The up side was, of course, that the Montgomery County Council was happy to fund artificial turf football fields because they are "similar" in cost to natural grass football fields. Well, that's what Superintendent Jerry Weast presented to the County Council on February 19, 2008. The reality of the costs associated with artificial turf fields is quite different as Blair High School is now finding out.
Athletic Department faces financial trouble
Extensive debt due in part to turf field and low gate receipts
by Ava Wallace, Staff Writer
...Miller speculates that the department could possibly owe Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) roughly $30,000 in total to by the end of this school year...
..."The new turf field cost a minimum of $20,000..."
...But the athletic department also lost $11,500 out of its allocated funds from MCPS because of the field. According to Miller, schools with turf receive less money from the county because theoretically, the schools should no longer have to pay to maintain the field. "They justify giving us less money by saying that the field doesn't need much maintenance," he said...
More on this issue from the Parents' Coalition blog: What the Richard Montgomery High School Booster Club said about paying the annual maintenance fee on the artificial turf field at their school here.
This puts the Blair HS parents/guardians in "debt" $38,000 to Jerry Weast.
ReplyDeleteSince the school doesn't have any income the principal will have to figure out how to "tax" the parents to pay this bill.
The other Blair bill:
http://parentscoalitionmc.blogspot.com/2010/03/weast-bills-students-for-266-hours-of.html
Which Blair parents want to start writing checks?