2025 7 7 Work Session Packet website 1

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III. E. Proposal from Baseline Sports Construction to Design and Install Artificial Turf on the 
Five Infields at Regional Park.  
 
Overview 
During the 2025 Strategic Summit held during February 2025, the top project that emerged was to 
install artificial turf on the five infields at Regional Park to enhance sports tourism, attract more 
regional and state-wide sports tournaments, and increase local hotel/motel tax revenue. Based on 
that meeting, $1,500,000 was budgeted in the approved FY 2025- 26 Capital Improvement Fund 
($1,300,000) and Hotel/Motel Tax Fund ($200,000) budgets for this project.  
 
The Parks & Recreation Director, Project Manager, and Purchasing Assistant met with several 
installers that are part of a cooperative purchasing agreement to obtain costs and installation 
schedules. To that end, they selected Baseline Sports Construction. to install artificial turf on the 
five infields at Regional Park. Baseline is a known company that has successfully performed 
similar work in the city and county prior. The cost of the turf installation is $1,342,815.23, the 
required bonds cost is $13,428.15, and grading design fees are $15,000. In addition to the 
installation cost, $50,000 is needed to repair a longstanding drainage problem on Field 4 for a total 
project cost of $1,421,243.38, or $78,756.62 under budget which would be used as a contingency 
to fund unforeseen items, if any. This project will start during late October 2025 at the end of the 
current softball season and be completed during early February 2026, the beginning of the 
upcoming softball season. Baseline’s proposal is attached.  
 
For additional background, Regional Park’s five baseball/softball fields are currently 70-foot bases 
which can only accommodate 8U to 14U girls’ softball, up to 12U boy’s baseball, adult softball, 
and senior adult softball along with these types of tournam ents. With this project, the five fields 
will have up to 90-foot bases resulting in accommodating and attracting a larger variety of sports 
teams and tournaments including middle school baseball, high school baseball, and even college 
baseball. Additionally, since McMinn County High School and TWU’s baseball fields have 90 -
foot bases, they can be included in tournament play with the city to attract even larger tournaments.  
 
When completed, this project would result in minimizing cancelled games due to weather and 
unplayable fields and less maintenance which would free up existing workers to be more 
productive with other tasks. Lastly, the Parks & Recreation Department would aggressively market 
the new and improved fields to attract as many local, regional, and state -wide tournaments as 
possible. Attached is a memo from the Public Works Department offering additional details about 
this project.  
 
Action to Consider 
Consensus is needed to move this item to the July 15, 2025 regular session for consideration.  
 
Affected Departments 
Parks & Recreation Department 
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