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HIGH SCHOOL
Ventura County Star
The Taj Mahal of Ventura County ballparks has been built on the campus of Fillmore High School.
Booty Sanchez Varsity Baseball Field’s towering support beams, painted bright Fillmore blue, are visible from blocks away. Manicured grass stretches out 365 feet from home plate to the center-field fence, while the carefully raked infield dirt looks almost like carpet.
Fillmore Unified School District Superintendent Christine Schieferle recognizes that visiting teams — and even locals — might be surprised when they park their car at Fillmore High and lay eyes on the new stadium.
“These are facilities that some may not expect to see in a small district, small town,” Schieferle said. “We just like to say, our kids deserve it. (We) say, ‘Why not Fillmore?’ ”
The $4.4 million stadium opened Feb. 19 after five months of construction.
Notable details include a 30-foot-tall section of foul-ball netting around the backstop, enclosed dugouts with covered roofs for both home and visiting teams, a large programmable scoreboard, five new bleacher sections, and a new irrigation system.
A towering batter’s eye dominates the center-field fence line, near the padded, six-foot-tall home-run fence and 15-foot warning track — all designed by consultant Bert Vigil and his company, Turf Team Inc.
It is the dream ballpark for a storied Fillmore baseball program.
Hall of Fame pitcher Rick Stewart and the great Flashes teams of the mid-1970s won three-straight CIF-Southern Section titles from 1975-77, before finishing runner-up in 1979. In 2023, the Flashes advanced to the Division 7 title game.
Fillmore baseball head coach JR Sandoval said he and his players were blown away when they first stepped foot on the field and have continued to be astonished watching the excitement it has generated around the program.
“It’s just an experience for the kids. It’s cool seeing the scoreboard and upgrades to everything. The biggest thing, for me, is having support,” Sandoval said. “Having a bunch of people coming to games, and they have something to look at — not only the baseball game, but something beautiful to look at.”
“The other field was great, don’t get me wrong, but this field is just so much better,” said junior pitcher Thomas Alamillo. “We were at a loss for words.”
Construction of the new facilities was funded entirely by a pair of general obligation bonds, Measure V and Measure G, which passed in 2016 and 2022, respectively.
Measure V authorized $35 million, then an additional $7 million the following year, with a goal of constructing a new varsity baseball stadium at Fillmore High. Eight years later, Measure G added $41.6 million more to fund, in part, the construction of a massive new athletic complex on the site of the old varsity baseball stadium.
Both bond measures passed with overwhelming support from the voters of Fillmore and Piru.
“It just shows that the community recognizes the potential, and they want to see that potential in our kids, from kindergarten all the way through,” Fillmore Assistant Principal D.R. Moreland said. “I think it’s really special.”
The funds raised have gone towards countless renovation and development projects across the district, according to Schieferle.
“Fillmore and Piru — they are generational. Many of our students’ parents, grandparents went through our schools,” Schieferle said. “There is a genuine interest in wanting to see our kids succeed, wanting to see kids in our community go out and do great things.”
“We have such a tight-knit community here,” Sandoval said. “When something goes into building facilities for Fillmore, they are going to buy into it. … I have lived here my whole life, so I know how strong the support is.”
Gene Evans has lived in Fillmore since 1961 and in the same home on Central Avenue since 1971. He was a close friend of the late Gabriel “Booty” Sanchez, the new stadium’s namesake.
A former baseball player himself, at neighboring Santa Paula High and Ventura College, Evans has seen his fair share of local ballparks. When Fillmore’s new stadium began to take shape, Evans could tell it was going to be unique.
“We watched it, from the first breaking ground and moving the dirt around, and wondering how they were ever going to make a field out of that,” Evans said while watching his grandson, Alamillo, pitch against Channel Islands on March 28. “Cut to this — I just wish I would have played on a field like this when I was a kid.”
The baseball field is just the first of many changes coming to Fillmore High’s athletic facilities.
Construction of a 43,000-square-foot athletic complex, with an estimated price tag of $27 million, is on the horizon.
The bidding process for the construction of the facility is complete, said Schieferle, and Fillmore High plans to award the contract at its school board meeting on May 6. Construction is set to begin this summer and administrators project a completion date in approximately 18 months.
A central gymnasium will house three basketball courts, with seating for more than 1,500 fans. With the use of a retractable wall, the gym will be able to expand or shrink based on need, from practice to game time.
The facility will also include a new weight training room, a new wrestling room, an equipment room, team storage rooms, locker rooms for players and coaches, training rooms and an athletic treatment room, which will accommodate Fillmore High Director of Sports Medicine Breanna McLain.
The Fillmore High Hall of Fame will be relocated to the lobby of the new building and trophy cases will proudly celebrate the great Flashes of old.
“As soon as you walk in the building, you are going to see that small-town, hometown sense of pride,” Schieferle said, “and all of the athletes that came before us.”
Dominic Massimino is a staff writer for the Star. He can be reached at [email protected]. For more coverage, follow @vcsdominic on Twitter and Instagram.