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Park Board Packet 2006 02-23-06 YORKVILLE PARKS & RECREATION DEPARTMENT Administration Office—Riverfront Building 301 E.Hydraulic St Yorkville,IL 60560 630-553-4341 Park Board Agenda Thursday February 23, 2006 7:00 p.m. - Riverfront Building Call to Order: Roll Call: Chris Rollins, Ken Koch, Van Truman, Heather Fiala, Tammy Smock, Gary Golinski, Alderman Paul James Introduction of Guests, City Officials and Staff: Interim Directors Superintendent of Recreation —Sue Swithin Superintendent of Parks—Scott Sleezer Public Comment: Presentation: Bristol Ridge — Concept Plan MPI Yorkville South -Annexation, Zoning and Planned Unit Development Approval of Minutes: Minutes- February 9, 2006 Bills Review: Cash Analysis Bill List Old Business: New Business: Overview Parks Dept. and Recreation Dept. Budget 2006-2007 Reports: Additional Business: Adjournment: Executive Session: For the appointment, employment, compensation, discipline, performance, or dismissal of specific employees of the public body or legal counsel for the public body, (51LCS 120/2(1)). Next meeting: March 9, 2006 *Items needing Board approval or recommendation i UNITED CITY OF YORKVILLE YORKVILLE PARKS & RECREATION DEPARTMENT BOARD MEETING Parks &Recreation Administrative Offices Riverfront Building Thursday,February 9,2006 MINUTES CALL TO ORDER: Meeting was called to order by Chris Rollins at 7:02 p.m. ROLL CALL: Chris Rollins,Ken Koch, Van Truman,Heather Fiala, Gary Golinski and Alderman Paul James GUESTS/CITY OFFICIALS/STAFF: Scott Sleezer,Interim Director/Superintendent of Parks Sue Swithin, Interim Director/Superintendent of Recreation Bob Nelson,Tanglewood Homes, LaFox, Illinois Mike Brandenburg, Tanglewood Homes Traci Pleckham, Finance Director .PUBLIC COMMENTS: None APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Minutes from the January 26, 2006 board meeting will be forwarded to the next meeting. The Board did not adjourn to executive session as mentioned in the minutes. BILLS REVIEW: Cash Analysis& Bills List The check paying Marty Munns for refereeing is still being reviewed. There was question whether Marty Munns was in violation of the state statute of collecting funds from the Park Board which is City funded. The City Attorney has been made aware of the situation. Ken Koch wanted to clarify that a 1099 form will be issued to all referees who make more than$600 in the year. Sue Swithin indicated that they have made everyone aware of the situation. Gary Golinski questioned why John Wyeth is being paid out of the Parks and Recreation budget. Traci Pleckham indicated that any attorney questions coming from Parks and Recreation, including phone calls,will be charged to Parks and Recreation. For confidentiality reasons it is not itemized but Parks and Recreation can request it. 1 Van Truman motioned to approve the bills list and was seconded by Ken Koch. Roll call vote: Chris Rollins—Yes,Ken Koch—Yes, Van Truman—Yes, Heather Fiala—Yes, and Gary Golinski—Yes. The motion was unanimously approved. OLD BUSINESS: White Pines Farms Tanglewood Development Bob Nelson returned to inform the Board of some changes that have been made to the Tanglewood Homes Development property which is on the corner of Ash and Galena. Plan Council made a change to the centrally located eight acre park. The park was 305 feet from right of way to right of way and the park standards for a soccer field are 450 feet. Tanglewood Homes extended that property to 10.1 acres and retained the 58 parallel parking spaces with the potential to add more parking. There will be a direct connection through the detention area to the park. And there will be approximately twenty acres designated for local commercial. There was a recommendation at the Plan Council to bring Beecher Road trail all the way through the ComEd easement. The Prairie Trail system will be on the north side of Galena Blvd. The cost for 1,000 feet of ten feet wide trail is $20,000 for pavement and $12,000 for five feet wide cement sidewalk. The sidewalk should be adequate. We will be requesting all land cash with the increase of the park size and will leverage the cash from another development to enhance this park site. The layout of the park is nice and we do not get many opportunities to get land like this for our athletic programs. It has nice exposure and plenty of parking. The Board would like an y more parking that is available so that spectators will also have a place to park, especially since there will be multiple fields for multiple age groups. Travis Miller—Park Planner Job Description Travis Miller