Penn-Harris-Madison schools lands more naming rights donations
Penn High School baseball fans this spring could watch the Kingsmen defend their state title at “Jordan Automotive Field,” and football fans in the fall will buy refreshments at the “Zolman Tire Concession Stand" at TCU Freed Field.
The Penn-Harris-Madison School Corp. board Monday night unanimously approved an agreement in which Mishawaka-based Zolman’s Tire & Auto Care will donate $25,000 to the P-H-M Education Foundation in exchange for the naming rights for the field’s north concession stand. Company President Nate Zolman is a Penn High School graduate and his children attend P-H-M schools.
Zolman will pay $5,000 a year each December over the next five years, plus the signage costs, and the naming rights will last for 12 years. The money will be paid into the foundation’s endowment fund to pay its overhead expenses related to administering general scholarship donations, except for 20 percent that will go into the school corporation’s discretionary fund.
Zolman has in the past contributed to the high school’s football, rugby, hockey and robotics teams.
“Both Zolman’s and the foundation’s commitment to PHM students’ education, experience, growth and quality of life is unparalleled,” Zolman said in a statement. “We are proud to become a long-term partner.”
The amount of the Jordan Automotive donation and baseball field naming rights has yet to be finalized, said P-H-M spokeswoman Lucha Ramey. Monday night’s board action authorized the Education Foundation to move forward with negotiating an agreement with the Mishawaka car dealer.
The Zolman deal brings the total amount of pledged donations secured in the foundation’s naming rights initiative, launched in August 2014, to $565,000 over 12 years. Other agreements have included:
• TCU Freed Field, $400,000 over 12 years.
• Music rooms at all P-H-M elementary schools named after Jim and Julie Schwartz, $50,000 over 10 years.
• Lionshead Penn High Soccer Field, $25,000 over five years.
• Dar and Dot Wiekamp Penn High School Tennis Courts, $25,000 over five years.
• May Oberfell Lorber Penn High School Softball Field, $25,000 over five years.
After the Jordan baseball field agreement is reached, the only Penn High sports facility yet to be named will be its basketball court.