Kingston City School District officials revealed last week that they don’t expect the freshly renovated Dietz Stadium to be available for the 2024 fall sports season until nearly three weeks into September.
“After (a site) visit and meeting with the construction manager at Dietz Stadium, I would say we’re probably looking at that facility not being competition ready until September 20th,” said Kingston City School District (KCSD) Superintendent Paul Padalino during a meeting of the board of education held on Wednesday, August 21.
In early July, Padalino expressed enthusiasm about the state of the Dietz renovation and the hope it would be ready for the start of fall sports, but added that the district was also maintaining its athletic fields at M. Clifford Miller Middle School and Chambers and Crosby elementary schools just in case.
“That way we still have the capacity to do everything that needs to be done with our kids in the fall,” Padalino said.
At the time, that included the beginning of football practice, which started in mid-August, and was never planned to take place at Dietz Stadium. The Tigers’ varsity season begins with a non-league away game at Nyack on Saturday, September 7. They’re slated to host their home opener at the newly renovated Dietz on Friday, September 20 against non-league visitor Beacon, the first of four Friday night games in Kingston. That includes the Orange County Interscholastic Athletic Association (OCIAA) Section 9, Class AA opener against defending champ Middletown on September 27; a visit from Valley Central on October 10 and the regular-season finale against Pine Bush on November 1.
Padalino said the hope is that the September 20 football home opener against Beacon will still happen at Dietz, with a celebratory 7 p.m. kickoff. He added that a soccer game could also take place there earlier in the afternoon, but as of press time the only Kingston soccer game on the Section 9 website is a girls’ JV visit to Rhinebeck.
Kingston’s varsity football team had three “home” games in 2023, all played at Rondout Valley High School. The rest of their schedule was comprised of road games.
Next on the schedule for Dietz is a varsity field hockey team against visiting Mid-Hudson Athletic League foe Pine Plains on Monday, September 23 at 4:15 p.m.
Padalino said Dietz cannot safely open to student-athletes or spectators until certificates of substantial completion are issued by all contractors. As of the August 21 school board meeting, Padalino said there were no seats in the stands, no electricity running to the scoreboard, and the lights weren’t ready to run.
“Right now, in my opinion, there’s some serious safety issues of bringing students onto that construction site,” Padalino said. “The field looks great. The track looks great. But we’re still in an active construction zone now.”
He said that should change quickly upon completion of the paving around the parking lot and footpaths, at which point much of the construction equipment currently on the site should be removed.
“That’s when we can reassess when we can put students…into that facility,” Padalino said. “There’s still work to be done. They’re moving quickly. It looks great, but I think to look at having a full competition with fans and all that at Dietz Stadium, I’d say September 20th is probably a reasonable place to see it.”
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