el Don V. 92 No. 4 | Page 16

el Don /SANTA ANA COLLEGE • MONDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2014/eldonnews.org

SPORTS

TAX BONDS FUND NEW FIELDS
E
BY HAIDE HERNANDEZ
/ el Don

In the past year, Santa
Ana College has opened
a new sports field and
renovated another, both
to great reviews from
student athletes and
coaches.
“It’s a bigger upgrade
than the locker rooms
or the weight room.
They definitely needed
it, a safe and beautiful
field,” Head Football
Coach Geoff Jones said.
The college spent
about $2 million to
open a modern soccer
stadium in 2013 and
retrofit the field at the
John Ward Track.
The funds for the
stadium were allocated
from Measure E, while
the $150,000 cost of

“Bermuda is built to
field. But it was so hot, I
did get a few skid marks, take the punishment
but we had the best field of football and basein our league,” Makenna ball. That’s what it was
Roa, former SAC middesigned for,” Athletic
Grounds Worker Jesse
fielder said.
Garcia said.
Despite the athletes’
However, maintenance
preferences, athletic
does require special
trainers have expressed
procedures to keep it
reservations.
from being cross-polli“Soccer should be
nated with other grasses.
played on grass and is
meant to be played on
The facilities department had to purchase a
grass,” Athletic Trainer
lawn mower at a cost of
Gary Kinney said.
$30,000 to use only on
The field inside the
this field.
John Ward Track was
completely gutted and
“One of the biggest
differences is it requires
a new combination of
a real mower, not a
sand and sod were put
typical rotary mower.
in place. The sod is a
blend of Bermuda grass Also you can’t cut it the
same all the time. You
named GM-1, which is
have to criss-cross it so
also drought friendly,
you don’t develop lines
only needing massive
that dip into the grass,”
amounts of water when
Garcia said
it is freshly planted.

retrofitting the field
came from the operational budget.
“It’s a lot nicer now,
[we] really appreciate
it because our coaches
work their butts off to
get us good stuff,” defensive lineman Thomas
Olds said. The old field
had holes, crabgrass,
and sometimes even
shards of glass.
The soccer stadium
was outfitted with a prostyle synthetic turf that
is drought-proof while
providing a smoother
surface for the ball to
roll on.
But the turf raises the
game-time temperatures
10 to 20 degrees above
natural grass, and can
cause skin burns on
routine sliding tackles.
“I personally love the

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Autodesk software, including
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$1.8M
of Measure E
monies to build
the new
Soccer Complex.

$150K
spent to redo the
John Ward field.

$30K

of SAC’s budget to
purchase a rolling
blade lawn mower.

Delicate.
Defenseless.
Endangered.

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Visit autodesk.com/students to get yours.

TAX FACTS

Image courtesy of Jomar Machado.

el Don /SANTA ANA COLLEGE • MONDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2014/eldonnews.org

MEASURE E
A voter-approved
measure in 2002
set aside $337
million for new
construction at
Santa Ana and
Santiago Canyon
Colleges

Rescue the Reef ®
Throughout the tropics, coral reefs protect
countless marine species and provide food and
livelihoods for 500 million people, but who protects
the reefs? Assaulted by pollution, overfishing and
climate change, coral reefs are being destroyed so
quickly that 70% of the world’s reefs may disappear
within 50 years.
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Photo: © Jeff Yonover