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The new baseball complex would be built where homes and businesses are now. This chart comes from this Renton School District Presentation
The Renton School District is on a buying binge, going after 42 business properties and single-family homes to amass ten acres to move their baseball field. They’re apparently surprised by the high prices, and are starting to use eminent domain to take properties. With many multi-million dollar properties in the mix, one of them reaching 6 million dollars, the school district could potentially end up spending 60-80 million dollars on this property before they are through. Then they will have to pay to close several city streets, relocating all the utilities. They’ll also have substantial demolition costs, and environmental cleanup costs for some of the properties. And they will have archaeological preservation costs, as this former Black River riparian zone may have significant historical artifacts. All told, they could spend 80-90 million on site procurement and preparation before they even start work on the baseball field.
This means Renton High’s new baseball field could exceed the costs of our nation’s most over-the-top high school football stadiums, even before we install the first bleacher. That almost certainly makes it the nation’s most expensive high school baseball field.
Dubious honor: National and international press has been critical of extravagant spending for high school sports; Just procuring the land for Renton’s baseball field is costlier than many of the nation’s most opulent high school football stadiums
Renton high athletes certainly deserve the same opportunities as anybody, and Renton has an incredible football stadium with covered seating for 5500 spectators, a press box, electronic scoreboard and all-season field. Renton High also already has a baseball field. While the baseball field is not lighted because of airport restrictions, the occasional night games can be played in City of Renton fields.
What Renton High lacks is a swimming pool for swim sports, which could have been built at a fraction of the cost of the new baseball field without taking land from the neighborhood. No pool is currently planned. This presentation describes what students wanted in a school remodel. While students mentioned school lighting, temperature regulation, food options, and wall colors, none of them mentioned their sports facilities– let alone a baseball field.
Renton taxpayers can’t afford unlimited school renovation costs. The total cost of renovating Renton High, including what the voting materials described as a 40-acre purchase of a new school site, was expected to be about half a billion dollars. With interest over the 22 years of the bond, the final price will be closer to a billion dollars. A billion dollars, divided by the 130,000 total population in the Renton School District, is about $7,700 per person. That’s $7,700 from each and every one of us, including 2-week-old babies and 95 year-old retirees– all of us. This is not a sustainable cost everytime we rework a school.
Taxes on my home have been rising faster than inflation. You can see this chart for your home by navigating to your home on the map here, clicking on it, and clicking on the tax tab.
The above graph shows the tax on my 1959 home in the Renton Highlands. The blue and red bar bars in the graph show the total I’m taxed each year for schools. $6,068 in 2025, up 25% in the past five years.
Renton School District still needs to update Dimmit and Nelson Middle Schools, and Hazen and Lindbergh High Schools are not far behind. The Renton school that my grandchildren attend, which supports the HOME program, is in even worse shape. It has a waiting list of 80 families, but it also has lead pipes, a broken heating system, and no air conditioning, so staff and students drink bottled water while sweating or shivering their way through their lessons.
How will Renton taxpayers be able to stay in their homes if we spend $100 million on one school’s baseball field?
If you agree, contact your Renton School Board members and encourage them to find a less expensive approach to remodel Renton High School. And encourage Renton City Council to advocate for residents and businesses, so that long-time members of our community don’t have to leave our city.
And by the way, because Renton’s Airport leadership is kicking out propeller planes and building a Renton Jet Center, we may have to tear down this school in about ten years to extend the runway and taxiway per FAA rules.
The School District Plan calls for a replacement grid of underground water mains and connections in the same areas they told voters they had issues digging because of archeological artifacts.
Renton High School shown by the red outline in the center, at the confluence of the now-extinct Black River and the original Cedar River. The School District has previously used this map to illustrate to voters the difficulty in disrupting the ground at the high school because of tribal artifacts; now they plan to expand and excavate a full replacement grid of water and power mains through this area.
This chart shows the houses and businesses being taken in the green areas. (From this presentation.)
A flyer being distributed by one of the many impacted residents. If you know of a house this Renton resident could purchase please leave a comment.
