Artificial turf coming for Hewitt-Trussville fields

Various Trussville City Schools athletic fields soon will have artificial turf, and part of a field will be covered.

The Trussville City Council on Sept. 27 authorized the release of up to $7 million from the city’s public school capital improvement trust fund for phase one of Trussville City Schools’ athletics master plan.

Athletics Director Lance Walker said phase one includes turf fields for Goldie Paine Field for softball, Phil English Field for baseball, the competition soccer field and the field behind Hewitt-Trussville Middle School, as well as a half field covered beside the football fieldhouse on Husky Parkway.

“It certainly would be a good start,” Walker said. “It impacts a lot of sports and a lot of people.”

Walker said the projects must be bid out, making it “extremely tight” to have fields ready for the spring 2023 season. A more likely timeline is starting work after upcoming seasons end.

In other city news, the City Council on Sept. 27 approved an ordinance regulating golf carts and other low-speed motorized vehicles on city streets. According to the ordinance, a city street is defined as any public street that is maintained by the city with a speed limit of 25 mph or less.

The ordinance states that any golf carts not designed or manufactured for operation on public streets are prohibited from operating thereon. Upon stopping or encountering a cart or vehicle not authorized under the ordinance, a Trussville police officer may “seize and impound the cart or vehicle which shall be impounded by the City’s towing and storage vendor.”

The City Council also imposed a temporary moratorium on rezoning applications for certain residential classifications through Dec. 31. The moratorium does not apply to new rezoning applications seeking either R-1 or R-2 single-family residential classification. The moratorium will allow the city council time to update and modernize the city’s zoning ordinances.

The City Council also recently approved its fiscal year 2023 budget, which includes an estimated total operating revenue of $47.8 million and total operating expenditures of $39.6 million.