Published: November 11, 2008 11:43 pm      

Concerns raised over naming rights for school facilities

Allegany County Board of Education hopes to end any confusion ‘through policy’

CUMBERLAND — On the same night it was proposed that the pressbox at Greenway Avenue Stadium be named in memory of the late J. Suter Kegg and the late Tom O’Rourke, the Allegany County Board of Education and community members noted the “fast and rushed” manner in which the policy for naming rights for school facilities and properties was passed.

The board approved the policy only three months ago, board member Tom Striplin said. He said there were misperceptions about what the policy required and exactly what the awarding of naming rights to an individual meant.

“There are things that need to be cleared up,” Striplin said. “They will be cleared up through policy. In our haste to gravitate funding, we really didn’t have a policy. We might have put stuff out that wasn’t clear.”

Board member Jeff Metz said there is “a question about what naming rights means.”

The two were responding to requests from Kristan Hafer, widow of the late Douglas S. Hafer. Kristan Hafer and supporters two years ago pledged $25,000 — $5,000 per year for five years — for naming rights to Mountain Ridge stadium’s home team locker room. With the stadium facilities all but complete, Hafer said she expected the memorial to be installed before May 2009. That’s when her son, Mountain Ridge multisport athlete Slater Douglas Hafer, will graduate. Hafer said the group has raised the entire $25,000.

Hafer said she was “becoming very concerned” when terms of the naming rights agreement, outlined in a recent e-mail from Mia Perlozzo, public information officer, differed significantly from what she had previously agreed to. She has yet to make the second $5,000 donation to the school system.

“With a $25,000 donation, I expected a very visible display of sponsorship, especially on the building itself,” Hafer said of the locker room tribute.

Mary Clites, co-owner of radio station WCBC, requested the board permit the radio station to offer $10,000 of in-kind advertising to initiate a campaign to raise $10,000 for pressbox renovations. The pressbox should be named in honor of Kegg, former Cumberland Times-News sports editor, and O’Rourke, former WCBC sports director.

“Our area lost not only tremendous sports reporters, but incredible advocates” of student-athletes and the community at large, Clites said.

Clites said the in-kind advertising could promote the pressbox renovations campaign and “any other Board of Education program as you see fit.”

“I believe we can raise $10,000,” said Clites, adding no one else has come forward requesting to sponsor the pressbox. “Please consider what you may be passing up financially. What have you got to lose?”

For the board members, however, it was an issue of ensuring the policy they passed in August was in line with promises made by the fundraising committees for both Mountain Ridge and Greenway Avenue stadiums.

Kathy Getty, a supporter of the Greenway fundraising effort, said committee members and the board could be “sort of in a jam if we renege on what we’ve already sold.”

Getty said it was apparent in conversations that when naming rights for certain areas were sold — combined, the two stadiums have sold $375,000 worth of naming rights — the donor’s names would be highlighted.

“That’s my perception as well,” Striplin said. “That’s the understanding most people do have.”

Board President Fred Sloan said members could determine a process as soon as the Dec. 9 meeting.

“Obviously, we need to make some decision in the very near future,” he said.

Contact Kevin Spradlin at kspradlin@times-news.com.