How does the District maintain similar fields at other schools? Are they in the same shake as Rentons? The field at Renton have been unusable for years. My sons Redhawk baseball team had to play at Liberty Park because the fields are kept up so bad!!!
Many of them are not in great shape, and this is because proper maintenance practices are not always adhered to. The School District is chronically short on funds, so I suspect that’s the reason for the deferred maintenance; of course that is also a great reason not to spend all our money on a new 100-million-dollar baseball field.
Here are some of the steps they should be taking on a regular basis at Renton High’s current fields, and others in the district:
Grade the infield so water drains off the field after rainfall
Regularly drag and rake the field to maintain the infield grade and prevent ruts and puddles from forming that could impede playability and present safety hazards
Clearly and thoroughly communicate proper baseball field care and etiquette to everyone using the field
Conduct soil testing annually and aerate the soil
Provide the soil with the nutrients it needs to stay healthy
Water the grass according to the soil’s dryness and overall moisture retention
With every mow, ensure the grass maintains at least one-third of its growth to prevent decline
Schedule regular mowings so you can keep the baseball field grass at its desired height without removing more than one-third of its growth
Examine and maintain the baseball field before and after every use and ensure it isn’t used when wet
Perform general maintenance and repairs on structures around the field to ensure their proper function and safety for both spectators and participants, including the fences, dugouts, bleachers and other miscellaneous structures
A full list can be found at the link below. While I was on Council I made sure we budgeted for field maintenance of Renton City baseball fields, and I think our Parks team did a good job of it.
https://www.grandslamsafety.com/post/baseball-field-maintenance-guide#:~:text=Water%20the%20grass%20according%20to,one%2Dthird%20of%20its%20growth
Time for new school board members. They’re not bad people, but they’re asleep at the wheel.
Renton School District is out of control! Two of the School Board members didn’t even show up to the condemnation hearing. They’ve got the money, so don’t care how much they waste or whose homes get demolished. There are so many less expensive options to provide baseball fields. Yes, School Board menbers are asleep at the wheel, not listening or caring about what the students or public wants
I still can’t believe they turned down the opportunity to have a Chihuly Glass studio right next to the school. What a wasted opportunity. No one wants the ball field except the Superintendent, and I can’t quite figure out what is going on that he is so dead-set to push forward on this conceived idea. And the School Board just rubber-stamps whatever he wants, like they have jello for brains.
I also can’t believe that the city planners are giving this plan a ‘thumbs-up’. It goes against the City of Renton 2025 Comprehensive Plan which states it will preserve housing in the downtown core. It also would remove the Tobin through-street, which would add congestion to Airport way as it removes a through street to get to the downtown core.
https://www.rentonwa.gov/Projects-Development/Community-and-Economic-Development-Projects/Planning-and-Programming/Comprehensive-Plan. (I had to download it to see it, it wouldn’t show with the link)
Very informative comment At A Loss,
Great idea to open the Comprehensive Plan for guidance in this case. Like you said, the City Link requires a download to open it, so I’ve made it easier by putting it on my website, and people can read it online here.
I’ve also pulled out just one of the many sections that applied and posted it below. There are many more policies that also apply in this case, and conflict with the School District displacing so many people from their homes and businesses. There are several paragraphs that speak the the city preventing displacements. I can only put one photo per comment so I’ll attach a couple below.
Here is one of several policies in the comprehensive plan regarding displacements:
And here is some language about business displacement. This is the tip of the iceberg, the comp plan includes many more sections about helping generate homeownership and business opportunities, helping people stay in their homes, and helping businesses succeed.
King 5 news today https://www.king5.com/article/news/community/facing-race/renton-man-fighting-land-justice-washington-state-eminent-domain/281-83181a63-8c74-42e3-bc07-736fc1c5827f
Is it fair to wonder if there’s kickbacks? Whenever you see an over priced boondoggle for no good reason…
I’m giving a long answer, because you are asking an important question that others have also asked me in various forms. My answer is not directed at the School District specifically, but instead a general answer affirming that you are asking a good question, and the question always needs to be taken seriously. A large bond issue like this one is certainly an opportunity for possible fraudulent charges.
