PCHS Baseball Coach to Board of Education: Multiple Problems at Baseball and softball Fields

Randy Irvine, the Baseball coach at Pocahontas County High School came before the Board of Education on April 23^rd to talk about multiple field and facility problems at both the Baseball and Softball fields at the school due to lack of funding for the programs. He cited the poor condition of the stands, the lack of a drainage system for the fields, lack of restroom facilities as well as a lack of funding for fresh dirt for the playing fields. Irvine said the kids on his team had to buy their own uniforms and he had spent  about $600.00 of his own money to put enough fresh dirt on the field to make it playable. He also said that the Board has spent enough money on portable toilet rentals over the last few years to have built real restrooms with flush toilets, especially since the plumbing into the schools sewer system already exists.  He has received an estimated cost of adding a drainage system for the field of $1,300.00 but there is no money for that. Irvine said that baseball could actually pay for itself if the facility improvements made it attractive for spectators to attend games. School Principal Joe Riley added that they have had for many years about $2,000.00 set aside for building bathrooms at the baseball field but that would only be enough to build either a men’s room or a women’s room, not both.

PCHS Athletic Director, Kristy Tritapoe also addressed the Board about sports related issues at the high school. She announced that an effort is underway to return Golf to the schools athletic programs, and they have posted a position for a volunteer golf Coach. Kristy also said that there has been a number of people pushing to return a Cross Country team to the school this coming fall, and they are looking at that.

School Superintendent Terrence Beam reported that they are working on a policy to require timely requests for field trips be made to the Board of Education in order to avoid the number of retroactive approvals of these trips by the Board of Education.

He also announced that the Super Scholar Awards will be held on May 14^th and the winners of the “Golden Horseshoe”  this year are Hunter Curren from Green Bank elementary-Middle School and   Aidan Madison from Marlinton Middle School. Mr. Beam also announced that the FFA team placed first in the state competitions while the 4H team also placed high in its state competitions. In addition, Beam announced the results of the Regional Social Studies Fair which will soon be available on our website

In financial matters, the Board examined then approved payment of $65,784.97 for outstanding vender bills and $163,145.90 in Government Purchasing Card charges. They also examined and approved a Summary Schedule of Revenues and Expenses for March, 2018. The bottom line there is that while both revenues and expenses were less than for March of 2017, the monthly revenues did exceed the expenditures by about $105,000.

In other actions, the Board approved new Math text books for the coming school year, approved the 2018-2019 school calendar and completed the Superintendent’s annual performance evaluation.

During the Matters of the Board portion of the meeting, Board Member Steve Tritapoe acknowledged that his “time as a Board Member is winding down” since he is not running for re-election. Joe Walker said that deeper cuts of the budget need to be made in order to better fund Career and Technical Education programs and add new ones such as a Parks and Recs CTE program which is very popular in other rural WV school districts, as well as to add to the available Advanced Placement Courses.