School Board Agrees to Explore Turf Options With Council

The has agreed to work together with the in considering the option of installing turf on the field of

Council President Jim Freda, who has been a l in Kinnelon, approached the board Thursday night to ask if they would be interested in looking into the feasibility of turf at the high school. Freda has brought up of the existing borough fields to the council several times and during a meeting with representatives of the New Jersey Highlands Council in November, Freda asked which Kinnelon fields would be appropriate for turf. Freda said the Highlands representatives told him and Mayor Bob Collins the only field that would likely receive approval from the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection is the field at the (KRP), however, there would still need to be an approval process involved.

In an affort to avoid the environmental approval process, both Freda and the mayor have said that installing a turf field at Kinnelon High School would be a good option.

"There's a field need here, it's just a matter of finding a new location," Collins said at the Dec. 8 council meeting.

At that same council meeting, Freda said he was concerned that the school board would not be interested in pursuing turf because they would likely have to ask voters whether they want the turf project in a referendum alongside their budget vote in the spring. However, the board did not seem concerned at Thursday's meeting, although Board Vice President Keith Dama said the topic and its details need to be explored further on the committee level.

Freda presented the concept as a shared services agreement between the borough and the school district and said the turf field could be shared between high school athletic teams and borough recreational teams. Both entities would work together to determine who has field time when.

"The whole idea of a shared services agreement is already worked out," Superintendent James Opiekun said, as the borough and school district had previously discussed the topic in 2005 when a referendum question for a turf field installation was voted on. The question, which asked if the district should undertake a $906,250 artificial turf field project, was rejected by 1,171 votes to 599 votes, according to the Suburban Trends.

Opiekun said he thinks it is important that the two entities begin meeting soon with the Facilities and Coordinating Committees to discuss the topic. He also thinks an engineer should be involved.

Freda said a local contractor offered to help pay for the costs of engineering for the project and recommended an engineer who specializes in turf fields and is a Kinnelon High School graduate to work on the project.

Freda said he wanted to approach the board now about the turf field idea because he knew the board is also considering

"There's no reason why the track development can't go along at the same time," Opiekun said.

Dama said combining the two projects at the same time could also open the school district up to be able to apply for grant funding.