One option was to give the girls a locker room next to the cheerleaders’ locker room. In addition to the space not being large enough, Ferguson said the two locker rooms are only served by one bathroom.

She also said the girls P.E. locker room was also available for the softball team to use, but she felt like the area wouldn’t be secure since it was being used for P.E. and would be a visitors’ locker room.

“No one else would have people invading their space like us,” Ferguson said.

Her proposal was for softball locker rooms to be included in the field house on the side opposite of the football and baseball locker rooms. She vowed to make sure that no incidents occurred during her tenure as Hartselle softball coach.

Board member Randy Sparkman, however, said the school system has limited resources and the project is already running over budget. He suggested that the board look at scaling back the field house to prevent additional overspending while including locker rooms for each football, baseball and softball.

Jason Weisner asked the board how they would pay for the projected additional school costs, which was estimated at nearly $44 million and $1.3 million over budget.

“Will the $1.3 million come from the state capital improvement funds to pay for the new high school?” he asked.

Reed answered, “No.”