BY KEITH LIPPOLDT
klippoldt@gbtribune.com
The late spring rains the past few weeks slowed the opening of the Great Bend City Pool and caused postponements of several little league baseball and softball games. Now that the weather has dried up, activities across the city have ramped up and the GBRC staff is experiencing big numbers of participants and spectators.
“We’ve been getting ready for pool season,” GBRC Enrichment, Aquatic and Marketing Director Megan Hammeke said. “We have opened the pool. We’ve been closed more days than we’ve been open with the crazy weather. And then fitness wise, we have all of our normal fitness classes going on, but obviously in the summer, we also add in the water aerobics and the a.m. water aerobics. A.m. water aerobics is actually the fullest we’ve had it since we started it three years. I think we have almost 20 ladies that get there early, but they haven’t got to get in the pool yet either, because it was 55 degrees Tuesday and 60 degrees on Thursday at class time. So we pushed it off. And then the evening class just cannot stop growing. I think they’re at like 50-some participants in the evening that show up Monday through Thursday. So water aerobics is very popular.”
Sports Director Shane Sandberg has also had to deal with Mother Nature. GBRC hosted the 2-1A KSHSAA 2-1A Baseball Championship at the Great Bend Sports Complex and although the games were able to be played, the conditions weren’t ideal early on.
“The city workers were out there late the night before trying to get us in the best shape as possible,” Sandberg said. “It wasn’t the most ideal conditions we ever played in on Thursday morning, but once we got a little sunshine, we were able to battle through and crown a new state champion.” Pittsburgh Colgan won its second state title in three years.
“Saturday and Sunday we hosted our biggest Hap Dumont Tournament that we host each summer. We had a good turnout for that to the point where we had to play some games on Friday evening.
“We’ll start men’s adult, slow pitch softball Tuesday, and then everything will be up and running. May is kind of my crazy month with planning, and then once it gets up and running, we’ll just hope it slows down a little bit. The planning part seems just as hard as the actual getting out there and doing it part.”
Sandberg hosted junior golf lessons, taught by Barton Community College Golf Coach Doug Kaiser as well as the Challenger soccer camp.
Next up for Sandberg is the Pitch, Hit and Run competition scheduled for Tuesday, July 1 at the Sports Complex.
“Last year, we had our best attendance ever, in the 30s,” Sandberg said. “And I’m really shooting for doubling that. We’re going to promote it hard with all of our teams. Kids get a chance to come out to the complex. They get a pitching score, a hitting score, and then they run them from home to first base. The winner of each division, 7-8 boys and girls, 9-10 boys and girls, 11-12 boys and girls, 13-14 boys and girls, if their score is high for the region, then they get to go to Kauffman Stadium to compete up there as well. We had some that got to go to it last year.
“We usually partner with Optimist Club with that. We’re doing it on Tuesday, July 1 this year. They did some awesome trophies last year. I’m sure they’ve got something in the works again.”
Enrichment and Activity Center Director Garet Fitzpatrick reported that most of his scheduled activities are up and running with good attendance numbers. The Summer Kids Day Out programs on Friday have had 18-22 participants per event to this point. He did say that he has several spaces available for upcoming programs.
“We are bringing in the StoneLion Puppet Theater June 30 and July 1,” he said. “They’re out of Kansas City, and basically they’re just going to make puppets, and go over puppetry and how it works, and maybe learn how to put on a little puppet show, or something along that line. It’s hands on.”
Fitzpatrick also mentioned there is still space available for the T-shirt design contest.
For more information on these, or any activity, call GBRC at (620) 793-3755, ext. 110.
Here is a look at what the GBRC Board did at its June meeting:
• Heard from Business Manager Joe Henry who reported that, once again, the participant and spectator numbers trended ahead of the numbers from the previous year.
“You’ll see that, year over year, our numbers are strong,” he said. “There was a slight increase this May compared to 2024 due to the Hap Dumont Tournament we had in May this year. So it ticked up a little bit on total participation. We had a little over 11,400 participants this year versus right around 10,000 last year. And that increase was pretty much that tournament. EAnd we had a little over 6,000 spectators versus a little under 5,000 last year.”
• Voted to move the August monthly board meeting from Aug. 11 to Aug. 25 after the Budget and Revenue Neutral Rate (RNR) Hearings on the same date.
• Met in Executive Session to discuss Purchase, Exchange, or Value of Real Property.
No action was taken.
• Met in Executive Session to discuss personnel matters on non-elected personnel.
The board voted to approve $70,000 to appropriate wage increases for administration, supervisory and seasonal staff effective July 1, 2025.
