Cosumnes River College athletes will soon have new sports fields to play on as a $14.5 million renovation project of the school’s stadium, baseball and softball facilities is almost complete.

Funded by the local Measure M Bond, which was passed by voters in 2008, $1.5 million of the $14.5 million dollars is coming from a partnership with the Elk Grove Unified School District.

As part of the partnership,  the new artificial turf stadium will serve as the Valley High School football team’s home field.

“Planning something like this can take up to 10 years. It’s a very lengthy process,” Vice President of Administrative Services Don Wallace said.

In addition, there will also be two new soccer fields and several new parking spaces in and around the sports facilities.

“These facilities are first class facilities with the highest quality grass for sports fields known as Bermuda grass, and a FIFA style class soccer field,” Wallace said.

Still, there are many questions about where the $14.5 million is going, Wallace said.

“Everybody is always asking, how in the world can you be building buildings and building sports fields when you’re shutting down classes?” he said. “Every chance we get we tell folks that these dollars that the public gives us can only be spent on construction. It can’t be used for classes or salaries or anything like that.”

The project is set to be completely finished by Oct. 1, but should be complete sooner than that.

Hopes are high that the campus and facilities will be more open and inviting to the public. Wallace believes nobody benefits more from this than the students.

“As is the case with all our projects, students are the ones who benefit most from these renovations,” he said.  “All of the sports facilities are here primarily for the support of our athletic programs, and these renovated facilities will provide state of the art facilities for our students who participate in these programs.”

The opening ceremony for the new stadium is Sept. 14 at 4:30 p.m. and is open to the public. The Elk Grove Unified School District will have their ceremony at halftime of the Valley High Vikings’ football game later on that night.

The baseball, softball and soccer fields will be open around the same time as the stadium.

Make sure to follow @CRCHawks on Twitter and Like the Cosumnes River College Hawks on Facebook to catch all of CRC’s sports action!