Siuslaw High School biology teacher Gina Castro-Brandt has been elected president of the Siuslaw Athletic Booster Club, succeeding Jack Butler.

Butler, who recently resigned as the Vikings' boys basketball coach, had been president the past three years.

Jennifer Waggoner was elected vice-president and will spearhead the annual auction that is one of the club's big moneymakers.

Eric Tanikawa will continue as treasurer, Lynnette Holdahl as secretary and Kim Pickell as membership chair.

It's been a year of achievement for the SABC, which paid for a number of big-ticket items during the 2014-15 school year, and still has a balance approaching $60,000.

"We paid more than $16,000 for a new scoreboard at Hans Petersen Memorial Field," says Butler. "It's a nice, neat scoreboard for football that's also track compatible, so they can put the times up for track.

"Now all the football teams who use the field — varsity, JV, middle school — and all the track teams can use the scoreboard. That's the idea of the booster club, to enhance athletics across the board."

The club also paid $6,000 for wrestling mats, $2,500 for middle-school football uniforms, $3,500 for two low-impact elliptical machines and $3,000 to repair the high school track.

"We did some things for baseball, cross country, did a wind-block for Petersen Field. We did quite a lot," says Butler.

Also at the August monthly meeting, the club voted to give each of the seven middle-school athletic programs $500. The high school programs are getting $1,000 each.

It will lift some of the burden on coaches, who are responsible for raising some 20 percent of their budget or face program cutbacks.

"We try to do what helps most of the kids," says Butler. "The coaches will have some discretion on where to spend the money to best do that."

The club's board will hold an executive meeting Monday, Sept. 14, to set club goals and priorities for the coming school year.

The club holds open meetings the last Monday of the month at the Siuslaw High School library. The next meeting is 6:30 p.m. Monday, Sept. 28.

For more information about the club, go to its website, http://www.siuslawathleticboosterclub.com/, email sabc_1972@hotmail.com or write to SABC, PO Box 1972, Florence, OR 97439.