Artificial Turf Field Proposed For Rockville High School

VERNON, CT — The proposed education system budget for the next fiscal year includes plans to replace the natural grass field with artificial turf at the Rockville High School stadium while also re-doing the track and field surfaces.

The $54.8 million spending plan for the 2020-21 fiscal year was released Tuesday. That bottom line represents an increase of 1.85 percent, or $998,629.

If the budget were to be approved as-is by both the Vernon Board of Education and Town Council, construction on the new field could begin this summer, Superintendent of Schools Joseph Macary said.

It's a lease-to-own proposal, he said. The cost would be $187,188 per year for eight years as an operational expense and the town would purchase the field outright for one buck after that period, Macary said.

Third-party vendors will be bidding on the project and the lease would include two maintenance visits per year, he added.

Macary said the new field, typically used for lacrosse, soccer and football, would be Field Turf. The entire track and field area will be resurfaced and new pits will be constructed for the jumping events, he said.

The field, Macary said, will "not save us any money," but will add 30 to 35 days of usage to the complex.

Two glaring examples of the need happened recently, he said.

A wet spring wreaked havoc with the lacrosse schedule at RHS and that spilled into the youth lacrosse and soccer schedules as well with several grass fields in town determined to be unplayable on several occasions. The RHS baseball and softball teams could not take proper infield practice in the early part of the season because of wet fields and a turf field would be a safer altrnative to a parking lot, Macary said.

In the fall, the RHS football team lost out on two chances to host state playoff games because of snowy and wet surfaces at the stadium. Those contests had to be staged on the road — at Weaver High School in Hartford and at Simsbury High School.

See more on the school budget here.

The town council is slated to receive an update next week on a separate proposal to acquire land straddling Vernon and Ellington to be used as a shared athletic complex. The town is in the midst of the "due dilligence" period and is looking at soild tests, designs and sports club involvement.

The price tag for the project is not to exceed $1.193 million and the money is already in town coffers.

A town meeting approved the purchase, contingent on suitability, last spring.