New football stadiums, swimming pools and more to be built for Merced County high schools

The Merced Union High School District is making major upgrades to athletic facilities at each of its campuses throughout Merced County, including new swimming pools, tracks and artificial field turf.

In addition, the district will soon break ground on two new football stadiums.

By the time the new football stadiums at El Capitan and Buhach Colony high schools are completed, the district will have funded over $42 million in upgrades to athletic facilities to the local high schools.

District officials feel it’s a priority that all students in the district have access to equal facilities at Merced, Golden Valley, El Capitan, Atwater, Buhach Colony and Livingston high schools.

“Absolutely, it’s critical that the district as a whole makes sure a kid in Livingston has the same experience as any school in Merced,” MUHSD deputy superintendent Ralph Calderon said. “We want to make sure their experience isn’t a different quality of any of our other campuses.”

“There’s a lot happening,” Calderon added. “We want to benefit as many students as we can.”

Where’s the money coming from?

The funds for the project are coming from a bond-refinancing deal and passage of the Measure M school facilities legislation in 2008. The bond has already paid for new gyms at Livingston (2011) and new 26,000 square-foot gyms in Atwater and Merced in 2017.

“The district refinanced Measure M bonds when interest rates were really low and between that and increased valuation in the county, we were able to access additional Measure M funds to help with these projects,” said Scott Weimer, MUHSD assistant superintendent business and student services.

Weimer says the district also has been putting aside funds for these projects over the years.

Construction is already underway on new swimming pools at Merced and Atwater high schools.

$9 million pools

The two pools, which will be 33 meters long and 25 meters wide, will be completed by next year. The Merced and Atwater water polo and swimming programs are using neighboring pools this season.

The cost of the Merced pool is $9.34 million and the price for the Atwater pool is $9.1 million, according to MUHSD facility planning manager Melissa Miller.

Both Merced and Atwater were using small, out-dated pools for decades.

“The aquatic facility has been a long time coming,” said Atwater water polo and swimming coach David Svendsen. “Selfishly, I’ve been waiting for it for about 20 years as a player and now a coach.”

“This pool is going to revitalize our water polo and swim programs,” Svendsen added. “The enthusiasm from our staff and student body is already high and the campus is buzzing with excitement for what this will provide for our current students and all the future of youth aquatics in Atwater.”

Artificial turf

New artificial playing surfaces have been installed and the tracks have been resurfaced this year at Golden Valley’s Veterans Stadium and Atwater’s Dave Honey Stadium.

With each high school in the district to soon play in its own on-campus stadium, Golden Valley and Atwater were able to add their colors and logos to the turfs. Atwater elected to go with a blue field turf.

The cost for the Golden Valley turf and track resurfacing was just under $1.2 million and Atwater’s project was just under $1.3 million.

New football stadiums coming

Ground breaking for the new football stadiums at Buhach Colony and El Capitan are scheduled for November or December of this year with price tags of $12 million and $14 million, respectively.

These projects include home and visitor bleachers, concessions buildings and restrooms, lighting, all weather track, fencing, press boxes, sound systems, lighting, walkways, entryways and scoreboards.

The seating capacity for both new stadiums should be for about 3,500 people.

Merced High opened its $6.5 million on-campus football facility Cathie Hostetler Stadium last year.

“It’s exciting for all of our communities,” Calderon said. “To be able to have senior soccer nights under the lights, our P.E. classes using outdoor facilities, the ability to have outdoor rallies, graduations in our own stadiums, it says a lot.”

Upgrades have also been made to Livingston’s football stadium in recent years, including bleachers, concession stands, restrooms and a ticket booth.

All-weather tracks to be installed

A new eight-lane, all-weather track is also currently being installed and will be ready in October.

“When complete, Livingston High will have one of the premier facilities in the Central Valley,” said Livingston athletic director Scott Winton. “The facility will be used year-round for both high school and youth football, boys and girls soccer, and track and field. We are grateful to have supportive leadership at our district office and on our school board.”

The cost for all the improvements to the track and football stadium at Livingston is just over $5.8 million, according to Miller.

Livingston strack coach Shawn Kwietkauski said wet weather made it impossible to practice on the Wolves’ old dirt track.

“Having an all-weather track is a game-changer for our student athletes,” Kwietkauski said. “We can pretty much practice in any weather conditions. Last Spring we missed well over a month of access to our track. Our dirt track on most days looked like a lake.”

“The new surface will give our Livingston track and field athletes a level playing field with not only the schools in our league, but also other MUHSD schools,” Kwietkauski added.

MUHSD has also completed other recent projects including new dugouts for Golden Valley softball, new visiting bleachers at Atwater High and gym renovations at the East Campus gym.

“I feel our district administrators have the right mind-set striving for equity with all the schools,” said Merced athletic director Paul Hogue. “It all started with the new gym built Livingston and then the two new gyms built at Atwater and Merced.”