Raptors sports, activities co-op tripped up near goal line

The Carlton-Wrenshall Raptors football program won’t take the field for varsity action this season. It’s a victim of not having enough players despite the cooperative agreement between schools in the eastern half of the county.

The schools will try to rebuild the football program by participating in the junior varsity and junior high levels.

The possible expansion of a sports and activities co-op between Carlton and Wrenshall came to a halt this month, after the Wrenshall school board balked at the 13-page agreement approved by Carlton.

“This is not what we agreed upon,” said Wrenshall board member Nicole Krisak during an Aug. 8 meeting.

Sides spent late spring working out an agreement that would make a series of co-curricular activities into co-op programs, programs such as robotics, One Act and Three Act plays, science fair, math league, and Knowledge Bowl. The agreement approved by Carlton also strengthened language for how the schools conduct the business of co-op programs, borrowing from policy used by the longstanding co-op between Moose Lake and Willow River.

But no sports were added in the agreement approved by the Carlton school board in July.

Krisak was among the Wrenshall board members to participate in negotiations last May. She and fellow board member Ben Johnson said they expected to see baseball as part of the agreement, with possibilities for more sports beyond the current cross country, track and field and football co-ops.

“What’s disappointing is reading those comments that indicate Carlton is essentially trying to pull a fast one,” Carlton superintendent John Engstrom told the Pine Knot last week. “That didn’t happen.”

Engstrom was charged with taking notes during negotiations, and crafting the agreement he said he mailed both parties in June. He didn’t receive any feedback early in the summer, he said, and, minus that, the Carlton school board went ahead and approved the agreement.

“My contention is when we walked out of that last meeting at the end of May everybody knew exactly where we stood,” Engstrom said.

The Wrenshall school board has charged its superintendent Kim Belcastro with restarting negotiations. But Engstrom said it’s too late for that.

“As far as I’m concerned the work of the committee is done,” he told the Carlton board.

In an update he wrote informing Carlton board members, Engstrom took issue with Wrenshall committee members’ claims of an altered agreement, and also their preoccupation with the future of Carlton schools.

“Both districts face challenges,” Engstrom wrote in his response. “While these challenges indirectly permeate into everything we do, neither district’s long-term future is under the purview of this committee.”

The agreement leaves the door open for the possibility to add more sports. According to Engstrom, a straw poll among co-op committee members from both schools produced near unanimous support for sharing all sports.

“A few days later we received an email stating that the ‘Wrenshall team’ was only interested in adding baseball,” Engstrom wrote.

At a recent Wrenshall meeting, volleyball coach John Peterson lamented a declining roster size, with 25 players grades six through 12 — down from 36 or 37 last season.

“I’ve just had a bunch of kids say they’re not going to play,” Peterson said, while wishing aloud for a co-op program with Carlton.

If any of this sounds familiar, it was only last year Carlton was central to another co-op discussion. In that case, Carlton walked away from an agreement that would have built a co-op with Cloquet.

“So, I understand,” Engstrom said. “It’s totally fair game to say no. A year ago we put a lot of work in with Cloquet, and Cloquet was ready to pass something and we turned it down.”

He said it’ll be up to Wrenshall to move next.

“They need to decide what they’re going to do,” Engstrom said. “We’ve already approved the agreement. I would say we did exactly what we said we were going to do.”