At the public forum held last week, we heard Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School students express deep frustration over the unchanged, dismal field conditions. We agree. Students should not be playing on compacted dirt and rocky sand.

We also agree that this matter, along with a new track, should be addressed immediately.

The Field Fund Inc. wants to help.

For the past year, The Field Fund has been supporting the maintenance of grass fields around the Island, including Chilmark, the Edgartown School, Oak Bluffs School, Veterans Park in Vineyard Haven, West Tisbury School and the town field in West Tisbury.

While we are still refining our practices, the community is already seeing results. Edgartown School’s chronically wet fields are draining better thanks to several rounds of spike and deep tine aeration. Tisbury kept Veterans Park fields open for the fall season, with maintenance work done by the town and the Field Fund taking place in between uses. The West Tisbury School field hosted more events than in previous years and held up well. Understanding that as we improve soil and root health, conditions will continue to improve.

At the forum, we heard many people argue that grass is too expensive. They said it would cost hundreds of thousands to maintain the MVRHS fields. Based on our experience, we disagree. We installed two new fields at the Oak Bluffs School including a new well and state of art irrigation for under $200,000. This year we have spent an average of $8,000 per field. Looking ahead, we expect to spend under $10,000 annually per field. At minimum a single plastic field costs a million dollars to install and about $10,000 a year to maintain. Additionally, a plastic carpet needs to replaced every 8 to 10 years. Yes, if the MVRHS were to upgrade their grass fields, we would spend more on the maintenance there than we have spent on fields for younger athletes, but this cost would come nowhere close to the amount the school would be spending on a single plastic field.

Another concern from coaches, athletes, and community members was about whether or not grass can adequately support Island athletics. We are confident it can. Is it going to happen overnight? No. The MVRHS and many other Island fields have been neglected for decades. This said, we have what it takes to grow excellent fields. We have the ideal sandy soil for drainage. We now have the expertise, as a community and as an organization. We now have the tools — spike aerators, slit seeders, etc. We now understand how to improve conditions without causing nitrogen loading and without using toxic soil amendments. What we need is the community’s will to invest in grass.

Finally, given the recent UN climate change report by 91 scientists from 40 countries stating that all communities around the planet have 12 years to work

on mitigating climate change, grass seems like an important choice. Organically maintained grass is truly a win-win. Healthy grass benefits students, athletes and community members of all ages and it also benefits the climate. Healthy soil has a natural cooling effect and sequesters carbon — two key ways to help arrest the warming cycle.

Lots of positive change is happening before our eyes as well as deep underground in complex root systems. If you have questions, we would love to walk a field with you and talk about our work. And hopefully, we can bring that positive change to the MVRHS fields too.

Mollie Doyle, Dardanella Slavin, Rebekah Thomson

Chilmark