TALLAHASSEE — The state Legislature is taking another crack at encouraging school boards to open their sports and recreational facilities to the general public.
Similar to last year, bills filed in the state House and Senate would lean on school boards to enter joint-use agreements with local governments or develop their own policies so residents could use the fields and other equipment off hours.
The legislation (HB 277) argues better access would help “reduce the impact of obesity on personal health and health care expenditures.” And it points out the facilities — including gyms, fields, tracks, courts and playgrounds — are taxpayer-funded.
“We want to give them every opportunity to make those facilities open, accessible and available to the communities, to the kids, to the families in those communities that pay for those schools,” said the bill’s sponsor, state Rep. Ross Spano, R-Dover.
Spano said the bill would encourage school boards to open up facilities, not force them. He said it also would give them freedom to choose to enter joint-use agreements with local governments and community groups or offer open access at the school facilities off hours.
“I want to stress again this is discretionary,” Spano said.
The bill would limit school boards’ liability during off-hours use. The school boards wouldn’t be liable for personal injury, property damage or death except in cases of gross negligence or intentional misconduct by the school board, according to the legislation. While not mandated in the bill, school boards could employ joint-use agreements to require groups to carry insurance when they used the facilities, Spano said.
“If their attorney and their local school board … is worth their weight in salt, they’re going to make absolutely darn sure that joint-use agreement has an insurance provision and an indemnification provision,” he said.
The bill passed through the House Education Committee on Thursday.
The House has passed similar bills the last two years, but the Senate has shown less interest. A similar bill last year would have required the state education department to create a model joint-use agreement, but that language has been removed in hopes of appeasing the Senate.
In 2013, the House bill passed 114-3 vote, including a favorable vote from state Rep. Jimmy Patronis, R-Panama City. The Senate, however, never gave the bill a committee hearing.
The landscape is shaping up similarly this year. The bill effortlessly cleared three House committees, picking up just one “no” vote in the process, and is on its way to the House floor when the session starts this week. The Senate version of the legislation (SB 396), meanwhile, has had its first hearing.
Bay County
Scott Clemo has worked for years to get schools to share their fields with the public, but with no success.
He serves on Bay County’s parks advisory board, which has not ironed out any joint-use agreements to open up school facilities. He said the primary target is Deane Bozeman School in northern Bay County.
Clemo said Bozeman makes the most sense because the county is growing to the north and the unincorporated areas of the county need open recreational facilities. He said it would be a good interim solution until a park is built there.
“I think it’s a monument to bureaucracy when perfectly good facilities are available in the evenings, on the weekends and during the summer months, and not used by one branch of government, (but) that they can’t be available to other branches of government,” he said.
Meanwhile, Panama City has nearly ironed out an agreement with the Bay District Schools to open up facilities at two locations, Rosenwald High School and Jinks Middle School, said Keith Baker, the city’s director of leisure services.
The plan would allow open public access to the facilities for city-organized league events, such as soccer or football, Baker said.
He’s pleased by the progress and thought back to his youth, when neighborhood kids would use the local school playground for fun. Now, padlocks on gates prevent children from getting in off hours.
“It’s almost like a jail system now (the way) these schools are shut down,” Baker said. “It’s just hard to get in and play.”
The school district “whole-heartedly” supports opening school facilities to the public, said John Haley, Bay District’s executive director of operational support services.
In fact, sharing fields already is being done; youth soccer leagues hold practices at Northside Elementary School, Haley said.
The district, however, wants to open up more facilities. Haley mentioned the pending Panama City agreement and said it may include six schools. He said the agreement would run one year, and the district would see how it goes and possibly re-up, maybe for five years.
“We think this is a good way to get kids off the couch,” Haley said.