Over time, the Haines Borough Assembly’s mistaken decision in 2011 to demolish the former elementary school gym becomes more egregious.
As our weather becomes more extreme, as our device-obsessed children fall into obesity, as we learn more about the importance of regular, strenuous exercise, it’s clear that we need more opportunities for year-round physical recreation.
The historic closure of our two school gymnasiums during the Christmas holiday only drives home our inability to make changes necessary for our well-being.
When I realized the swimming pool would be closed during most of the holiday this year (for repair of floors), I phoned around to three or four of our seven school board members, asking if something might be done to open the gyms to youngsters during the school closure.
At the time, outdoor temperatures were dancing near zero and I could only imagine being a parent in a small house or trailer full of children, children maybe eating sweets and probably all wound up for Christmas.
The district made an attempt to respond to my request by scheduling four “open-gyms” for adults during the holiday break, but my concern was for the younger people.
They’re the ones who need to develop habits of regular exercise, nutrition, and healthy choices. That’s easier to do around here in summertime. But when daylight is limited to just six hours, when it’s zero degrees F. or a rainy Slurpee out of doors, children need in the gym.
I was told by friends at the school that my request would be turned down for 100 reasons.
These include that a hallway gate, that once could be drawn to cordon off the gym from the rest of the school, was removed due to liability reasons. So opening the gym requires not only a paid monitor in the gym, but also perhaps another employee in the halls keeping the peace.
Using the school’s smaller gym for youngsters when the large gym was open for adult open gym would, of course, require a third employee to monitor the small gym. Also, as younger children apparently can’t be trusted to play nice or make up their own games, the small-gym monitor would also have to organize a game or activity, such as kickball, I was told.
Finally, there’s something to do with janitors. They apparently have to clean the entire school or a large part of it every time the school doors open. Whether this is policy or part of a union contract or commandment from God I’m not sure, but apparently it’s an issue.
All of these are ostensibly good reasons the school can’t just be opened a few hours to young people during the holiday.
But none of them are good enough to justify our closing of a heated space we’re already paying for to our children at a time of the year when they more than ever need a place and time to run around, blow off some steam, burn some calories and see their friends.
Recreation is education. It teaches us about ourselves and our abilities, about how to use and strengthen our bodies, and about how to interact and play peaceably with others. That shouldn’t end because scholastic classes are cancelled.
Further, developing a healthy exercise habit improves long-term health, reducing the costs of health care for all of us.
Let’s raise this issue now. Call or email your school board members and ask them to fund open gyms for youngsters during the 2023 Christmas break, and to put funding in their upcoming budget.
There are likely 100 reasons for closing the gyms to youngsters during the holidays. With more than 300 days before the next Christmas holiday, school officials will have three days to resolve each of them.
Phone or email your school board members when you can. Here’s how to reach school board members Shelly Sloper, Kevin Shove, Ann Marie Palmieri, Shannon Dryden, Brian Clay, Michael Wald, and Keely Baumgartner.
If it makes it easier, copy and paste this commentary and send it to:
ssloper@hbsd.net
sdryden@hbsd.net
apalmieri@hbsd.net
bclay@hbsd.net
mwald@hbsd.net
kbaumgartner@hbsd.net
kshove@hbsd.net
Or you can drop a snail-mail addressed to “all school board members,” P.O. Box 1289, Haines, AK 99827. Hand-written messages tend to be most noticed and remembered.