County School board members on Thursday agreed to accept $1,050,000 from the county despite strong criticism of the way the money was diverted from two non-profits.
The County Commission on Nov. 15 voted to pull the funds that had been pledged earlier to county Parks and Recreation and two local groups and use the funding for two county school athletic projects.
Earlier, the Urban League was told it was getting $450,000 and the Sankofa Fund for Civic Engagement was pledged $400,000. Parks and Recreation was to receive $200,000 for parking lot paving projects at the Enterprise South Nature Park.
The money is from the federal American Rescue Plan Act.
County Commissioner Lee Helton had introduced a late resolution that would allot the funds instead to provide a turf field at the Howard High School football stadium and for a softball field at Brainerd High School.
Tiffanie Robinson said, "I didn't like the way this went down no doubt."
Another board member, Jill Black, said, "I'm incredibly disappointed with how our non-profits were treated."
Ben Connor said, "I didn't like the way this happened." But he said the board should not turn down the unexpected gift and deny use of new fields by Howard and Brainerd athletes.
Gary Kuehn agreed, while saying, "We all see that it was bad policy."
Larry Grohn said he questioned why the natural turf at Howard would be torn up after just a few years of use at the new stadium by I-24.
Supt. Justin Robertson said there are several sports at the crowded school using the field and would be better able to do so with artificial turf. He said it was also possible that the field could be used for tournaments due to its prime location.
Board member said both the decision to build the new Howard stadium and the move to change to artificial turf came from two administration "at the county mayor's office. It did not come from us."
Marco Perez called it "poor government policy."
Tiffanie Robinson and Karitsa Mosley Jones voted no, and Mr. Perez abstained.