Fuel fallout

By Corine Gatti

Published: August 1, 2008

Rising fuel costs have targeted food prices, summer travel and families’ pocketbooks.
Now, two Augusta County school officials say local high school junior varsity sports programs are in the crosshairs.
Stuarts Draft Athletic Director Steve Hartley said if diesel fuel costs do not decline, his JV teams will not take the road.
“Right now, that is one of the changes that we are looking at,” Hartley said. “The future looks uncertain for JV unless the cost of gas goes down. You don’t want to see it come down to that, but we are looking at everything we can, and what we can afford in our budgets.”
It’s a “dismal” option supported by Augusta County Schools Superintendent Gary McQuain in an effort to save the school system money during the budget crunch.
“Right now we are using caution,” he said. “It’s always a dismal situation when you have to cut teams or think about it because of our budget. Everything is on the table and being looked at.”
The fall season, however, seems safe for now with schedules already locked up and football teams either already on the practice field or preparing for training camp.
“For us, we basically stick to this area and we got Broadway and Rockbridge,” Hartley said. “We will be fine with our [football] schedule right now.”
Other sports teams might not be so lucky in the coming months.
“The cross country and wrestling teams travel farther,” Hartley said. “They might have a problem. The men in transportation are going to have a tough time.”
There will be some changes in how teams get to road games for all three high school sports seasons.
“What we will try to do in the spring is to make sure all baseball and softball teams ride together,” Hartley said. “We will push back their times to get both teams at a location at one time.”
McQuain said there will no longer be a separate bus for the equipment for football road trips. Waynesboro High School is taking a wait-and-see approach.
“Right now we are not going to cut anything,” Waynesboro Athletic Director Mel Morris said. “We might consolidate cheerleading where they will all ride on one bus. We probably will have baseball and softball teams ride together.
“We do not want to eliminate anything yet because things can turn around.”
Morris said ending varsity feeder programs would be a final option.
“It will be a last resort to eliminate JV,” Morris said. “If gas becomes outrageous, JV will suffer. We’ll have to evaluate things as we go along. We will not do anything to our varsity teams.”