New maintenance position approved
Under the premise of making youth sports available to everyone, Kris Myers, superintendent, presented his plan to create a scholarship program to the Bellefontaine Joint Recreation District (BJRD) board of trustees at their regular meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 2.
Myers started the discussion by asking for the board’s opinion about reducing the program fee to $20.
“Is that reasonable? Too much? I hope that’s not a hindering factor but,” he added, “it would mean they still have skin in the game.”
How they’ll implement the scholarships, though, is under consideration. The hope is to continue developing a plan and have it ready to go in January 2026.
Which sports to provide scholarships for was also discussed, with the thought that this wouldn’t include travel teams. Another suggestion was to take tackle football out of the equation. Myers, however, stated they generate extra revenue for the program by charging for admission to games, which is regulated by the league.
Much more was covered but, in the end, Myers emphasized their goal is to make sure every child who qualifies has the opportunity to participate.
“We’re not to January yet,” he said. “And I’m not sure what the right answer is.” Later, he concluded, “We’ll tweak it some more. We’ve got a little time.”
In other new business, Myers asked the board to approve adding a job position: parks recreation manager. This person would do specific maintenance work like painting the ballfields and other projects.
“A lot of this is taking things off my plate,” Myers admitted. “I want to make sure the board is good with that. We have work to be done coming out of our ears.”
He added one of their regular employees is close to retirement, plus they have someone in mind who would bring a degree in sports management to the job.
They board voted to approve the request.
Other board action:
- Myers will have the 2026 budget to the board in October but said it will be similar to 2025. Besides finishing the work on Harmon Park in the spring and starting the new pool construction in August, he doesn’t “predict a ton of capital projects next year.”
- The maintenance team has been fighting mower issues, leading Myers to acknowledge he “can’t figure out what our guys keep hitting.” With that in mind, he said he might be the only person who appreciates the dry weather because it allows them to move from mowing to other tasks.
- As part of United Way’s Community Care Day on Aug. 22, teams “did a little bit of everything” at Myeerah Nature Preserve and installed new signs at the Southview Park butterfly garden. The larger signs were used to cover the water tank.
- The pool is closed for 2025. “Making the decision to close when we did was way good with the weather we had last week,” Myers said.
In other pool-related news, the team has conducted initial interviews with construction supervision firms for the new pool and hopes to finalize their choice by mid-September. If all goes well, that firm will present their plan to the board in October. - The new playground equipment for Oakland Square Park isn’t expected to arrive until later this month. In the meantime, they anticipate having the concrete work done in the next few weeks.
- Quotes for the dredging work at Fred Carter Park, which was discussed at the August meeting, are being worked on. In the meantime, Myers said Terry Lunz has continued to clean out the park by removing more truckloads of brush.
The next Bellefontaine Joint Recreation District board of trustees meeting is 7 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 7.
