Mustangs Are Taking Stand For Full Field
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Del.icio.usIf we build it, they will come ...
And that is exactly what Kalaheo PCNC, coach Chris Mellor and the football team hope to see this Saturday when they kick off phase I of their “Field of Dreams” project - to have a regulation-size playing field for the Mustangs.
The group will meet at 11 a.m. on the field, where they welcome volunteers to help them move goal posts to get the plan under way.
“This is the third ‘incarnation’ of the football field,” said Meg Barth Gammon, who has been facilitator of the high school’s parent/community networking center for 13 years.“The problem is that the field, in its present form, isn’t long enough for football.Soccer games are played there, but not football.We now have permission to move the goal posts - not an easy task - so the field will be the right length for football games, I am told.
“Our previous principal, Jim Schlosser, worked with Kaneohe Ranch for 11 years and made great headway. But there’s lots more to be addressed.“Gammon explained that to become the “Field of Now,“they need fences, port-a-pot-ties, more parking, bleachers and a place to sell tickets.
The school cannot play night games, she added, until lights are in place. Future meetings will establish safety zones, erect perimeter fencing and ultimately culminate in having daytime football and track events.
State Sen.Jill Tokuda helped appropriate $300,000 in 2007 for the planning and design of the field. She reports, however,that because of a lapse last year, the money is no longer available to the school.
“There are a number of factors as to why this particular project couldn’t make its way up the ladder at the DOE,” Tokuda said,“but I know the school was working on ways so that I could go in and get the money back.”(Toward that end, Gammon, Tokuda and others have mounted a fund-raising effort, which begins Saturday as well.)
“From past experience, whenever you have a situation where state CIP dollars would be matched by community dollars, it makes it much easier for legislation to get behind,” Tokuda explained, adding that she has requested $750,000 for Kalaheo this year (SB 2953).
“I know it’s a top priority for Kalaheo High School, to get the field completed, and it would be a very positive thing to show that the community is very much behind this.
“This is something that the Kailua community wants - that this field would make Kalaheo a fully functioning high school - and it was a promise made over 30 years ago. It is a continued priority for me to make sure we complete the dream.”
To learn more about the project and how to help, call Gammon at 236-4230 or e-mail .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
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