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Frontier BOE discusses bleachers

NEW MATAMORAS — The Frontier Local School District continues to struggle with a solution to replacing or renovating its athletic field bleachers and concession stand, which have suffered water damage over the years.

At a board of education meeting Monday night, community members Rachel and Gary DePuy told the board they have become concerned about the amount of time left to raise the $20,000 needed to somehow replace the concession stand. At last month’s meeting, members of the athletic booster club said they would examine some potential solutions.

Rachel DePuy, who is a member of the Peewee football group, said a number of options are under consideration, including putting a permanent stand on raised ground and using ramps as entrance ways. She also said building a structure on a mobile home frame, to make it moveable, might be worth considering.

Superintendent Brian Rentsch said no results came in for a request for bids to sandblast the bleachers, but he’ll continue pursuing an estimate. Rentsch said TQI of Beverly, which specializes in bleacher installation, service, maintenance and inspection, told him a completely new set of stands would cost $250,000. The district has budgeted $75,000 and is planning to remove the seats, have them sandblasted and refinished, and replace the structural steel.

Rentsch suggested that Danny Riggs, the district’s maintenance supervisor, be recruited to become point person on the project.

Rentsch also notified the board that the district had been invited by the Washington County Behavioral Health Board to seek grants involving projects intended to help children and their families and to enhance teachers’ skills.

“We are working toward several grants with the Washington County superintendents,” Rentsch told the board. “The behavioral health board told us they’re really interested in pursuing something. L&P Services (Life and Purpose Behavioral Health) is available to train teachers about children with behavioral problems … part of the grant proposals would enable us to build bridges between families and schools.”

Another grant would provide teacher training in the PAX game, a technique for allowing children to discover the rewards of self-managment to create a peaceful, productive and respectful learning environment in the classroom.

Rentsch also requested board approval for a school safety resolution to be sent to the president, Congress, the governor and the Ohio General Assembly calling for improved access to mental health and substance abuse treatment, better financing to allow building safety measures for schools, including infrastructure, school resources officers and other measures “to protect students and staff from an active shooter on school grounds, and training for school employees and enhanced coordination with law enforcement agencies and first responders.

The resolution was drafted in response to the Florida school shootings and others before it, and Rentsch said the language was a modified version of a national draft drawn up by school superintendents. The resolution passed unanimously.

The board agreed to meet next at 7 p.m. April 9 at Frontier Middle and High School.

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