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Schools

Volunteers Raising Funds for Multi-Use Building at BHS Stadium

Locker rooms, concession stand would complete athletics fields, supports say.

The Brookfield High School Athletic Association (BHSAA) hopes to start construction within two years on a multi-purpose building near the school’s stadium field that would provide facilities for teams, spectators, referees and staff members.

“We have an outstanding athletic facility now and we want to have a building to add to that,” said BHSAA President Harry Shaker, who also serves on the Board of Education (BOE).

Brookfield High School (BHS) installed two synthetic athletic fields as part of the renovation project that began in 2006 and has recently resurfaced the all-weather track that a citizens group helped build in 1997.

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The school also added a new scoreboard last summer, which was sponsored by Iroquois Gas Transmission System, and another scoreboard, which will be sponsored by Pepsi, is about to be installed at the athletic complex behind the school on Long Meadow Hill Road.

“Right now we have our Booster Barn, which is behind the bleachers and really is bare bones,” Shaker said when asked about the need to install the 2,700-square-foot, two-level facility, which is to be built near the first turn of the outdoor track.

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“This would be the icing on the cake that would give us a state-of-the-art facility,” said Angelo DaCunha, a member of the seven-member Board of Directors for the BHSAA.

Shaker, who has coached youth baseball, basketball and soccer in Brookfield for decades, said the facility would include a concessions area, a locker room for visiting teams, a room for the referees, a working area for the school’s athletic trainer and men’s and ladies restrooms.

He said there also would be a terrace on the roof where spectators could watch games.

Shaker, who also is a former basketball coach at BHS, said the building would “cost well into six figures,” and that precise cost estimates should be available later this month.

He said the goal is to start construction in “18 to 24 months” with local contractors doing the work.

Shaker said the BHSAA is seeking corporate and foundation contributions to supplement the funding it is generating from the advertising banners that are posted on the fence that circles the all-weather track. He said it initially costs $500 to buy a banner.

“With these economic times it’s a big challenge, but it can be done,” DaCunha said.

He said the BOE also is making a commitment to the outdoor athletic facilities, since its long-range capital plan includes renovations to the lighting at the stadium field.

Art Colley, the school district’s business and technology director, serves as the treasurer of the BHSAA and BHS Athletic Director Chris McDougal also is a member of the Board of Directors.

The BHSAA also held a dinner dance in February, which will become an annual event, and plans to sell commemorative bricks for the walkways to the fields.

“Once we finish the building, we want it to be self-sustaining in funds from the concessions sales and other sources after it is established so we’re not using funds from the Board of Education or the town government,” Shaker said.

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