The Shelby Eastern Schools board is interested in purchasing a 5.5 acre parcel of land adjacent to Morristown High School’s baseball field.

At Wednesday’s monthly school board meeting, the board gave superintendent Dr. Todd Hitchcock permission to work with legal assistance to negotiate the purchase of the land.

“The land we are inquiring about purchasing would be east of the current baseball facility at Morristown,” explained Hitchcock after the meeting. “There are a row of trees behind the baseball diamond, on the other side of that on what is Washington St. in town, there is a five-and-a-half acre parcel of land that is currently farmed. There is no existing structure on it.”

There are no immediate plans for the land should the school system negotiation the purchase, according to Hitchcock.

School board president Ben Kuhn was in favor of the purchase to have control of the land for future use.

“It is in an area where if someone else bought it they would probably consider building houses on it. That could be good to bring students but it could be bad if we need (the land) later and we can’t get it back,” said Kuhn in the meeting. “And we always have the option to sell it again later. We only have the chance to buy it once.”

The land could continue to be farmed while under the school system’s ownership.

In other board business Wednesday:

• Approved a food service agreement to keep Chartwells in the school system’s lunchrooms.
• Tabled a decision on the addition of a football club as an extracurricular activity to obtain more information. “That item was placed on the agenda because the board was in discussion and considering what it would look like if Waldron football, 8-man as a club sport, and what does a club sport mean versus what does it mean to be sponsored by the athletic department?” said Hitchcock. “What does it mean for our liability? What does it mean for their liability? The board wanted some more information so we are going to get some more information and come back to that in July.”