The old expression “you won’t believe your eyes” is used for a multitude of breathtaking things, but when it’s used to describe the new TAG Building at Rancho Cotate-Rohnert Park it’s literally taking it to another level with respect to a high school facility.
The TAG Building, or Theatre, Arts, Gymnasium building that’s set to open for students and faculty on March 25, is a $56.4 million project (including landscaping and parking lot improvements) that is the finest of its kind in California and possibly the entire nation.
A gymnasium with a seating capacity of 2,500 that is named after revered former athletic director Henri J. Sarlatte, who passed away in 2010, is the centerpiece of the TAG Building, and is unequaled for a high school gym in Northern California. In fact, the only similar high school gymnasium we know of in all of California is at Mater Dei-Santa Ana,
Besides boasting a remarkable gymnasium the 40.000 square foot plus TAG Building is a whole lot more than a new gym.
The one of a kind facility also houses a 250-seat theater with a state of the art sound system, plus it also combines a state-of-the-art approach to education.
The people of Rohnert Park should be proud of what they voted for when residents approved two bond measures, Measure B in 2014 and Measure C in 2016. Once the funds were in place construction began at the conclusion of the 2017 school year.
“This project has been a long time in the works,” said Henri Sarlatte, the son of the man the gymnasium is named after.
“The original gym was only temporary so my dad started envisioning something like this 30-years ago when he was the athletic director, and it’s been in the plans of the (Cotati-Rohnert Park Unified School) District since then,” continued Sarlatte, himself a former Rancho Cotate athletic director and a current Assistant Principal that among other things oversees athletics, and is the school’s on-site administrative designee for the TAG Building project, serving as the liaison with the construction company and the district’s Facilities, Maintenance and Operations Department.
“A while back I saw an animated presentation of the facility and I know of nothing like it anywhere that I’ve been made aware of,” said retiring state CIF Executive Director Roger Blake.
“It looks like it’s going to be just spectacular and a great addition for not only the school but the entire community,” continued Blake. “As a former school administrator you couldn’t ask for anything better. The way they’re maximizing the space by combining classrooms along with athletics and a performing arts center is absolutely unique to my knowledge. I would think the CIF would be looking at the site for Regional events.”
The elder Sarlatte may have envisioned a replacement for the old gym, however it’s hard to believe anyone could have pictured something as magnificent as what we saw when his proud son took us on a tour of the TAG Building last week with retired North Bay League Commissioner Marie Sugiyama.
Workers were busy putting the finishing touches on the TAG Building, but even not totally complete what we saw on a tour that took nearly an hour was stunning.
Of course the tour started with the jewel and showpiece of the TAG Building, the Henri J. Sarlatte gymnasium.
Not only does the gym hold 2,500 but it doubles as a theater with a dropdown video projector and a huge screen on the western wall with a stage in front of the screen that also makes the gym suitable for all-student rallies and other presentations.
Next was the visitors’ locker room and for anyone facing the Cougars from now on they’ll have a locker room that almost assuredly is better than the one they have for themselves at their school.
From there we went to the other side of the stage and screen in the gym to the theater, and I can’t say I’ve ever seen anything like it except at a major college or university.
The theater also has an adjacent shop for making props and other things for productions. There’s a backstage room behind the theater stage with girls and boys dressing rooms that has a common area between them with makeup stations that resembles something you might see backstage on Broadway. The backstage area also has one of many TV screens throughout the TAG Building that will show what is happening on stage.
Sarlatte’s next stop on the tour was a huge band room that will also be used for the orchestra and choir.
The tour continued to a dance studio with a beautiful hardwood floor and glass walls that Sarlatte hopes will grow the dance program from currently offered modern dance and aerobics.
The weight room was state-of-the art as well and the Cougars student-athletes won’t have any excuses for not being in shape with all the fine equipment now available. We also visited the new physical education offices adjacent to a new locker room, a really nice varsity team room and a training room.
“We certainly don’t have anything like this in the North Coast Section. Dublin built an outstanding new gym and a performing arts center but they’re on opposite sides of the campus,” said retiring NCS Commissioner Gill Lemmon. “I’m so happy for the Rancho Cotate community and for Henri. I’ve been following the progress and I know how hard he has worked on the project.”
Athletics to state-of-the-art education
What makes the TAG Building even more unique is four of the six new academies for freshmen are housed in the facility.
The Careers in Sports Academy and Drama Production Academy are on the first floor with the gym and theatre, and the Computer Science Academy and Film Production Academy with an adjacent green room and editing room, are on the second floor.
Two other academies, the Law and Justice Academy and the Biomedical Academy will be on the main campus.
According to Sarlatte and Gehrig Hotaling, the Rancho Cotate football coach who also teaches business and sports management in which he has a Masters Degree, the freshmen academies are the brainchild of current principal Dr. Louis Ganzler.
“I’ve been with Louis seven years when we started at Windsor as teachers and then at Technology Middle school where he was a teacher and vice principal, and fully understand his vision. It’s what we did at Windsor and he believes it’s a very successful education model,” said Hotaling, who plans on joining Ganzler in getting a doctorate that for him will be in sports management, however that will have to wait until after he and his wife welcome a baby in July.
Each academy has its own curriculum but the students also rotate between the academy and English and World History classes, none of which are in the TAG Building, but even those two classes are tailored toward the academy in that the students will be taught sports curriculum in the two non academy classes. Hotaling had two perfect examples for the Career in Sports Academy where he will be the instructor.
“In history when studying Rome it won’t be so much about the fall of Rome, instead it will be about the societal consequences of the Gladiators and contests that led to the fall of Rome,” Hotaling said. “In English instead of Bless Me, Ultima it could be The Jackie Robinson Story.”
Overall the Careers in Sports Academy will examine careers in sports as well as the organizational management of leagues, and will also be ideal for students interested in the business and management side of sports. Once the freshmen leave the academy they can continue their careers in sports studies in sports psychology, sports broadcasting, kinesiology and advanced business strategies classes.
For both Sarlatte and Hotaling the TAG Building project has a lot of meaning to them personally, and for the Rancho Cotate and the Rohnert Park and Cotati communities as well.
For Hotaling, a 2002 graduate of Rancho Cotate who played on two North Coast Section Division 3A Redwood Empire championship teams, and assisted retired Cougars Coach Ed Conroy for eight years before taking the helm two years ago, seeing something like the TAG Building makes him proud of the community where he grew up.
“For me personally I can’t wrap my brain around it or the true meaning yet,” Hotaling remarked. “It’s too big to comprehend, too important to fully understand, like a work of art, a Picasso.”
“For the community it’s no secret Rohnert Park has sometimes been underappreciated in Sonoma County and considered a commuter town,” Hotaling continued. “Between this and the new downtown Rohnert Park will finally become a destination spot.”
Although a he’s a 1986 graduate of St. Vincent de Paul-Petaluma and is helping coach the softball team at his alma mater, Sarlatte has had a decade’s long affiliation with Rancho Cotate because of his father.
“The naming of the gymnasium for my father has been really meaningful to me because he had this vision for so many years and now I’ve had a hand in helping bring it to fruition,” Sarlatte said.
“Just to be able to have this type of facility for the residents of Rohnert Park and Cotati is phenomenal,” continued Sarlatte. “It chokes me up thinking about the generations of students this facility will benefit.”
For Dr. Ganzler, who has been promoting the TAG Building in public service announcements on local radio, Sarlatte, Hotaling, and all the students, teachers and staff at Rancho Cotate, and the Rohnert Park and Cotati communities, Monday and the opening of the TAG Building can’t come soon enough.
