Hailed as a model for future coordinated projects that might someday erase the stigma attached to many Hawai'i public school facilities, Roosevelt High's sparkling renovated Ticky Vasconcellos Stadium was unveiled yesterday just in time for Saturday's graduation ceremony.

The $4.5 million makeover includes a state-of-the-art artificial turf field — the only one on a Hawai'i public school campus — along with a synthetic all-weather track; new long jump, high jump and pole vault pits; shot put area; and concession stand.

Its cost was shared by public, corporate and individual sources, and the result is a first-class facility expected to be used by at least four high schools as well as the community at large.

"Everybody worked together, and to actually see it now is amazing," said Roosevelt High athletic director John Chung, who has taught, coached and been an administrator at the school for the past 23 years. "But I've been telling everybody that we are a test project. The bottom line is that more public schools need help, so there is good in this."

The state of public school facilities has been a much-chronicled topic for decades, and Roosevelt's football/soccer field might have been a centerpiece illustration. It is the football home field not only for the Rough Riders, but also McKinley, Farrington and sometimes Kaimuki.

But hosting four games every weekend (including junior varsity) took a toll on the grass field. After three months of daily beatings from thundering cleats and buckets of rain — interspersed by days of scorching sun — it more closely resembled a barren desert tract.

And that was before soccer season even started.

Roosevelt football coach Les Parrilla said the field would be so hardened by late season, the team stopped practicing onside kicks.

And the dirt track might have been even worse.

Longtime Rough Riders track and field coach Jeff Azuma said the school had to dig and patch holes on the oval every year.

"We talked about (an improved facility) for so long, and we used to say, 'Not in our lifetime,' " Parrilla said in October, when ground was broken on the renovation project.

HELP FROM ALL SIDES

Ironically, the wheels of progress started turning not from a high school event, but rather correspondence with the National Football League.

In early 2005, Hawai'i High School Athletic Association executive director Keith Amemiya was alerted to the NFL's "Grassroots" program, which provides funding to refurbish and renovate school and community football fields in NFL cities.

Amemiya said Honolulu was considered an exception to the city requirement because it hosts the Pro Bowl, so the NFL and its field renovation partner, Local Initiatives Support Corporation, offered to award a $200,000 grant to the HHSAA for Roosevelt's field if the HHSAA was able to generate $200,000 or more in matching funds.

Amemiya then approached attorney and Roosevelt graduate Bert T. Kobayashi Jr., former First Hawaiian Bank CEO Walter Dods and State Sen. Brian Taniguchi, D-10th (Manoa, McCully), for advice and guidance on how to obtain the matching funds and additional funding.

"Those are the three key players who ultimately made the project a reality," Amemiya said.

Amemiya said Kobayashi spearheaded alumni fundraising efforts and enlisted retired Circuit Judge Marie Milks and State Sen. Carol Fukunaga, D-11th (Makiki, Pawa'a), to co-chair Roosevelt's 75th Anniversary Dinner in November 2005, which raised more than $500,000, including a donation from Friends of Hawai'i Charities.

Taniguchi, then chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, helped secure about $4 million from the legislature.

"This was a true community effort in that both the public and private sector worked together to make the project a reality," Amemiya said.

"Due to the tightening economy and sheer amount of school and community needs, the days of relying on the government to provide for all our needs are probably over. The public/private partnership forged to make the Roosevelt facility (happen) is the wave of the future, and hopefully can be used as a model for future school and community projects."

MODEL FOR OTHERS

Taniguchi, a Roosevelt alumnus whose two children also graduated from the school, said he had "chicken skin" while standing on the brand-new artificial surface yesterday and agreed the project should be emulated by others.

"It's just amazing. I'm hoping this is a formula that can work for other schools," Taniguchi said. "The NFL grant gave us a beacon, so we said, 'Let's take advantage of it.' I'm a public schools guy, and our students are deserving, but we don't always get first-class stuff. Hopefully this facility will be a platform for the future."

The highlight of the renovation is the 75,000 square feet (1.7 acres) of Momentum 51 artificial turf, which is similar to the FieldTurf at Aloha Stadium. Momentum 51 is used at the Louisiana Superdome, the University of California's Memorial Stadium and the Baltimore Ravens' M&T Bank Stadium.

Jon Muraoka, a vice president at design firm Fukunaga & Associates, said the turf comes with an eight-year warranty and maintenance equipment is included.

"The (rain) water will percolate through crushed rocks, and the field will have a series of drains every 15 feet, so there will be no standing water," said Muraoka, who described Momentum 51 as "top of the line" and Roosevelt's field as "the best in the state."

No more muddy games, no more rock-hard landings after being tackled, no more dirt where there should be grass.

"The students are excited, they're antsy," said Chung, Roosevelt's AD. "They can't wait to play on it."