Moore spoke at length about health and safety protocols for athletes, as well as transportation to and from away games.

“Our new start date is Aug. 24 for practices,” Moore said. “This (plan) just verifies the different transportation … it matches up with the plan that you already approved for the school district.”

Last Thursday, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf made a recommendation that scholastic sports do not take place until Jan. 1, 2021. In response, the PIAA suspended the start of the fall sports season for two weeks while it works to coordinate with the governor’s office about how to safely have fall athletics in the Commonwealth.

According to several published reports, PIAA associated executive director Melissa Mertz said the PIAA had emailed a letter to Wolf’s office on Tuesday.

PHOTOS COURTESY BELLEFONTE AREA SCHOOL DISTRICT
Directional stickers have been placed on the floors at Bellefonte Area High School. In between the directional stickers are additional stickers reminding students to social distance and stay six feet apart during the school day. The board held its lone August meeting on Tuesday night.

Mandatory football practices were slated to begin on Monday, Aug. 10 and other fall sports on Monday, Aug. 17. However, the two-week delay means that practices cannot begin until at least Monday, Aug. 24. The first day of school in the district is Tuesday, Aug. 25.

Board member Rodney Musser asked about attendance at games. Under the governor’s current guidelines, outside groups must be kept to 250 or less.

“I am under the assumption that we won’t have many people sitting in the stands,” he said.

“At this point, no,” Moore responded.

Musser then asked if there was a way to stream games live.

PHOTOS COURTESY BELLEFONTE AREA SCHOOL DISTRICT Directional stickers have been placed on the floors at Bellefonte Area High School. In between the directional stickers are additional stickers reminding students to social distance and stay six feet apart during the school day. The board held its lone August meeting on Tuesday night.

“We have ordered a software program in order to stream it live and put it on YouTube. We are looking into different cameras and how we’re going to do that,” Moore said.

Moore did admit that it will be difficult to stream every event live because schedules often overlap.

“We can have four events going on at one time, but we’ll try our best,” Moore said.

Board president Jon Guizar inquired about another way to broadcast games.

“Have we looked at C-NET coverage? Is that something C-NET could cover?” he asked.

According to Ken Bean, director of fiscal affairs, C-NET is a possibility.

“They could cover some of it. We’d have to pay for additional coverage,” Bean said.

Bean said that he’s in favor of buying equipment to stream it live.

“The equipment will last us several years,” he said. “It’s better for us to buy the equipment.”

In other sports news, Moore said that the district plans on playing all of its Mountain League games. Non-league games may be a casualty of the delayed start, however.

Additionally, marching band and cheerleaders would be allowed to attend football games. Interim superintendent Tammie Burnaford said that Mountain League superintendents and ADs met virtually last week to discuss that.

“Our bands and cheerleaders should be able to participate. I think we’ve pretty much come to an understanding that to stay under the 250, we will have our band at our home events, our cheerleaders at our home events … at least we will give them a venue to be able to participate,” Burnaford said.

Another announcement is expected from the PIAA on Friday, Aug. 21 regarding the future of fall sports. The first football games throughout the state were scheduled for Friday, Aug. 28.

“I have everybody practicing as if there is going to be a season,” Moore said. “We’re keeping that optimistic.”