meeting earlier this month. The draft document incorporates a modified use request form, but also lists the decision criteria that the school district uses to assign spaces like fields and gymnasiums to teams and groups. If adopted by the Board of Education, the new facility and field use request procedure would replace the single-page form now in use.
“This comes from our desire as a district to be more transparent about the use and assignment of school facilities like athletic fields,” said Superintendent of Schools Jan Perruccio.
Perruccio said the BOE would discuss and could act to adopt the new draft procedure at its next meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 4.
Unlike some other shoreline towns, Old Saybrook has few regulation-size athletic fields, all located on public school grounds. As a result, there is a lot of competition for the use of those fields.
As Pendleton explained, in recent years, the school district has upgraded athletic and other school facilities. With a stronger interest by school and community groups to use these fields and facilities, it’s now time to formalize the process by which use of those spaces are assigned.
“Everyone would like to use the new turf field at the high school. Even now, we rotate existing varsity teams so all can get the chance to play games on the turf,” said Pendleton.
“Our dilemma is that we don’t have enough acreage in town to have enough fields for all of the older children’s athletic programs,” said Perruccio.
That requires the school district to prioritize use of the fields. This new procedure is intended to make this process clear.
The Breakdown
The draft procedure divides athletic field user groups into four categories. The group with the highest priority on field use, Group I, is Old Saybrook High School programs and other schools’ sporting activities in season. No team or program in Group I will pay a fee for use of a school field. High school programs in season are given the highest priority. Just behind the high school programs are Old Saybrook Middle School and Goodwin Elementary School programs and activities in season.
The next user group, Group II, still would not pay a fee to use a school field. In this group fall town clubs, teams, and groups in season and in which 100 percent of the members are Old Saybrook residents. An example of this type of group would a Department of Parks & Recreation sports team.
Group III includes clubs, teams, and groups in season that have 50 percent or more of their members as Old Saybrook residents, followed by those teams that provide “an exclusive feeder program for clubs and activities at the high school or middle school”; an example cited is the TICKS Lacrosse program. Groups and teams in Group III will pay a seasonal rate for the use of school fields.
Currently the school district charges teams that would fall in Group III an in-season rate of $1,000 for a field assignment for play of 12 to 15 games.
The final user category—and the one with the lowest priority for field assignment—are clubs, teams or groups with less than 50 percent Old Saybrook resident participation (a special fee schedule applies) and groups with a 100 percent Old Saybrook participation, but that seek a field assignment for an out-of-season sport or teams in an exclusive feeder program for which there is no local feeder program in Old Saybrook (a seasonal rate applies).
Also included in the new Community Use procedure for school fields are rules and regulations that users must follow. The rules prohibit from school fields all food, snacks, candy, and drinks (including sports drinks). Only water bottles are permitted on the fields. Also prohibited from the fields are sunflower seeds, chewing gum, pets, bikes, strollers, motorized vehicles of any kind, heels, chairs, tents or stages (unless authorized in advance), driving stakes, alcohol, and tobacco products.
The Board of Education will discuss and consider adoption of the draft procedure at the board’s next meeting, scheduled for Tuesday, Oct. 4. Once a field/school facilities use procedure and fee schedule is adopted by the BOE, Perruccio said it would be posted on the school district’s website www.oldsaybrook.k12.ct.us.