GAP, county teaming on baseball; Richardson Stadium redo sees delays

BY MELINDA J. OVERSTREET
GLASGOW NEWS 1
The Glasgow Athletics Program announced Tuesday evening that it is partnering with Barren County Parks & Recreation for its baseball program this year.
The discussion took place at a special meeting of the Glasgow Common Council committee that works with parks and recreation matters.
Cindy Green, a member of GAP’s board of directors, said that over the past few years, participation had decreased.
“Last year, we were able to serve over 100 players,” she said. “That consisted of T-ball and coach-pitch, but we really just haven’t had the numbers for our two live-arm divisions, because you need about 40, 42, you know, in each of those leagues. So a lot of our kids that age have already had to go over and participate in the Barren County league.”
In November, then-judge-executive-elect Jamie Bewley Byrd approached Corey Jackson, a GAP volunteer who was also present at Tuesday’s meeting, to see whether they were interested in combining the programs, so they had a board meeting and decided that’s what would be best for their baseball program.
“We’ve had a great relationship with Glasgow Parks and Rec … and wanted to let you all know that we appreciated you all letting us use the facilities, making everything available to us for practices and games and all that stuff,” Green said.
Eddie Furlong, director of the Glasgow Parks and Recreation Department, asked whether they know what that new partnership is going to look like.
Chris Jennings, the new director of the Barren County Parks and Recreation Department, said they want to have a similar relationship as to what the city had with GAP, with their using Beaver Creek Park and still employ the youths who worked concessions, but with the county. He said the coaches and other types of personnel would still have all the same opportunities.
He said he would like for Furlong, Byrd and Mayor Henry Royse and him to work out an agreement that would still allow the city to have the revenue it received by allowing GAP to use its city facilities and start building a new relationship between the city and county.
Councilman Patrick Gaunce asked, “Wouldn’t you see this long term – I mean nobody’s really wanted to do it – but don’t you see this happening with all sports, in some ways? … I mean, we should be better together.”
Green said that right now, the GAP football and basketball programs are really strong. They are able to use the gym at the HERO Center, which is owned by the Housing Authority of Glasgow, and had a total of nearly 200 participants with the girls and boys basketball program and more than 150 in football.
Gaunce said he just thought it could benefit the kids if everyone works together.
“I think this right here is a good start,” Jennings said, elaborating on some of the details he has in mind for making the transition as smooth as possible.
Royse said he was interested in making sure everyone agrees as to what the hierarchy of leadership is going to look like as the programs combine, “so that the interests of kids stays the top of the line.”
Jennings also announced the community meeting he has planned for 5 p.m. Wednesday on the third floor of the Barren County Government Center to introduce himself, discuss the GAP partnership with Barren County Youth Sports, address some rumors, some of which are incorrect, and have some questions-and-answers time.
The other primary agenda item was progress on the reconstruction of the fire-damaged Richardson Stadium at Gorin Park, and what sort of agreement there should be between the city and Glasgow Independent Schools, the high school and middle school teams from which use the ballfield for their home games.
On the latter of those two elements, GIS Superintendent Chad Muhlenkamp reminded them he had suggested something where the school system would maintain the fields and the city would maintain the structure. Tentative ideas were presented from Gaunce and Councilman Terry Bunnell with dollar figures they had in mind for GIS to pay to have exclusive rights as to the happenings there, as a type of lease agreement, because Muhlenkamp has said the Kentucky Department for Education will nix the expenditure of funds directly for construction or certain other types of improvements to facilities not owned by the school system. Bunnell’s suggestion was $5,000 annually with field maintenance still falling the school system, and Gaunce said he loves Glasgow schools, but he believed it should be higher. He had proposed $2,500 per month.
Ultimately, Furlong said he has a copy of the agreement they had for use of the field at American Legion Park they could use as a model that he would send Muhlenkamp.
Councilwoman Chasity Lowery who works at Glasgow Middle School, recused herself during that portion of the discussion.
She said that at the last meeting of what is technically called the Planning and Development Committee, but is also known as the Parks and Recreation Committee, they had discussed that three main things needed to be completed for the ballfield to be usable by the first scheduled game of the spring season: groundwork, backstop and netting installation, and lighting.
Furlong said that he has the engineering design for the lighting plan, but it will require review by the city building inspector, who is unavailable until Friday at the earliest.
The company that has worked on that plan that could actually do the installation of any necessary wiring, panel box, etc. is in the meantime working on a cost estimate for that part of it, and Furlong said he hopes to have that next week. Once the plan is approved and the project is on that company’s schedule, it should takes about four weeks to complete, Furlong said.
He said that when they advertised for bids on the backstop and netting, they received none, and then David Pedigo with Superior Fencing reached out to him, and they’ve been working together for about a month to try to get a quote worked up, and it was $56,135, not including installation, but the padding that’s incorporated with it has a 10- to 12-week wait, so even if they could order it right then, they’d been looking at a mid-April arrival.
The first game is scheduled for March 18, and the season goes through around mid-May.
A second, temporary option would be to use the existing block wall that remains, if it’s certified safe by the building inspector, and put up a 12-foot high chain-link fence behind it. That would cost $15,760 plus the cost of padding that doesn’t absolutely have to be there for this option. That prompted discussion of whether that fencing could then be reused elsewhere once they get the more permanent option in place and whether the early games in the season could be scheduled away, and Muhlenkamp said that runs into issues with bus and driver availability, among other things.
Eventually, after roughly 45 minutes of discussion, the group decided to move forward with the less expensive, more temporary fencing, as well as the electrical work, as long as it stayed below the threshold at which they would have to advertise for bids.