Everyone enjoys being in first place, and that includes the Austin Parks Board.
That ranking was revealed over this past weekend in email votes counted for a grant that could give the board $50,000 to renovate an old baseball field at Austin Community Park.
“We’ve heard plenty of talk from folks that support the project; now, we need action!” declared J.D. Buchanan, Parks Board President.
Voting in favor of the project can be done twice per day from any one email address until the final seconds on Monday, April 30, at 12 noon.
“Just go to MLB.com/scottsfield. Follow the instructions and support the park and its plans,” explained Buchanan. “It’s getting closer and closer to April 30. We really need this grant to improve our playing field. We can completely renovate it for this amount of money so it’s not susceptible to washouts anymore,” explained the board president.
As part of the Scott County Little League/Softball League, the field is used extensively by elementary-age players during ball season, which begins in May. Last year, the county organization had 350 children playing ball.
“We’ve had lots of people ask questions about the grant. We’re one of four communities in the running for the grant, and the other three are major metropolitan areas. Austin would be the first rural community to ever win a grant from Major League Baseball (MLB) and Scotts Company L.L.C. The two have partnered since 2016 to give out these grants, and we’d really like to be known as a recipient of an MLB/Scotts grant,” said Buchanan.
Los Angeles is currently listed as number two in voting. Rankings of the other two finalists, Kansas City, Ks., and Passiac, NJ, are not known.
Austin’s application was prepared by Austin High School baseball coach Gordon Bayes, an AHS graduate. All of the finalists were selected by a special panel from 315 applicant cities in 43 states.
“We can only encourage our supporters to vote twice each day and help us keep this number one ranking and get this grant,” pointed out Buchanan. “If we can get it, it’ll be like a hitting a homerun 50,000 times over.”
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