Laura Young
ECB Publishing, Inc.
Jefferson County Schools grew its athletic program significantly during the 2022-23 school year, with considerably more students participating in more extracurricular sports than during the past several years. New uniforms were provided in many cases, and the damaged floor in the gym, which is used not only for extracurricular basketball but also for physical education classes and some assemblies, was resurfaced. In a year of team rebuilding, several sports performed well at the district level, and all coaches reported growth that their athletes can be proud of.
Rebuilding in terms of facilities has been a topic of interest as well, as a component of “restoring the roar” of Tiger sports, and early on there was talk of establishing athletic fields at the relatively new K-12 campus on David Road. In the meantime, teams continued using the old fields and selected rooms in the facility across town on Tiger Lane for various sports throughout the year and into the summer conditioning program for the varsity football team. The old facilities carry lots of memories for JCS alums, but for those trying to use them now, the site is showing its age and inadequacies.
Frustrations over the condition of the athletic facilities became a passionate topic at the June 12 meeting of the Jefferson County School Board. After the board had worked its way through a hefty agenda that included two planned presentations and 21 items to vote on, it was time for closing comments, including time for public comments on non-agenda items. Among the seven residents who stepped to the podium were Jamia Bradley, Stephanie Footman and Rachael Scott.
Jamia Bradley, vice president of the Jefferson County Athletic Booster Club, said in part, “The last time I was here I asked each one of you all to take a visit out to the field, the facility for the football. I have yet to see any one of you all out there, so I felt like I had to do my job and bring the pictures to you since you couldn't go see for yourself... I want you to take a look at those pictures and understand that our kids are not safe up there and something needs to be done asap.”
Bradley cited lack of air-conditioning, mold, rusted equipment and torn items held together with duct tape as evidence of the poor conditions that needed to be remedied.
Following Bradley's comments, District 1 Board Member and Chair Gladys Roann-Watson asked if this topic could be placed on the next agenda to be addressed.
Superintendent of Schools Eydie Tricquet replied, “Sure, but you realize it's a building that DOE is not necessarily letting us spend money on.”
Roann-Watson then asked, “What can be done if the kids are using it, and it has all this?... If the state won't let us spend money on it, what can we do?”
Tricquet said she would see what she could find out.
The board's attorney, Tommy Reeves, pointed out, “It's either safe or it's not safe. What I think you need to do is have an inspector or some other professional go in and look and give you a report. If it's not safe, you don't need to have students in there. If it's not safe, and you don't have any other money to do this, you may not be able to have sport programs in there.”
Tricquet responded, “I would then like to ask that football stop practicing until we know for sure that that facility is safe. You [Bradley] are saying that the conditions are not favorable for students. I don't know that for a fact. I have asked Mr. Woods to go over there and clean it and look at it and see. So right now I will close that building down until I can find out if it is safe or not.”
Stephanie Footman took a turn at the podium next, saying, in part, that she didn't think the football team should suffer because somebody's job wasn't done. She wondered, could the team practice on the fields even if the building was closed?
Rachael Scott, who identified herself as a concerned citizen, parent and member of the booster club, said in part, “My first issue is that recently I learned of the purchase by the school board for their new meeting furniture. I was flabbergasted to learn of the amount of taxpayer money that was spent... To even consider spending $58,000 on nonessential items is an insult to the taxpaying citizens of this county. When the median income according to the 2021 census report for Jefferson County is $53,000, it is a slap in the face of your constituency to spend more on rarely used furniture than most people make in one year.”
During the June 12 board meeting, Scott went on to comment on the material needs of the athletes, which she described and characterized as in a dire state.
“The athletic boosters should be raising funds to enhance the athletic programs, for example, sending the athletes to skills camps and extra support,” Scott added. “They should not be expected to help fund the basic needs of an athletic program. These are not issues that can be ignored or pushed off any more.”
When Scott's allowed three minutes for public comment ran out, Tammy Brookins continued reading Scott's prepared remarks, including the following: “For some kids, the desire to play sports is the only driving factor for them to keep their grades up. If you want them to improve academics, you have to give them a reason to want to.”
