CV athletes will pay to play

Starting this fall, the Central Valley School District will charge students fees to participate in sports.

The school board agreed at its meeting Monday night to institute participation fees to all Washington Interscholastic Activity Association sanctioned sports that don’t have a class connected with them. This means programs such as music, debate, DECA or drama will not have a fee.

At the high school level, the fee will be $60 for each sport the student wishes to play. The district will charge for the first two sports, and the third sport is free. Reduced-lunch students will be charged $30 per sport and those students who receive free lunches can participate for free.

At the middle school level, the fee will be $25 for each sport, $10 for students receiving reduced price lunch and free for those on the free-lunch program.

The district hopes to recoup around $125,000 from the fees to help pay for coaching staffs.

Some teachers and parents came to the meeting to dispute these fees, arguing that it isn’t fair to single out the athletes and not the other activities.

Don Ressa, a teacher at University High School and president of the coaches and activities association in the district, told the board that he understands why the district must charge the fees.

“We totally get it,” he said. “It’s something we have to do.”

But, Ressa argued, he questioned the fairness of only charging athletes and not students involved in other activities.

“It’s important that we’re fair and equitable,” he said.

He also argued that student athletes are connected with a class when they play high school sports – many of them take weight training as part of their sport.

Jennifer Stalwick, a teacher and coach at Central Valley, said the criteria the district used to be charged is misleading, arguing that some activities, such as debate are sanctioned by the WIAA. She also suggested another alternative.

She suggested that if everyone paid across the board the district could charge a smaller participation fee to recoup the funds.

Lori Wilson has been a parent with a student involved in the Central Valley High School band and has another child entering the program this fall.

She said that every year, parents in the band program pay around $300 to $750 for their children to participate.

“We already pay to play,” she said.

She said that as the funds to the marching band program get smaller and smaller, the CV band continues to flourish.

Other parents agreed that band parents spend a lot of money for their children to be involved, but so do athletes, who need specialty shoes, cleats and other equipment, as well as money for uniform fees and travel.

Many also mentioned that when the district suggested implementing fees during its many budget workshops this spring, the district offered to institute the fees to all activities, not just sports.

Superintendent Ben Small agreed with this argument, but said that nothing had been finalized when they discussed the fees at the summits. The district researched what other districts in the state do and found that only one district in the state had instituted fees across the board, but that endeavor hadn’t been successful.

Jean Marczynski, the executive director of secondary learning and teaching, answered questions from the board.

Debra Long wanted to know when the fees would be due for students involved in sports that cut players. Marczynski said the fees would be due after the cuts were made. No-cut sports’ fees would be due when the player joined.

Tom Dingus asked if the district could perform an audit at some point to pinpoint the fees for students in each sport and activity to see what they actually pay. The audit should include funds the sports and activities receive from parent groups, as well.

Small said implementing these fees for athletics is just the start – the program could expand in coming years to include other activities, but he hopes that the district won’t have to come back and ask the board to raise the fees in coming years.

The board voted unanimously to implement the fees, which will start in the 2010-’11 school year.