Time To Review

Pay-To-Participate System

To the Editor:

Last year, I paid $750 for my two daughters to participate in sports at Newtown High School. Every year we have been told these fees are used to cover the referees, busing the athletes, and “other” expenses.

Even though this is a huge expense for our family, I am the first to admit that when the pay-to-participate fee is broken down by the number of hours our fantastic coaches put in every single day, the hourly rate is miniscule.

However, I am outraged that the surplus of $18,622 (school-generated fees — pay-to-play) as noted in last week’s issue of The Newtown Bee will be returned to the town. Thank you very much, but we have already paid our excessive town taxes, which included another huge increase this year.

Thank you to Joe Kierney who suggested the unfairness of this distribution. Not only should funds be rebated, as he suggested, but the fee system needs to be reevaluated so this does not happen year after year. I encourage our Board of Education and Board of Finance to more closely examine this surcharge on the student/athletes and their families.

Janis R. Solheim

11 Harvest Common Road, Sandy Hook                August 22, 2006