By Ward Peck

Editor

    When the Cape Elizabeth Town Council asked for the
opinion of school board members about a proposal to borrow $150,000
toward the cost of bleachers for the new high school turf field, they
got an earful.

    To a person, the seven-member school board expressed
dissatisfaction about being asked whether they supported a project they
knew little about even though it was being proposed on land under their
jurisdiction. Several board members described an incongruity of being
asked to support $150,000 for a concept, while facing very real cuts to
their proposed budget.

    Based upon the School Board’s reaction, the council
decided to drop the item from the bond proposal, which will get a
public hearing along with the school and town budget on Monday, May 7.

    School Board Finance Committee chair, Rebecca
Millett told the council the extent of her knowledge about the bleacher
proposal consisted of a single line on a proposed town bond referendum.
But she said she was willing to support the item if the council agreed
to fully fund the $18.9 million school budget the board proposed.

    The offer drew generous laughter that indicated the
prospect of the budget escaping without cuts. The Town Council Finance
Committee later recommended cutting the school budget increase from the
proposed 3.9 percent to 3 percent.

    “I’m not opposed in concept to bleachers,” said
School Board member Patricia Bingham. “My basic concern is we are
trying to get the most efficient budget and discussing $150,000 for
bleachers.”

    Board Member Kevin Sweeney echoed that sentiment.

    “We are breaking our backs trying to be fiscally
responsible and this is something Cape Elizabeth doesn’t need.”

    Other school board members saw in the bleacher
proposal the continuation of a pattern of misinformation and lack of
communication surrounding the yearlong effort to fund, construct and
operate the artificial turf field now under construction behind the
high school.

    Several members expressed confusion about whether a
contract had been signed. It had, apparently approved by the board,
which according to Millett was given to the board to review on the same
day they were being asked to approve it. Others took issue with a
decision to install permanent markings on the field for boy’s sports,
but not for girls’.

    For their part, town councilors expressed surprise
that school board members were in the dark about much of the project.
Several councilors said they assumed the school board was better
informed about the process.

    “It’s a surprise to us that it was a surprise to you,” Councilor Mary Ann Lynch said.

    “I’m very surprised you didn’t know anything about this,” Council Chair Paul McKenney said.

    School board members reached in the week after the
meeting expressed their support for the turf field, but said their
concerns related to the process in which it had come to fruition that
they said was rife with miscommunication.

    “What troubles me is a lack of formalized
communication,” Brigham said. She place the blame for the lack of
communication on the fact that there were several groups working hard
but with different responsibilities in the effort and that dynamic
allowed information to fall through the cracks.

    That effort was initiated by a private non-profit
group called “Kids’ Turf,” and began in earnest in the spring of 2006
with a proposal to construct a state of the art artificial turf field
in place of a rehabilitated natural field that was delayed indefinitely
when the sod failed to grow properly. The prior rehabilitation effort
included the installation of lights to allow games to be played at
night.

    Following a presentation in April 2006, the School
Board voted in support of the private fundraising effort. From the
beginning, the turf field effort envisioned the project would include
the field, bleachers, snack shack and a coaches’ box, with the project
split into two phases, the first phase being the installation of the
field. Bleachers and other facilities as well as establishing an
endowment fund for the eventual replacement of the playing surface
financed by a separate fundraising effort.

    Initially, the Kids’ Turf organization envisioned a
highly aggressive fundraising schedule. In the early months of the
fundraising effort, there was an expectation that funds for phase one
could be secured in time to have the field installed by the fall of
2006, which meant raising more than $600,000, securing a contract and
constructing the field in a matter of months.

    By June 2006, Kids’ Turf made a similar presentation
to the Town Council to elicit that body’s support. In the intervening
month between the two presentations problems and conflicts with lines
of authority were already being raised.

    In May 2006, Town Manager Michael McGovern sent an
email addressed to Michael Ott, the Cape Elizabeth resident
spearheading the Kids’ Turf fundraising effort. In that email, McGovern
wrote, “...I have been quite uncomfortable with the process on this
proposal.”

    McGovern described his uneasiness with, “a private
group...being put in the position of answering questions that are not
theirs to answer.”

    Those questions related to how the field would be
used, how often it would be used, by whom it would be used, how much it
would cost to operate and how would the operations be financed and who
would have the ability to negotiate naming rights.

    “Kids Turf should focus on their fundraising and
staff and policy makers need to focus on the many other questions that
are being raised,” McGovern wrote.

    To address these concerns, the town council formed
an ad hoc committee to steer the policy issues outlined by McGovern.
The committee included as voting members two town councilors and two
school board members to set policy and harmonize the fundraising
efforts with the needs of the school and town.

    With the formation of the ad hoc committee and the
support of the council and school board, there were four distinct
groups working on the turf field project, each with a different charge
and different interests to protect.

    By September 2006, it became clear the Kid’s Turf
had not raised enough money to install the field that year and
according to Ott at the time, the effort was in danger of collapsing
altogether. In that month, the council, based upon a recommendation by
McGovern used $50,000 in surplus funds to subsidize the replacement
endowment, reducing the need for Kids’ Turf to raise the funds.

    Around the same time Kids’ Turf was in negotiations
with the Hannaford Company to name the field after the company in
exchange for a $100,000 donation.

    While the town council did not adopt the agreement
for several months, several emails released by McGovern indicate the
offer was being considered as early as September and may have
conflicted with assurances fundraisers made to others who donated.

    On Sept. 14, Ott received an email from Jessie
Timberlake, who mentioned a donation made in the name of her brother
Ray Moulton.

    “How are we coming on naming the field...”Are we on
Hannaford or is there still a chance that it might be the ‘Rey Moulton
Field?’” Timberlake asked.

    In response, Ott told Timberlake, “If the field
becomes a turf field then I believe that it will be named after the
company you mention below. They have given a large sum of money to the
field, they have arranged for a new scoreboard, and six executives have
personally given in. In addition, the school campus was the family farm
in the 1800s.”

    On Nov. 29, Timberlake, along with several other
family members sent a more detailed email, claiming that Rey Moulton
had contributed $50,000 to the earlier effort to install lighting at
the field in exchange for the field being named after him shortly
before he died.

    In December, Timberlake sent a third email
summarizing a conversation with Ott in which he offered several other
naming possibilities that might carry Moulton’s name, including a
bronze plaque or granite bench. That same day, Ott sent an email to
McGovern and School Supt. Alan Hawkins for council approval for “future
naming rights at the site.”

    However in an email dated Feb. 28, 2007 related to a
separate issue, Councilor Anne Swift-Kayatta mentions the agreement
with Hannaford, states Hannaford “would be the exclusive name of the
Facility and no other party shall have the right to have their name
associated with any part of the Facility.”