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  • Matt Hamilton/ The Daily Citizen The Murray County Recreation Department baseball field is home to the Murray County High School team and also is used by the new North Murray High team, which was charged a $200-a-game fee. An anonymous donor has come up with the money to pay for North Murray’s participation.

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March 17, 2010

Murray high schools reach field use agreement

Rachel Brown Dalton Daily Citizen

CHATSWORTH — John Raley is not happy North Murray High School is being charged $200 per baseball game to play at Appalachian Community Bank Stadium, Murray County High School’s home field.

“We’re all Murray County citizens,” said Raley, whose son is a junior varsity Mountaineer baseball player. “These fields are on county soil. This is a recreation department (field) owned by the county.”

True, says Dean Donehoo, school system spokesman. However, the Murray County Dugout Club, a group of parents and boosters affiliated with MCHS, has an agreement with the county to maintain the field and incurs all associated expenses. After a few days of controversy over whether the $200 fee was justified, a donor agreed to cover the cost of the games to avoid contention, officials said. In response to an open records request for the name of the donor, Donehoo responded the school system doesn’t have any records containing the name of the donor, just a receipt showing the money was donated, but not who donated it.

Principals at both schools did not want to speak about the matter. North Murray Principal Maria Bradley confirmed the agreement between the two schools, but declined to give an opinion on it. MCHS Principal Gina Linder referred all questions to Donehoo.

North Murray has been borrowing the field that the MCHS varsity team uses to play ball while their own fields are under construction at the site of the new high school on Mount Carmel Church Road. The fields are scheduled to be complete by the end of the year.

MCHS athletic director Mitch Holcomb said many people have a misconception that the Indians are trying to squeeze money out of the Mountaineers. Yet North Murray received a $10,000 gift from Murray County High School’s athletic department at the beginning of the school year to help cover costs of purchasing the uniforms and equipment needed to begin the new school’s athletic programs. The money came from funds the athletic booster clubs raised during the year, officials said.

Holcomb said the Dugout Club spends more than $10,000 each year on maintaining the field, but he said he did not have exact figures. Club vice president Steve Shaw said he didn’t know the exact cost, but estimated it is several hundred dollars per game. Holcomb said having more games means more wear and tear on the field, and thus more expense for upkeep.

Raley said North Murray is tight on money, and being charged for use of a taxpayer-funded field only makes the situation more difficult. He said freshmen and sophomore players have typically been the ones who did the hands-on work to maintain the field. Costs for re-striping and cleanup should be minimal, he said, and North Murray baseball families even offered to do the work themselves.

“Our school is a really poor school right now,” Raley said. “We’re having to go out and collect money and do fundraisers and stuff just to pay for our uniforms.”

Murray County government leases the field to the school system for free, Sole Commissioner David Ridley said.

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