presented the revised city park designer job description and the planning department schematic. Since the last meeting he has presented the description to the Administration Committee in which they have reviewed it and given their input. It is scheduled to go to the Committee of the Whole next week. He is still on the same timeline,planning to get it advertised in March and start interviews in April. The job description has been reviewed by the legal department so that the language is correct from a legal standpoint. Travis Miller read the position description overview and the eight essential job functions as provided on his handout. One of the essential job functions was to attend all regular Park Board meetings and work closely with the Parks and Recreation Executive Director and Department Staff. Of the five position requirements, Travis Miller specifically noted that the person needed to be proficient with AutoCAD 2000 or.better software and must have the ability to develop high quality graphics and reports. The minimum and preferred experience and education included a Bachelor's degree in landscape architecture, urban planning, urban design, parks/recreation, or related field and three years of experience. The salary range will be $41,000—$57,000. The funds allocated are $48,000. Depending on the number of candidates, he may put together a selection committee to help make the final selection and would like Parks and Recreation's input as well. 2 4 The cost center for this position will be Planning and Development, but for certain projects it may come out of land cash,the general budget, etc. The work will be project oriented so it should be easy to log time. Van Truman's concern is that since land cash dollars will be funding this position why isn't there any organizational reporting relationship between the park designer and the executive director. The Board and staff do a lot of work on the design of the parks and he would like to make sure that their decisions are relayed and carried out by the park designer. Travis Miller assured him that there would be a direct relationship between the two and the Board will have an influence on the design. The park designer will be attending all of the Park and Recreation Board meetings to be informed of the decisions. In fact, Travis Miller indicated that there is an advantage of having this position in planning and development because he will also be working with the urban designer and himself on other projects, and they will be able to tie city and park projects together. He informed them that the park designer will also have to answer to the Board. He will get day to day direction from staff too and when key decisions need to be made he will present it to Parks and Recreation for their input. Chris Rollins takes comfort in that they have a fairly well developed process for our Parks and Recreation master plan so it would be the park designer's responsibility to maintain and implement it, not to draft it or alter it in any way. He does not want a lot of land cash used without getting what we need. This position should,however, offer some relief from the expenditures we have been experiencing for park design services,but will need to be watched. As a staffed salary employee, this should be a budgeted line item out of the general fund. It is not the intention to fund an employee with land cash. This is just to get the employee started. Travis Miller will provide a list where the advertisement for this position will be published. His intention is to have it listed nationally as well as locally. Parks Maintenance Facility The Public Works Committee was happy with the proposed letter. Mayor Art Prochaska also gave the go ahead. Sentle Rubel will revise the estimates and Scott Sleezer will bring this information back to the Board. Youth BaseballAgreement Chris Rollins signed the Youth Baseball Agreement with the revisions made as mentioned at the last meeting. It will now go to the Committee of a Whole. Kendalwood Estates Bid It was proposed to ask Kendalwood Estates to put in a bid to put in a trail on the Commonwealth Edison easement since they are adjacent to the property. This is not property of Kendalwood Estates but they should be able to give a fairly good bid,but they will still look for the best bid. The trail here may need to be a different standard since it will need extra strength for trucks to drive on it for maintenance purposes. This section of the trail will probably be compacted stone instead of pavement so that the trail does not get damaged too quickly. This does not mean,however,that we cannot pave it . or get a grant to pave it in the future. This is a fifteen acre section and the funds will 3 come out of land cash. The Board gave unanimous consent to ask Kendalwood Estates to put in a bid. NEW BUSINESS: Revised Budget Traci Pleckham presented the proposed revised budget. Some of the items that she noted were... • There is a$60,000 carry over for the purchase of two trucks. • The parks capital fee is up from$13,750 to $20,000 which was from money that was not spent. • Park capital donations are up $7,000 because the baseball equipment has not been purchased yet. • There was a decrease in employee salaries due to the Executive Director vacancy. • Park Contractual has gone up for electrical contract work. Fertilizing will be brought in-house however. • Program refunds are up $7,000, but this is because we are offering more programs: • Most of the land cash carry over is from build-out. • The big change is in the Hoover holding costs which were not in the budget before. It was transferred from Land Acquisition. Chris Rollins indicated that if we value keeping funds on a contingency basis,then we cannot purchase land. However, if something comes up we can ask how we can fund it. We should not have a loss in flexibility by using the funds in this way. We need to start working on our strategy for land acquisition in our master plan,though. Chris Rollins asked if we needed to worry about the variability of what we will have to pay for the holding cost at Hoover. Scott Sleezer will ask the Forest Preserve and will confirm the time frame and the interest on it. It is believed that if we do not purchase the land, the forest preserve has the right to sell it. The obligation is actually with the County and we need to reimburse them. They do not believe that'the forest preserve is interested in selling the land elsewhere,though. • A lot of the land cash went down. The major ones were Grand Reserve and Autumn Creek. They are taking a different direction on these. Most,however, are just running behind. Regarding Grand Reserve, since we will never see the money, it was questioned what is our leverage if they do not pay for something such as the concession stand. They are obligated to us for a certain amount of money under Yorkville's specifications. Currently,they want us to guarantee certain dollar amount parks, which is not something that we can do. We can, however, guarantee them that there will be a park. We do not build substandard parks. Our parks are well in line with the needs of the community and we point to them with pride. The City Administrator is working with the person from Grand Reserve to resolve the situation. • Gary Goldinski asked about the$10,000 for a Master Plan update if a new planning tech is not hired. The new director will need to review the master plan. There are a lot of things that need to go in the next update. Chris Rollins feels it would be in our best interest to wait until the new director and park planner are in place so both can participate in that process. It will save us money because of the hours involved. 4 REPORTS Recreation Report Sue Swithin provided the recreation report for the Board's review. She also informed the Board that they have hired Kathy Kastak at the Receptionist/General Secretary for the Recreation Office. She will start on February 13, 2006. She has sent a memo to Mayor Prochaska to inform him and the Council too. There were approximately 50 applicants for the position. Kathy was originally one of the full-time applicants that the City had shared with Parks and Recreation. Richard Korinek cannot attend the City Council meeting on February 14, 2006 to accept his plaque. The presentation of the plaque will be rescheduled to February 28, 2006 at 7:00 p.m. On March 11, 2006 from 11:00 a.m.to 4:00 p.m.the Yes, Yes, Walk for Kids Rally from the Yorkville Schools Referendum Committee would like to rent the Riverfront Park and would like us to waive the fee. Sue Swithin wanted to know if this was okay because it is a political issue. The Board had no problem with them using the park. They did not want to waive the fee to use the facility,however, because they did not want to set a precedent where they would have to waive the fee for everyone. We received,a grant for Whispering Meadows. ADDITIONAL BUSINESS None ADJOURNMENT: The meeting adjourned at 9:08 p.m. following the motion by Heather Fiala and seconded by Ken Koch. The motion was unanimously approved. Minute Taker—Jeanne Arbet 5 ATTENDANCE Yorkville Parks &Recreation Department Board Meeting Thursday, February 9, 2006 Please Simon In GUESTS/CITY OFFICIALS/STAFF: Scott