By Nick Mattera
Niagara Gazette
LEWISTON —
The Town of Lewiston has plans to add a much-needed irrigation line, as well as maintain Lewiston-Porter School District’s athletic fields in exchange for the community use of the schools newly refurbished facilities.
Town of Lewiston Supervisor Steven Reiter said the shared services agreement something he is extremely excited about.
“The way I look at it is Lew-Port has built four nice fields that sit idle all summer long and could use the required maintenance,” Reiter said. “It saves the town anywhere from $50,00 to $90,000, which is what we would spend on building a new field and allows them to get some benefits from us in the maintenance department. It’s just a great partnership.”
The town will provide everyday maintenance on the facilities ranging from mowing the grass, trimming and weeding of the fields. Grooming and raking to prevent compaction and seed germination, equipment maintenance to portions of the field damaged due to playing conditions or wear will be completed daily.
Along with daily measures, the town will conduct seasonal maintenance including soil testing and fertilization on a regular schedule. There will be summer and fall seeding conducted at Lew-Port to encourage turf growth and all athletic fields will be aerated.
“The town will take over what our ground crew was normally doing, but on a more regular basis and will make our fields much better,” Roser said. “It’s a great investment. We want to have that relationship with our town and with our village that we can work together and use facilities and share each others services because its all tax dollars.”
Roser said most importantly, the town will work with the district on a much-needed water source for the athletic fields. The agreement which Reiter confirmed will include the district purchasing the required equipment, water pipes, hoses and other irrigation related items and the town performing the work.
“This is just another example of how we can help each other out and save taxpayer money,” Roser said. “ It’s just a matter of doing what is best for not just kids, but the community. If everyone could come to work with that philosophy, this community will see a better school, a better community, better facilities. We have to remember we are all in this together.”
The town is expected to use the baseball fields for a series of summer tournaments a well as for travel league baseball games.
“The town is very active in supporting a number of baseball tournaments and events and this partnership really helps us out,” Reiter said. “This will make the facilities at Lew-Port a true community complex.”
Roser said all of the facilities on school district property including tennis courts, the soccer and football fields are available for community use.
At Tuesday’s school board meeting, the district earmarked $54,535, which is a combination of leftover capital improvement money and a $10,000 donation from a local businessman to construct what Roser called much-needed football and soccer scoreboards at the athletic fields. He said the boards will be up and running for opening day this fall.