The US Government Accountability Office, that serves the US Congress, has historically estimated that 3-7% of federal payments on contracts are typically fraudulent or improper payments, even with federal-level accounting controls in place. Local governments are just as susceptible, and perhaps more so, to the kinds of fraud and/or kickbacks that plague federal contracts. With 5% improper payments, the losses on a $650 million school project could be $32 Million dollars! It takes careful, systematic, ongoing scrutiny on the part of local agencies, like Renton School District or the City of Renton to prevent these losses. The Board Members and City Council Members must take the risk seriously. Fraudulent payments can sneak in in the form of payments to contractors who didn’t perform the work claimed, payments to phony contractors, kick-backs in cash or items of value to unscrupulous persons in the oversight chain, or even accidental over-billing errors that are not caught.
Hiring an accountant won’t necessarily catch these errors, as preventing the fraud requires very diligent hour-by-hour management of the project by highly trustworthy individuals who are not too distracted by other duties to keep their eye on the ball. They have to have awareness about who the contractors are that are working on the project, when they are working on it, and what they are getting done. Also, the quality of the materials and work need to be scrutinized, and compared to the bills submitted. Otherwise, overbilling may never be caught.
The Board Members or Council Members are the trustees, and must take personal interest in ensuring the contracted work is getting done properly for the contracted amount, and hold their engineers accountable to watching every detail for them. The agencies field inspectors, like Renton’s building inspectors for instance, have a role in this surveillance, but they are not the main part of this oversight. Engineers and architects have a big role, too, along with the executives and trustees.
I was fortunate to work alongside many Council Members who took this oversight seriously, as I did, asking the necessary tough questions. Occasionally we did find hints of fraud in the contracts we oversaw, and investigations would be conducted, and cases would be sent to the prosecutor’s office. Obviously the full-time professionals at the School District and the City are also crucial for watching for this, and the trustees need to model the behavior, oversee the people doing the overseeing, take any concerns seriously, and rigorously pursue anything that has a hint of fraud.
I’ve definitely read of many cases where an agency employee or public official will recommend a big project be undertaken by contractors, only to find out later that the proponent of the contract was simply creating an opportunity to enrich themselves– it most definitely happens, and everyone must be watchful of it.
As Council Member I much preferred to keep city maintenance and construction work in-house instead of hiring contractors whenever possible. I favored this because we could get better workers, it maintained union harmony, and the possibilities of fraud were much less with our own workers doing the work. Whenever big payments are made to contractors, there is a chance it’s not going to match up with the work done.
I personally get concerned about any agency when their board is overseeing contracts for hundreds of millions of dollars, if their board is not laser-focused on their core jobs as financial trustees. It will be important for the School Board Members to track every cent.
That does not mean the School District should low-ball or be predatory when it comes to purchasing people’s homes. If they go through with acquiring 42 homes and businesses to build their baseball field, they must work to make the rightful owners of the property whole, and give them fair market value plus compensate them for all their costs.
Thank you for the important question!
how is this equity? renton gets to have $100M baseball fields while we on the hazen booster for hazen baseball team have to fundraise each season to pay to rent fields because the baseball fields are so torn up and unsafe??????? hazen practices and plays games off site.
I thought the was about making things equal and fair for the students? just not all students apparently.
I heard that the Superintendent went to Renton High… so that probably explains it
The Superintendent and Mayor both went to Renton High. I haven’t had time to look into it, but they appear similar ages. Perhaps they are conspiring?
They won’t admit that Hazen fields are messed up or that they charge you. I agree, pay to fix the fields at the other High Schools!
This slide in the latest school board presentation now includes ironic wording (which I’m sure the person who said it did not intend), since District officials are forcibly taking family backyards away from families
School Board Meetings are held the 2nd & 4th Wednesdays of the month at 7pm. Sign up for public comment. It is your right for your voice to be heard. Check the website to confirm location.
https://www.rentonschools.us/our-district/school-board
or email your comment so it is on record: board.public.comment@rentonschools.us
You can also email the board members and superintendent.
school.board@rentonschools.us
damien.pattenaude@rentonschools.us