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ROARING SPRING – Spring Cove School Board member Troy Wright made a controversial proposal to his colleagues Monday night.
“I look at it as a safety issue. If something’s going to happen, it’s going to happen,” Wright said. “If you can use our facilities, it’s safer for the kids.”
Wright wasn’t talking about wild parties. He was talking about Sunday basketball practices at the YMCA.
For decades, Spring Cove has enforced a policy banning athletic practice on Sundays. But some on the board – noting that unofficial, under-the-table Sunday practices are already widespread – are pressing for the rule to be relaxed.
If Monday’s board committee meeting is any indication, the religiously charged proposal could become a magnet for controversy in conservative Morrisons Cove.
“You know, the weekend is a day to play and a day to pray,” board member Harold Blattenberger said. “And I don’t think the day of play is going to be satisfied until it has completely overtaken the day of worship.”
Under the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association’s rules, high school teams can practice no more than six days a week. The organization once banned Sunday practice and competitions specifically, but a 1991 policy change opened Sundays in exchange for a day off sometime during the week.
Spring Cove, however, continues to forbid Sunday activities and closes campus facilities during the day.
The rule has led some coaches to seek secret alternatives, Wright explained Monday. Especially during weeks when bad weather restricts practice time, district coaches schedule unofficial Sunday gatherings off school grounds.
“It’s not an official practice. It’s a ‘meeting’ … an ‘open gym,'” Wright said. “It’s a shame that they have to sneak to do it.”
Because the gatherings take place unofficially and off school grounds, they raise safety and chain-of-command questions, some on the board said. By opening Sundays and allowing teams to practice at school facilities, administrators could better oversee the meetings and ensure safety.
Some expressed surprise that some coaches have allegedly violated school rules. Others wondered aloud whether some compromise could be struck to please students, parents and the community’s clergy.
Wright suggested a revised policy could leave only a few afternoon hours open, forbidding practice during church times. Another option: opening Sundays only on an as-needed basis, with administratror’s approval required in advance.
That might not be enough for some, like Blattenberger, who remained deeply skeptical of school activities on a day biblically reserved for rest. (Religious groups including Jews, Muslims and Seventh-Day Adventists mark the Sabbath on different days, but Cove residents tend to adhere to other sects.)
“We just have more complacent and worldly Christians who are willing to compromise,” Blattenberger said.
It’s a sentiment board President Brian Gahagan disputed. Gahagan, a self-identified Christian who said he regularly works on Sundays, argued that the district needs to remember its wider responsibilities.
“The school’s part of the community. We live in a 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week world, but we think we’re sheltered here in the Cove,” he said. “I hate to tell you: There’s baseball games all the time on Sunday.”
Jim Laird, a district resident and father of several student athletes, rose during Monday’s meeting to challenge some on the board who argued that children might be spending too much time on sports.
“Why do these kids practice every day? Some of the kids are actually going to get college scholarships. In this district – believe it or not,” Laird said, visibly irritated.
Board members agreed to gather recommendations and discuss the matter again, possibly later this month. In the meantime, parents and religious figures will have time to weigh in on the proposal.
It appears some, at least on the board, might be hard to sway, however.
“Some of these kids might excel academically or athletically,” Blattenberger said. “But they’re not going to church.”
Mirror Staff Writer Ryan Brown is at 946-7457.