Athletic facility changes hit a snag

CLOVERDALE -- Although work has begun on resurfacing the Cloverdale Schools track, Project Manager Dan Sulkoske announced that operations have hit a snag -- or two or three -- during the school board meeting on Monday.

"(Tennis Technology wasn't) even 20 percent into it and they contacted me," Sulkoske said. "There were more cracks, other than what we knew about, on the track."

Sulkoske explained that the previously known cracks run perpindicular to the track, and that Tennis Technology had planned to fix these with asphalt repair fabric. But the new cracks, which were uncovered when the old track rubber was removed, run parallel, and for these the company recommends pouring an asphalt overlay.

While Sulkoske and his team believe that asphalt repair fabric can be used to fix the parallel cracks, Tennis Technology is not sure the fabric will adhere to the new track rubber and will not honor its three-year warranty on those areas without the asphalt overlay.

Sulkoske says that no warranty may be a non-issue, as altogether those areas represent just 10 percent of the track. Still, he acquired a cost estimate for aspalt overlay from Wabash Valley Construction that came back at $45,500, which would bring total track resurfacing costs to $122,000 (still a "low-bidder").

Meanwhile, Sulkoske said that Tennis Technology is "receptive to moving forward with the fabric at no additional cost."

But removing the old track rubber uncovered more issues than just parallel cracks.

"The high jump (runway) is flat," Sulkoske said. "Your track is at a slope, so when they come together there's a place for water to sit. Someone had wedged that asphalt so that the water would drain to the side. When they pulled the sticky rubber up, it pulled the wedging up too."

Anticipating suspicions, Sulkoske emphasized, "The other thing you should know about Tennis Technology is that they don't do asphalt. So there's no motivation for them to say, 'Oh, well, oops. We took the rubber off and this condition exists; now you've got to pay us to do the asphalt."

Project Engineer Lori Young said that employing current staff to remove some of the accumulated sod would help, but that ultimately a drainage system -- either a catch basin at $15,000 or a trench drain at $20,000 -- would have to be installed.

"I think the trench drain would be better," Young said. "You'd have an inlet that would flow all the way around the track rather than a single location that the water has to flow to. It's more shallow, and you'd still have to do asphalt pavement repair with the other option."

The asphalt repair Young referred to was damage that heavy construction equipment might cause to the track should the school board opt for a catch basin or wait to address the long jump and pole vault runways, which need complete replacement, until after the track had been resurfaced.

"The track is meant for foot traffic and golf carts," Sulkoske said. "If we do something like that, you're bringing the heavy trucks on it and the concern is that it's going to do a lot more damage to that. The asphalt is almost certain to fail. You're going to address the long jump and pole vault and drainage first; you don't want to address them after you resurface the track."

Young also brought up the long-standing issue with the drainage at the north end of the football field.

"We've brought this up over and over again," Young said. "There is a drainage issue around the football field itself, and it is contributing to some of the issues that we're having. We had talked about putting a curb up there, but that's only creating a bigger problem somewhere else."

Rather than installing the curb as discussed in the May school board meeting, Young recommended installing another trench drain at an estimated cost of $75,000.

"We thought that was better than a curb because that's a narrow area," Young said, "so it'd be either a tripping hazard on the sidewalk or a driving hazard being right there next to the edge of the pavement."

Finally, Sulkoske announced once and for all that the drain at the north end of the football field is indeed working, but he and his team are unsure where it goes.

"Really what we're looking at is the pole vault, the long jump and potential drainage," Superintendent Greg Linton said. "So we may be looking at $30,000. My recommendation would be to get both (runways) fixed and probably go with the trench drain if (the drains) are within $5,000 of each other."

Linton asked Sulkoske to acquire quotes from S & T Construction for drain installation and said that he would get that information to the board.

"That way we're not holding anything up," Linton said. "We can probably have (the drain and runways) taken care of by the end of the week."

The board is set to vote on these issues in a future meeting that has not yet been scheduled.

In other developments:

-- Linton and several board members commented on the Clover Command's recent trip to Washington, D.C.

"The fact that not just the Cloverdale community and (Putnam and Owen) counties," Secretary Whitaker said, "the fact that people who didn't have kids involved stepped up to the plate and worked to raise money so that the kids could get the cost down to $250 per student and give them extra money for the meals going out and the meals coming back, we are truly blessed for the community that we live in."

-- Cloverdale High School Principal Sonny Stoltz introduced Karl Turk, the Jobs for America's Graduates (JAG) specialist and the high school volunteer assistant boys' basketball coach. Turk, best known for his time as a coach at West Oso High School in Texas, is expected to become the assistant basketball coach next month.

Principal Stoltz also introduced Jared Metzger, the new band director.

"We spent quite a bit of time interviewing," Cloverdale Middle School Principal Dawn Tucker said, "and we felt that Jared was our first choice. We feel very blessed to have him here."

-- The board approved a pay increase of $1,631 per year for a Cloverdale Middle School teacher selected to fill the new administrative assistant position created last month.

-- The board approved the Annual Financial Report, a Form 9 required by Indiana Code detailing budget, teacher pay scale, ECA reports and other general information. The public can get a copy of the report in the Cloverdale Schools administration building.

-- The board approved the bus driver employment agreements.

In other business:

-- The board approved the June claims at $746,267.06, an increase of $500,000 from May's claims and of nearly $400,000 from the March to June average. Linton explained the increase by saying that there were computer purchases and two additional Five-Star Technology monthly bills.

-- The board approved the following personnel report:

-- Employment: Jared Metzger ( high/middle school music instructor/band director); Hannah Ramey (elementary school music teacher, middle/high school choir teacher) and Tori Maldonado (middle school math teacher)

-- Hire: Tom Winders and Jagger Hamilton (high school varsity football assistant coaches)

-- Volunteer: Holly Watkins (middle school volunteer assistant cheer coach), Zach Waycott (high school volunteer assistant cross country coach) and Karl Turk (high school volunteer assistant boys' basketball coach).

The next Cloverdale School Board meeting is set for Aug. 9 at 7 p.m. in the administration building.