The structure of the school board meeting included time at the end not only for public comments on non-agenda items but also final comments from board members and the superintendent. When it came time for board members to give final comments, District 5 Board Member Magdalen “Mags” Flynt began.
“Thank you for coming to share your concern about the athletic area,” said Flynt. “I know that unfortunately DOE ties our hands about not wanting to put any money into that facility because they anticipate they want us to either build new facilities or create new facilities. So we have not been able to spend money there, which is unfortunate and wrong. I support all of your frustrations and disappointments and disgust over the whole building and facilities over there, and I agree, something needs to change... I'm excited to explore how we can come up with something that meets everyone's needs because I do agree that athletics are prime for our kids.”
District 3 Board Member Brenda Wirick said in her final comments on this issue, “I kind of feel there's a lot of communication tension... and I would like for us to find a way for us to come together.”
She made arrangements with Head Football Coach Lenorris Footman, who attended the meeting, to see the facility under discussion.
District 2 Board Member Willie Ann Dickey commented, “I would like to thank everyone for coming out... It would be a shame not to have the football supported.”
District 4 Board Member Bill Brumfield said that he felt he could answer nearly all of the questions the public had raised, and he added, “It's good that we're going to talk about this in the next week, and I would like to be able to address a lot of this. We want to help out.”
As Roann-Watson joined the round of comments, she asked for clarification about which parts of the facility were being discussed. Various voices from around the room said that the mold was only in the weight room, that the bathrooms are not an issue and that one area being described as unsafe had been designated as off limits to students and had been locked up earlier in the year.
Roann-Watson thanked the members of the public for coming out and bringing their passion to the meeting. She gave assurances that the issue would be an agenda item at the board's next meeting.
In making her closing comments, Superintendent Tricquet said, “Thank you all for coming out. Let me remind you all that I am here five days a week, and you are more than welcome to come and make an appointment with me and talk with me... I don't like being ambushed in a meeting. It's not productive... So, please remember: Come; I will make time for you; I will talk with you. You can call me. You can text me, and we can work through this. But just coming into a meeting when I'm not prepared with answers or solutions or know the issues is very frustrating to me.”
Tricquet went on to provide some explanation of the categorical nature of funding and how budgeting works for the school district.
“We are in the process of rebuilding our district. I don't have just a fund that I can go pull money from, equipment from, those kinds of things. So, whenever you presume that I'm just holding money back or I'm not utilizing what you think I'm utilizing money for, please come ask me, and I will go through the budget with you. There's not anything in there for extracurricular activities, for art, music, PE. Not of that is FTE funded. None of it. It's only the core curriculum. That is how we get funded. We choose to spread out our budget and provide these things because we know it's what's important for kids.”
Tricquet invited members of the public to go to the DOE website and look up the “red book” to learn more about the funding that the school is given and how it can be allocated.
“We did take some of our money that the state gave us and helped to purchase some new equipment, uniforms and things like that to help support our extracurricular activities, but I can only take a percentage of that...,” she said. “That facility out there, it is not under our inventory per se that we can spend money on – even if we had capital outlay – without special permission. They have asked, years ago. Whenever they built the new school, they were supposed to create a new facility our near the school. I don't know what happened, why it didn't happen.”
Tricquet said that some discussion began about a year ago with the county government about the prospect of doing a joint facility so that youth could begin to play sports younger than high school.
“Things are in the works,” she said, “but I am bound by the budget and allocations. So, when I am not able to spend something, or it looks like I am not necessarily in favor of something, that has nothing to do with whether I am or I am not. It's about how I am allocated and able to spend money.”
Board members began making plans to meet with Coach Footman individually to tour the facility before their next meeting.
That meeting, which will be a combination of a Workshop Board Meeting and a Special Board Meeting, is scheduled for Monday, June 26.
The Workshop Board Meeting begins at 5 p.m., and once the workshop agenda is concluded, the board will move immediately into its Special Board Meeting. Those interested in attending should note that this means the Special Board Meeting may begin before 6 p.m. All pubic meetings of the Jefferson County School Board are streamed live on the Facebook page for Jefferson County Schools K-12, and video recordings of past meetings are available there as well.