Warren Hills Regional School District voters will decide on $5.5 million for new athletic facilities in referendum

Voters will decide Tuesday whether the Warren Hills Regional School District needs new athletic facilities.

It is something Joe Hevern has been pushing for since 1976, when he began a five-year stint as the Warren Hills Regional High School football coach.

"Let's be serious about this," the Washington Township resident, now 70 and a financial consultant, recalled telling administrators when he was hired. The football stadium "dates back to the 1930s, the lighting is poor and the field is atrocious."

Hevern and 11 district residents, including some of his former players, formed the group Friends of the Blue Streaks Athletics about six months ago not knowing of the board's referendum plans.

Passage of the $5.5 million project replacing the aging facilities soon became the group's most immediate goal, Hevern said. The group has pooled its own money for signs and promotional materials it hands out at school events.

Cost $60 a year per capita

The project is projected to cost taxpayers $60 a year. Supporters say because a 20-year bond from a previous high school renovation, approved in 1989 is soon completed, taxes would remain level.

Backers of the project also say there is a dire need to replace the facilities, which no longer host some sports such as track due to disrepair and dangerous conditions. The new facilities are proposed to be safer, open to all school sports and the public.

Opponents have said taxes would be reduced by about $60 per year without the project and that everything proposed need not be done immediately.

Concern has also surfaced about the proposed turf field because some such fields have been linked to lead poisoning. Hevern said this field would be made out of safe materials.

Voters twice rejected a similar proposal in 2004, first as a second question on a school repairs referendum and again as its own question.

"We can't keep postponing this indefinitely," said Superintendent Pete Merluzzi, describing the effect of rising construction costs.

Students benefit this year from previous projects

The question to voters comes just as the last major project -- renovations and additions to the district's middle and high school approved four years ago -- are being completed. That project added 41,000 square feet of new space to the high school and renovated 60,000 square feet of the building to the tune of $34 million.

Freshmen and some sophomores attended classes in the district offices while much of the work was completed. All grades this year are back in the high school and work is expected to be completed by the end of the year, Merluzzi said.

That 20-year bond is being paid off and the athletic fields project would be bonded over 15 years, Merluzzi said.

"I know we did well planning the additions to the middle school and high school, and I think we could do the same for this project if we're given a chance," Merluzzi said.