INGLEWOOD, Calif. – Inglewood Unified School District has been granted $150,000 by the Los Angeles Rams through the National Football League Foundation Grassroots Program to refurbish the grass field at Caroline Coleman Stadium in Inglewood.
The grant from the Rams, the NFL Foundation, Nike, and Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) is part of $6 million in field refurbishment awards allocated this year. The field will serve students at Inglewood, Morningside, and City Honors High Schools as well as local Pop Warner teams.
The NFL Foundation Grassroots Program – a partnership between the NFL Foundation and LISC, the nation’s leading community development support organization – has supported the construction or renovation of 416 football fields nationwide since 1998. During that time, the NFL Foundation has granted nearly $58 million to revitalize playing fields in underserved neighborhoods. Fields are newly built or significantly renovated, with improvements such as irrigation systems, lights, bleachers, scoreboards, goal posts and turf. Grassroots grants are issued once established funding thresholds are reached for each project.
“We are thrilled to help give kids in Inglewood a best-in-class field where they can work hard to achieve their dreams of becoming Super Bowl Champions,” said Rams Chief Operating Officer Kevin Demoff. “Inglewood is not only where we won Super Bowl LVI, but it is home to our own SoFi Stadium 365 days a year. We are grateful to the NFL and to Nike for joining us in giving back to this incredible community we call home.”
“The refurbishment of our Caroline Coleman Stadium supports the efforts of our District and community, as we collectively continue to build equitable and inclusive facilities and programs for our students.” said Dr. Erika Torres, County Administrator of Inglewood Unified School District. “The refurbishment will bring positive change, inspiring hope and purpose, igniting their potential, and envisioning their dreams becoming reality.”
NIKE, Inc. is also a partner in this work to increase sport at all levels, for girls and boys, through the field renovation. In addition, the company will provide $100,000 in product donations to help support the Inglewood and Morningside High School’s athletic programs, which also include City Honors International Preparatory students.
Source: therams.com.
3 Comments
Before we bring out the champagne and those excited rounds of applause ….Shall we look at some pesky numbers?
Butts was present at the press conference at Sentinel Field aka Coleman Stadium.
Butts had previously said that renovations would cost roughly $ 3.5 million and that NFL and Nike would be covering the cost because he (Butts) had brokered this great gift .
At this press conference the combination of NFL (per Forbes the 32 teams of NFL are roughly worth $3 Billion each or $96 BILLION) and Nike, (roughly worth $34 BILLION-) announced their Grass seed and Fertilizer Donation of $150,000.00.
— Without getting into all the significant ethical short comings of Nike perhaps we should discover what Wikipedia shares. Nike has that annoying moving some offices offshore to avoid US Taxes, and there are environment impact issues in the form of air / water pollution and employee health issues in their corporate operational resume. What is the school system teaching? Is doing wrong cool if you spread around a few dollars an ocean away from the Environmental Damage, and worker / child exploitation?
Perhaps we should hold our excitement in reserve even be SKEPTICAL of what strings may be attached… that is in addition to happy face press photos and of course that tax write off thing.
So far the decisions of Ms Erica seem more like a betrayal of Inglewood resident/taxpayers and a well thought through commitment to keep our students dazzled rather then educated while she maneuvers to sells our schools without public input.
For those who are ever so devoted to sports often acting as if they are more important that math or reading…
please don’t forget with some 30ish yellow multi-passenger vehicles (School Busses) parked in Morningside’s lot – Erica’s well paid wonder staff somehow couldn’t figure out how to get a school based baseball team to their game.
Wouldn’t it be better for “Advisor” Erica to focus on education rather then pleasing Billionaires with gifts of our property and press conferences. Better yet, students may benefit if she simply do the proper thing and RESIGN effective end of this school year so that an educator with experience can get to the work of making Inglewood Schools once again about teaching students. When that happensthey can enter the workplace or college prepared to compete well with students who have gone to schools were reading and math proficiency are considered basic essentials.
Back to the field – Taxpayers have already paid for the running tracks and the grass seeding multiple times using those Bond dollars which will appear on property tax bills for multiple years to come .. Why were they not maintained ?
As for James BUTTS rather than throw a party for the well Out of Towners who came to the SuperBowl, those roughly $200,000.00 tax dollars could have gone to the grass seed for EACH of the HIGH SCHOOL properties in the community which he is supposed to serve..consider that is roughly half what he has been “compensating” with TAX DOLLARS his – secretary/ special assistant for several years?
What taxpayers of Inglewood have given (forgiven loan /discount land parcel sale or labor hours for landscaping and law enforcement) to Billionaires far exceeds what City Funds have been utilized for our School District which thank goodness are separated entities.
One group sold OUR parking lots (aka an ongoing income source) the other is selling OUR (once) education centers.
Let’s start voting for someone who has a track record of Caring for our community long before the election cycle and vote based on what candidates have done for OUR community rather than how much money they gathered from non-residents.
Im an Inglewood HS alum. I was extremely excited about the field finally getting the necessary renovations. I recently drove pass Sentinel Field (Coleman Stadium) and I saw trucks applying fertilizer to the field. I do not know if that’s apart of the turfing process but it definitely seems sketchy. IUSD doesn’t have a reputation for fiscal responsibility. Hopefully everything is still moving forward and these kids don’t get neglected again.
According to the mayor, the Coleman complex is undergoing a $3.5 million renovation of the field and adding locker room facilities. Sounds like they are preparing for the NFL to use as a possible training center, not primarily for the use of the students.