Daily News (West Bend, Wis.)
Published: Nov. 14, 2018
Into scoring position
West Bend’s Carl Kuss field project gets
$500K donation; construction to start soon
By Nicholas Dettmann
ndettmann@conleynet.com 262-306-5043
WEST BEND — When the last pitch was thrown in
August at Carl M. Kuss Memorial Field at Regner Park, it was believed the next
pitch there would be on a new baseball diamond and facility.
Despite a lack of construction at the
decades-old facility, everything is still on track to be ready for opening day
of the WIAA high school baseball season in April.
“We’re still on the goal to have the field
ready by the first home game by April 1 or thereabouts,” West Bend Baseball
Association board member Craig Larsen said Tuesday. “We’re optimistic.”
On Monday night, the project received a
$500,000 donation from West Bend Mutual Insurance Co. It was one of four
monetary donations the company made, totaling about $2 million, as a kickoff to
its 125th anniversary celebration. Also benefitting from the donations were The
Museum of Wisconsin Art, the Historic Downtown West Bend Theater and the West
Bend Riverwalk.
Larsen said about $1.4 million has been raised
for the renovation of the cornerstone park and baseball field in the city. The
projected cost is $2.4 million. The city, the baseball association, the West
Bend School District and West Bend Mutual have all chipped in.
In baseball terms, Larsen said, the project is
in scoring position and has rounded second base. He believes some other donations
that haven’t been finalized should help get the project around third base and
across home plate.
“There’s still a lot of excitement,” Larsen
said. “Everyone wants to have it done now and see it done because spring
baseball is coming up pretty fast. We’re four months away from spring
baseball. Everyone is itching to get something
started.”
Some construction is hoped to start soon, work
such as tearing up the field, removing the light poles, etc. But as far as
tearing down the grandstand, that is to be determined, especially with
Enchantment in the Park beginning Nov. 23.
The unknown in this project, Larsen said, will
be the weather.
“Who knows what it’ll be like in January,
February or March?” Larsen said.
Because of that, Dave Ross, facilities director
for the West Bend School District, already has a Plan B if winter stretches
into April, like it did this year.
If the field at Regner Park isn’t ready, the
West Bend East and West high school baseball teams will play at the high
school, next to the soccer complex, until Carl Kuss Memorial Field is ready.
Shortly before the end of last season, the
WIAA, the state’s governing body for high school athletics, announced it was
cutting summer baseball, citing a lack of participation, that forced East and
West to move to spring baseball.
It was not a popular decision by the summer
baseball advocates.
“Baseball is meant to be played outside when
it’s nice outside,” Larsen said.
Because of that decision, Larsen said, the need
to get the project going was accelerated.
Even though construction hasn’t started at the
field, that doesn’t mean work hasn’t started, which is why Larsen believes the
project is still within the projected timeline.
“The engineering and design work has started,”
he said.
“I think you’ll start seeing some things in
short order. You could start seeing some things coming down,” Larsen said.
The hope now is that weather will cooperate.
“You’re at the mercy of the weather,
permitting, finishing the fundraising,” Larsen said.
Ross said, “It’s one of those projects that
depends on the dollars to do it. It’s not like the dollars were set aside. It’s
a nice partnership and (we’re) looking forward to getting started on it. We
have to be patient.”
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