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The Dallas County Board of Education approved a $1,830,510.88 bid from Summerville Construction of Faunsdale to build a softball complex at Keith Middle and High School and baseball and softball fields at Southside High School.

School Superintendent Anthony Sampson said the bid alternates approved include construction of the fields and dugouts, installing an irrigation system, scoreboards, sound system and power outlets to power the scoreboards and sound system for all three fields.

The installation doesn’t include lighting for any of the fields. Also, it does not address the needs at Dallas County High School for a lighting upgrade or installing a sound system for their baseball and softball field. The reason why there will be no baseball field at Keith is due to not having enough land to build a baseball field.

Sampson said the goal of this project was to provide equitable facilities for all schools in the district.

“So we were able to accomplish as much of that to be balanced and equitable across the whole district with the developable funds that we have,” Sampson said.

Board member William Minor asked when construction will begin on the fields.

Maintenances supervisor Jerry Ware said they will know more as soon as they can schedule a pre-construction meeting with Summerville Construction and McKee & Associates, the architect for the project.

“Can we do that sometime in the month of February to get moving on this?” Minor asked.

“We might get it done in the month of January,” Ware said. “Once the board approve it, then I’ll expedite everything… We will call tonight.”

It was not clear from the meeting if the fields would be completed in time to hold any on-campus games this season. Baseball and softball begin in February with the end of the regular season in April.

According to a memo from the State Department of Education, the state awarded $2.4 million for capital outlay projects for the current year. These funds will be used to pay for the project.

Two other bids were received from Frasier-Ousley ($2,073,100) and Wayne Davis Construction ($2,026,990), but were higher than Summerville Construction’s bid.