This is something that is very near and dear to me, so I've been keeping a close eye on the proceedings.

Amarillo has long been in need of a youth sports complex, and not long ago, Kids Inc. announced they were trying to make that happen.

Well, I'm happy to report that Kids Inc. is officially halfway home in securing the funding they need to get the project up and rolling.

Back in January, they announced plans to build this complex with 90 acres of land that was donated by Suzanne Attebury Boyce and Matt Griffith from Rockrose Development.

The plans for the massive complex were detailed here but to refresh your memory, we're talking about baseball and softball fields, football fields, soccer fields, track, etc. It's all there.

$30 million was needed to build out phase one of the complex, and as of today, Kids Inc. announced they are sitting at the halfway point. All of the money has been raised or donated by local companies and people. There is no tax money going towards this project.

As a coach and parent of kids that play sports here in Amarillo, I can't begin to tell you how much this is needed. Sure, we have some city fields and they serve their purpose, but as youth sports continue to get bigger, the facilities need to follow.

The city does a fine job of keeping the fields playable (at least when it comes to baseball), but they don't sink as much money and time into them as they need. Finding fields to practice on can be a challenge when you're full-on in-season.

The Kids Inc. facility will be all turf, which makes maintenance much easier and Amarillo will have one of the premier facilities for youth sports anywhere in the region. I've mentioned before how much this can mean for area businesses as these teams travel in for tournaments every weekend.

If you can or want to, please donate whatever you can to the project. You can reach out to Kids Inc. President & CEO Jimmy Lackey at 806-376-5936 or email him at jlackey@kidsinc.com for more info on how you can help.

Google Answers the Top 10 Questions About Amarillo

I love Google. It can literally answer ANYTHING you need it to answer. Whether it's right or wrong is a totally different question.

Recently, I found myself wondering about something and went to Google. And that's when I started noticing the "people also asked..." section and BOY...Some of them made perfect sense, some of them were interesting, and one of them was downright baffling...and it was a top 10 question which is even more absurd.

So let's see what we've got. Here's the top 10 questions as asked to Google about Amarillo.

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Here are the best things to do in Amarillo.

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