New Berkshire Stadium to be Built on KSU – Geauga Campus

May 13, 2021 by Ann Wishart

The final location of the Berkshire Schools stadium was announced at the end of the school board’s hour-long May 10 meeting.

After a comprehensive review of two possible sites, the board has decided to build the stadium and a small field house east of the all-grade school under construction on the Kent State University – Geauga campus.

“This decision is the result of the board of education working with the administration,” said Superintendent John Stoddard, adding they had considered many options.

In addition, he said the stadium will be named after the Great Lakes Cheese Stadium for the company headquarters in Troy Township. Great Lakes Cheese and its owners, the Epprecht family, donated $2 million to the stadium fundraising campaign.

On April 1, 2021, Stoddard said the stadium would be built on about 60 acres the district owns on Claridon-Troy Road across from the Geauga County Fairgrounds.

Residents objected to having the stadium so far away from the school and some lobbied for the athletic complex to be built on land offered to the district by resident John Bonner east of the KSU-Geauga campus.

Bonner stipulated the district would have to build a road through his property on Burton Windsor Road to the school campus, a condition the board rejected on the grounds they could not build a road on private property. Construction of the road was estimated at more than $400,000.

Stoddard said on Tuesday the entire complex will be situated on land the school is leasing from KSU. The field house will include locker rooms, restrooms, a concession stand and a training room and cost an estimated $300,000. A separate ticket booth will cost about $150,000. The stadium is estimated to cost about $3 million.

The drawing presented April 1 showed baseball and softball diamonds located east of the new school, but Monday Stoddard said those fields will stay in their current location at Burton Elementary School until funding for new fields is raised.

Stoddard to Negotiate Bus Deal

In other business, the board voted unanimously to authorize Stoddard to negotiate with First Student Inc. for the transportation of Berkshire students when the new school opens in 2022.

Stoddard sent an email to the families of Berkshire students on April 6 explaining why the board has chosen to outsource the transportation services.

“It is the fiduciary responsibility of the board and administration to look into as many ways as possible to run the district more efficiently.  That is what we are currently doing with transportation,” the email said. “Transportation management has many layers and managing transportation is not what school administrators are trained for.

“Our goal is to find a professional organization that understands how to manage a transportation department as well as provide training and technology that will help our drivers grow as professionals.”

“We were clear in our proposal request that we want to retain all of our drivers, and we want them to be taken care of.  The only proposal that we are considering is the one that increases drivers’ compensation and allows Berkshire drivers to remain Berkshire drivers until they retire.”

Wages for people with commercial driver’s licenses will be a minimum of $20 an hour with a minimum five-hour-a-day shift. Drivers who already make $20 an hour or more will receive a 2% raise, Stoddard said in the email.

Wages for drivers without CDLs will start at $16 an hour and those who make that wage already will receive 2% raises, Stoddard said.

Sign on bonuses of $2,000 and $1,500 for CDL and non-CDL drivers, respectively, will be offered, he said, adding seniority will be maintained, unemployment benefits for school breaks will be provided and all Berkshire drivers will be retained if they so wish.

Monday, he reiterated the email during the meeting and said one of the prime focuses of the negotiations will be to get bus drivers better health insurance than First Student Inc. has proposed.

If that is not possible, there will be no contract, Stoddard said.

He answered questions from concerned residents for half an hour, assuring them the district wants to be fair to bus drivers and has done due diligence in researching the company’s track record.

The district will save about $45,000 per year by contracting with First Student Inc., he said.

Tuesday, he said the district spends about $1.5 million per year on its transportation department.

District Treasurer Beth McCaffrey said outsourcing the transportation service offers good operational efficiency.

“Just the ability to have someone who understands the transportation business, can manage the transportation department and provide training for drivers and economies of scale … makes this something we feel will be beneficial to the district and to the drivers,” Stoddard said.

Current drivers will be retained and new drivers will be thoroughly vetted by First Student Inc., he said.

The same bus drivers will run the same routes every day unless a substitute driver is needed temporarily, he said

The district also thoroughly researched having all grades of students ride the buses together in a “one tier” plan and did not find any negative consequences, he said.

All students will be on the same time schedule at the new school and resources for students will be more readily available, Stoddard said.

First Student Inc. will provide technology, including an app that tells parents when their children will be picked up and dropped off. The company also has GPS tracking devices on all the buses, Stoddard said.

Berkshire will continue to own the buses and maintenance will be coordinated with the school, First Student Inc. and Preston Superstore in Burton, Stoddard said.