With district-wide cuts set to take place for next school year, Wareham High’s athletic budget will be trimmed down by $20,000, with user fees to increase as a result.

As for the cuts in spending, Athletic Director Ed Rodrigues said he wasn’t too worried about them, as long as the district doesn’t get into the habit of doing it every year.

“We’re going to be OK,” said Rodrigues when reached by phone recently. “If we continue to do this, it won’t be OK.”

Rodrigues said they hope the raise in fees will make up for some of the money lost in the budget cuts, adding that comparatively, their new rates are still reasonable compared to other schools.

“Hopefully, (the user fees) will make up some of that,” he said. “They’re still some of the lowest in the area.”

While fees will stay the same for golf, tennis, and cheerleading ($100) due to their lower costs compared to other sports, each of the baseball, softball, field hockey, volleyball, soccer, basketball, and track teams will go up to $125, football will go up to $150, and hockey up to $250.

There is also a maximum of $500 per family, up from the $400 cap seen last year.

Comparatively, Old Rochester Regional has a $600 cap for families with a $225 fee for a student’s first sport, while Bourne has a $1000 family cap with a $300 fee for one sport.

Part of the cuts include the disbanding of a joint wrestling team with Carver High School, which Rodrigues said only included two Wareham High students last year.

“It doesn’t make sense for us to continue that sport,” said Rodrigues, adding that it cost them about $2,000 for the wrestling team this past year.

Wareham High Principal Scott Palladino, who presented the restructuring of the user fee program to the School Committee last week along with Rodrigues, said that although the cuts were necessary, they’re still going to strive to ensure that the program remains in place and continues to grow.

“Ed and I really feel strongly in keeping as many programs at the high school that we can, and obviously in order to do that and sustain the $20,000 cut, we need to take a look at our budget and try and figure out how we can maintain the programs that we have and attract the best and the brightest students and student athletes to Wareham High School.”

Rodrigues added that they’ll continue the practice of offering waivers for the fees, but only for those who truly need them.

“The people that are getting the waivers deserve it,” he said.

School Committee member Geoffrey Swett cautioned Rodrigues and Palladino that by raising fees, they might see a decline in participation.

“Unfortunately, you’ll be defying economic theory if you raise prices and have no loss in participation,” he said. “I think you’ll have to assume you’ll have some.”

Palladino said that when he initially got involved in athletics in Wareham, there were no fees, but when they did start using them, they didn’t see a major decline.

The School Committee voted unanimously to accept the new fee structure as presented by Rodrigues and Palladino at last week’s School Committee meeting.

“It’s a community responsibility to make sure that we have enough resources in our athletic programs, because it’s only going to benefit the kids,” added School Committee member Rhonda Veugen. “I applaud you for this effort.”