The the big ironies of North Texas school districts — taxpayers foot the bill for those multimillion-dollar stadiums, turf fields, courts, and gyms, but the second class is out, the gates get locked like it’s Fort Knox. Meanwhile, kids are dodging cars in the street because they can’t set foot on the pristine facilities their parents literally paid for.

It’s not even just a summer thing — a lot of districts have blanket “no public use” policies year-round. They’ll cite liability, vandalism, or “preservation of facilities” as the reason, but the result is the same: empty fields, fenced-off courts, and taxpayers staring at what they bought but can’t touch.