Contents of Baltic High School’s new fitness center have been installed as of this week, and Baltic School Board members talked scheduling and usage during the group’s Oct. 8 regular meeting.

As of last week’s meeting, the equipment vendor had nearly finished delivery and set up of the new items in the center. Superintendent Bob Sittig said that there were a few minor details to complete but that the school hoped the facility was ready for use by Monday, Oct. 15.

“We may not, however, allow students to begin using it on that day,” Sittig said last week. “We are planning some training sessions that we want students to participate in before they use the facility to make sure they know how to use the equipment so that students can get the maximum benefit from using the facility.”

The administrator said that the school’s “Fitness for Life” classes, though, would begin use of the new space on Monday, as they’d been previously trained on the equipment.

The center will be monitored by a staff member from 3:30-5 p.m., Mondays through Thursdays, with Fridays to be added at a later date if interest is high. Open workouts, though, will be held off on until training sessions have been completed.

“Jason Aberson has the title of ‘fitness coach,’ so he is in charge of the training sessions and scheduling supervision in the facility,” Sittig said. “We have had some tentative discussions about community use, but we are going to start by just allowing students and staff to use the facility and then later we will discuss community use.”

The board previously discussed public use of the facility at its September meeting. At that time, members mulled possibilities such as 24/7 key access, staff hours for monitoring and whether or not to charge community members for use.

Though no official action was taken, school board members agreed that letting students make use of the facility for some time before making public use decisions would be the best route.