Serving Lincoln County for more than a century!
Serving Lincoln County for more than a century!
REARDAN – The town may be getting a new readerboard off Highway 2 coming into town from the east through a partnership with the town, school district and Spokane Teacher’s Credit Union. The proposed readerboard was discussed by athletic director Brian Graham at the school boards’ Sept. 30 meeting, and mayor Gail Daniels brought up the proposal to council at its Oct. 1 meeting.
“We are looking to go really state of the art,” Graham told the board.
The readerboard would display news and upcoming events in town, as well as promoting school events and other happenings within the district. Data will get onto the board through a cloud-based system that can be controlled from a smartphone.
The screen would have a four foot by eight foot 10 millimeter display with a backlit title sign promoting the school district, according to a preliminary sketch Daniels handed out at council’s meeting. Graham also referenced the sketch at the board meeting.
Metal poles would mount the board eight feet off the ground and would be wrapped in wheat shocks made with a plasma cutter in the school’s ag shop. The base would be bricks styled after Smith Gym.
At the bottom of the frame would be a plaque recognizing those who assisted in the project.
Avista will dig the holes for the poles and provide the electricity for the display.
The partnership would also put new scoreboards in the high school gym.
The idea came when the Champions of the Tribe board contacted STCU with their partnership to see if they were interested, which they were, Graham told the board.
“They’re willing to give us a total of $50,000 up front for sponsorship of scoreboards,” Graham said.
Approximately $20,000 would go to purchasing the new scoreboards at the high school. The scoreboards will be interchangeable display.
“During wrestling (and) during volleyball, it won’t say ‘points and fouls and timeouts left,’” Graham said. “Those will be sport-specific.”
Because the district and town want to go “state of the art,” the project will cost more than $50,000, Graham said. Therefore, he went to the booster club, who happened to have $15,000 set aside for a readerboard.
“We are trying to pull the town of Reardan, the booster club, obviously our school district, and STCU all in this together to build the board,” Graham said. “We’re about $18,000 off. We’re at $68,000, roughly, to purchase the new boards.”
The board had no issue with the booster club donating $15,000 for the proposed project, noting it would be almost “disrespectful” to not take their money that’s been set aside for over a decade for such a project.
The project would take approximately two months, Graham added.
The town got involved when Daniels met with superintendent Eric Sobotta, who asked what they could do to help the town pass levies.
“I said, ‘gosh, I think city people need to know what’s going on at the school,’” Daniels told council. “I live a block away from the school, and I drive by and I don’t know what’s going on.”
Daniels suggested that the town could contribute by building and furnishing the metal for the frame of the readerboard.
“It’d be up to us if we’d like to pay the monthly fee to Avista, which would be very minimal,” Daniels said.
Daniels had had previous interest in a readerboard and informed council she’d be seeking their approval for the readerboard when the time comes. For now, the idea remains a proposal that many within the partnership seem quite interested in.
“This is exciting,” councilmember Clay Soliday remarked.
Drew Lawson is the editor of the Davenport Times. He is a graduate of Eastern Washington University.
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