SportsTurf provides current, practical and technical content on issues relevant to sports turf managers, including facilities managers. Most readers are athletic field managers from the professional level through parks and recreation, universities.
Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/442256
FACILITY & OPERATIONS 30 SportsTurf | January 2015 www.sportsturfonline.com Reduce capital expendituRes Sharing of equipment has enabled the Peoria Sports Facilities division to reduce capital expenditures on equipment. We have an aerator that was purchased using Rio Vista's budget, the verticutter and large turf vacuum was purchased with Pioneer's budget and laser grading equipment was purchased by the Sports Complex. Since all the facilities are collectively part of the same organization, we are able to save on having to purchase units for each site. Not purchasing those specialty units has saved our divisional organiza- tion in excess of $127,000. This was also true with Brickman STS, and even more so, we pooled together savings from operational budgets to purchase these types of equipment, since there was not a capital budget for them. Also, with Brickman we did friendly borrowing from the local branch or area golf courses for single uses, many times just for tickets to a game. Aside from the opera- tional savings by foregoing specialty equipment, the Peoria Sports Facilities division was able to realize collective capital purchase incentives for our regular use equipment purchases. By collectively buying mowers and 3-wheelers, we earned a $12,000 incentive in the form of preventative maintenance kits from the vendor. In an effort to align the replacement of older equipment between the three complexes, a depreciation schedule is used to determine a threshold of maintenance costs that will be put into a particular piece of equipment to keep it running. It is anticipated that the de-fleeted equipment will be traded to the local school district where the automotive shop at the high school will keep the mowers and utility carts going for the agri- cultural department to use on the high school's athletic fields. This opportunity with the school district should allow the agri- cultural department to thrive and thus continue providing our facilities with part time internship students. The City of Peoria has a unique situation of having a high school with a strong Career and Technical Education (CTE) program in agriculture. Students have the opportunity to gain exposure and experience to nursery production, biotech, live- stock science and of course turfgrass management. The Sports Facilities division has partnered with the school as an opportu- nity to be a guest lecturer in the class and for students to tour our operations. We have also made several site visits to the schools athletic fields to consult with coaches and school representatives on turf management best maintenance practices. In turn, the By collectively buying mowers and 3-wheelers, we earned a $12,000 incentive in the form of preventative maintenance kits from the vendor. Continued on page 34 High school science teachers shadowing operations in York, PA with Brickman Group STS.