Definitely a dirty job Community groups earn money for postgame cleanup at Mac CourtBy Mark Baker The Register-Guard Published: Jan 5, 2009 08:41AM Home: PhotoAmanda Smith/The Register-Guard Churchill swimmer Andrea Douglass, 17, looks under the seats at
McArthur Court for trash Sunday. Groups can earn money for cleaning up
the stadium.
Home: StoryMcArthur Court, the University of Oregon’s historic and not-long-for-this-world basketball arena, is known as “the Pit” because of its creakiness, its steam-bath-like environment and its inhospitality to opposing teams. The old arena, which opened in 1927, lives up to its name even after a game, because then, too, it really is a pit. A pit full of hot dog wrappers, soda cups, popcorn buckets, bingo cards, pretzel cheese and … chewing tobacco spit? That’s what Churchill High School sophomore Blair Ramsing proudly held up Sunday, swishing it around in the bottom of an empty water bottle, as his best find “so far” near some courtside seats. Ramsing and about 30 other members of the Churchill swim team were busy cleaning up Mac Court after the UO men’s basketball team’s game against UCLA. Community groups, mostly high school students, clean Mac Court and the UO’s other athletic facilities — Autzen Stadium, Hayward Field, Howe Field — as a way to raise funds for their groups. UO student groups — fraternities, club sports teams, etc. — also do it, mainly after weeknight games, said Steve Green, the Athletic Department’s maintenance and laborer coordinator. Groups get $600 to clean up after a UO men’s basketball game, and $375 for a women’s game, Green said. The lesser fee for women’s games reflects smaller crowds and the fact that Mac Court’s second and third balconies are closed for women’s games. A typical men’s game, which can often be a sellout with 9,087 fans, or come close, as when 8,595 fans showed up Sunday for the UCLA game, can result in all four trash bins behind the arena being filled to their brims, said Joe Motta, an events maintenance worker for the athletic department who organizes cleanups. It’s about a three-hour job to clean Mac Court after a game, Motta said. The Churchill swim team will use the $600 it earned Sunday to buy new fins and lap counters, and start a fund for team members who can’t afford equipment, head coach Megan Murphy said. The team has held a “lapathon” to raise money, but had never before cleaned the Pit, Murphy said. And their reaction when told they’d get the chance? “Some of them were like, ‘We have to clean?’ ” assistant coach Liz Hendrickson said. “And some of them were excited to be at Mac Court.” As for Murphy and Hendrickson, they volunteered to clean the arena’s bathrooms Sunday, seemingly sparing the students. Why? “The bathrooms are the quickest and the easiest,” said a grinning Hendrickson, who had helped cleaned Mac Court when she was a member of the UO water polo team. If some of the Churchill students didn’t exactly find Sunday’s job a thrill — “I really don’t like picking up other people’s stuff, but since I’m on a team, I do it,” sophomore Mariah Godinez said — others were fine with it. “I was excited because we get to help our fellow university, and I was excited to get to hang out with friends (during winter break),” said sophomore Chloe Marquardt. She was less excited, however, when she found a “chewed-up hot dog” in a bag. “It was really not right,” she said. “It was gross.” Cleaning up Mac Court pales in comparison with cleaning Autzen after a football game. That takes about 350 people, mostly the day after a game, Green said. He hires groups for the entire season to do specific jobs. One group does bathrooms, another does the parking lot, etc. About 15 groups are working on any given Sunday after a home game, and fees paid range from $110 for cleaning up garbage immediately after a game to $1,800 paid to the group that takes blowers to the entire stadium the next day. At least at the Pit, there’s less chance of finding sneaked-in alcohol or its aftermath. “Personally, I like it for that reason,” Motta said of supervising Mac Court cleanups over Autzen. Cleanup crews start on the third and second balconies at Mac Court and work their way down to the main floor. Larger cleanup crews most likely will be needed when the UO opens the nation’s most expensive college basketball arena, the $227 million Matthew Knight Arena, in 2011, said athletic department operations manager Ryan Stock, who hopes to improve the level of recycling during cleanups at the new arena. Will the new arena be easier to clean than the Pit? “I would hope so,” Green said. “Because Mac Court is a chore. It’s just got so many nooks and crannies.” Sometimes, though, things are just lying right out in front of you, such as the barely dented bucket of Big Duck Popcorn that junior Morgan Phillips found. “That’s good stuff,” Phillips said, shoveling a handful into his mouth as fellow teammates cringed. “Life is sweet.”
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