Sunday Sit-down with Ehren Earleywine
ABC 17 Sports Director Andrew Kauffman brought on Jefferson City School District athletic director Ehren Earleywine in this week's edition of Sunday Sit-down. You can watch the entire interview in the video player above.
Earleywine said all of the members of the Central Missouri Athletic Conference met in Sedalia on Sunday to discuss the upcoming fall sports season. He said fan attendance was the primary topic, but they were unable to come up with a uniform policy.
"The tough part is trying to figure out an attendance policy that will match up with all of the different counties," Earleywine said. "We have Pettis county with the Sedalia school, and we have Boone County with the three Columbia schools, and then we have JC and Capital City in Cole County. All four ordinances are different."
Earleywine said JCSD is leaning toward having 20% capacity in the stands. Adkins Stadium holds about 6,000 fans, so Earleywine said he's hoping to have 1,200 spectators for each home game. He said the school district is working on a plan to decide who will get to be in the 1,200 in attendance.
Fall sports practices begin on Monday, and Earleywine said there are plenty of safety precautions in place to keep the kids and staff member safe.
"Everybody's wearing masks that's not competing," Earleywine said. "Everybody's got their own water bottle and trying to stay six feet apart, and we're doing everything that we can. We're doing everything that you hear about on the news. At the end of the day, I don't know how much of that is truly effective and how much of it is is for show, but we're trying to do everything we can."
Earleywine said JCSD is asking kids and their families to sign a waiver before they participate in athletics this fall.
"Just to kind of release us of the responsibility of somebody testing positive because even if they do test positive, we don't know that it came from sports - it could've come from something they did on the weekend."
Overall, Earleywine is optimistic about fall sports in Mid-Missouri. He doesn't anticipate MSHSAA or Gov. Parson shutting down the season.
"If I had to guess, I'd say they're all going to play that first weekend," Earleywine said. "But, that's just a total guess, so nobody can hold me to that."
