School Board Nixes Artificial Turf Idea as Too Expensive

The Plainfield Community Consolidated School District 202 board decided Tuesday night it would not install artificial turf at its four high schools, but it may be a wish list item for the future.

District administrators, at the direction of the school board, have been researching whether it would be more cost effective to install artificial turf fields than to maintain the current natural grass at each of the high school's stadiums.

The district found that while artificial turf would increase the usability of the stadiums for school-sponsored teams as well as community-based organizations, the turf would not be more cost-effective than natural grass.

Installing and maintaining turf would cost between $2.3 million to $4 million for four fields. Artificial turf lasts about 10 years before it has to be replaced.

On the other hand, installing new sod and replacing the irrigation system once every 10 years would cost between $53,000 and $76,000 per field. And maintaining all four natural grass fields over the course of 10 years is estimated to cost between $705,700 and $1.17 million.

The money to fund the installation of the artificial turf would have come from the district's construction fund, which has a balance of about $19.1 million now and is projected to have a balance of about $15.2 million at the end of the fiscal year.

These funds can be used to make capital improvement on the district's buildings. They cannot pay salaries.

District officials believe that over the course of six years, about $28.5 million will need to be spent to make repairs on the schools. Half of that estimate would be for repairing and replacing roofs and heating and air conditioning units.

School board President Stuart Bledsoe said that after hearing the financial figures, it is time to put the turf issue aside and continue to ensure that the fields are safe to play.

Board member Michael Kelly said artificial turf should be on the school board's radar screen during healthier economic times, but not when the board is trying to reduce a $6.7 million budget deficit.

"The reality is there are a lot of sports folks out there who would love to do artificial turf," Kelly said. But fiscally, it is not prudent to install turf now, he said.

In the 2008-09 school year, three games were moved to another field and four games were canceled when field conditions were deemed unplayable. In 2009-10, two freshmen football games were moved and a girl's varsity soccer game was cancelled due to field conditions.

This school year, three band practices were moved to an alternate field and four games were moved to opposing venues due to the stadium fields being unplayable, officials said.

Joel Murphy, the district's director of facilities, said maintenance will continue to be done to fertilize, aerate and test soil at the stadiums to make sure they are in the best possible playing conditions.

Next spring, the district plans to close one practice field per high school per year to strip it back to dirt and replant seed, Murphy said. This will give the grass time to recover from excessive use, he said.