Sleezer, Interim Director/Superintendentof Parks Sue Swithin, Interim Director/Superintendent of Recreation Travis Miller, Community Development Director Bob Nelson, Tanglewood Homes, LaFox, Illinois Mike Brandenburg, Tanglewood Homes Traci Pleckham, Finance Director BOARD MEMBERS: { ] Heather Fiala E] Alderman Paul James l Ken Koch �] Gary Golinski El Chris Rollins ❑ Tammy Smock 1 Van Truman UNITED CITY OF YORKVILLE YORKVILLE PARKS &RECREATION DEPARTMENT BOARD MEETING Parks & Recreation Administrative Offices Riverfront Building Thursday,January 26,2006 I MINUTES CALL TO ORDER: Meeting was called to order by Chris Rollins at 7:00 p.m. ROLL CALL: Chris Rollins, Ken Koch,Van Truman, Gary Golinski, Tanury Smock,Heather Fiala, and Alderman Paul James (Left early) GUESTS/CITY OFFICIALS/STAFF: Scott Sleezer, Interim Director/Superintendent of Parks Sue Swithin, Interim Director/Superintendent of Recreation Travis Miller, Community Development Director Vince Rosanova, DBCW Ltd. John F. Philipchuck, DBCW Ltd. Gary Neyer,Richard Marker Associates Inc. Shawn Schumacher, Yes! Yes! Yorkville Referendum Committee Alderman Dean Wolfer PUBLIC COMMENTS: None PRESENTATION: Lynn Burks'Presentation for School Referendum Lynn Burks was unable to attend the meeting because she was attending a presentation for the Chamber of Commerce. Shawn Schumacher,the co-chair, attended in her place. The School Board resolution on Monday night that would cut out all extra-curricular activities was passed because we are having a shortfall of funding of$1.5 million in order for us to open the Grand Reserve School to alleviate some of the over crowding we are experiencing in our schools. Cutting out extra-curricular activities will give them the funds to staff the Grand Reserve School with teachers, aides, and administrators, as well as all of the curriculum materials. Two referenda will be placed on the March 21, 2006 ballot and Shawn Schumacher came to give some information on why these referenda are important to pass. The two items to vote on are... 1. $56 million bond for the Yorkville CUSD#115 Building Fund This is to build three new schools as well as the opening of the Grand Reserve School. It is important to begin to think ahead and be pro-active as the 1 schools continue to become over-crowded and the class sizes continue to increase year by year. It takes at least two years to build a new school. 2. 63 cent increase for the Yorkville CUSD#115 Education Fund The education fund is primarily used for funding teachers, aides, other support staff, and administrators along with any curriculum and instructional materials. We need these increases because the community is experiencing some alarming growth. Within the last nine years we have experienced a 73%increase in student enrollment in our district, and they would like to stay proactive in trying to make sure that we are ready for this continued increase. The City has already approved 21,000 new home sites. Currently, the district average is 273 students per grade level,which is up 12.2%since last year. Just this year alone the district has had more than 120 new students enter the district since the beginning of the school year. The school referendum committee feels we need to build three more schools besides the Grand Reserve school, which would included another elementary school, intermediate school, and a middle school. It would cost approximately$56 million to build these schools,but they are trying to be good stewards of the taxpayers' money. The building fund would also go towards the current middle school for some renovations needed for the heating system and to Yorkville Grade School and Circle Center for air conditioning. The school referendum committee believes that passing the education fund is the most important thing that needs to happen on the March 21 ballot. Getting the Grand Reserve School open is absolutely essential to keep class sizes reasonable. Some of the class sizes at the intermediate school and middle school are over forty students per class. The state recommends that the average class size should be 22 students. Currently, in every grade level in our district we are above that average. If the referendum does not pass, all schools will close at 6:00 p.m. every day and will remain closed throughout the weekend in order to conserve energy costs. Along with the extra-curricular activities being eliminated, any organizations, such as Parks and Recreation, Cub Scouts, Girl Scouts, etc.,will not be able to use these facilities. The school referendum committee believes that extra-curricular activities are part of the learning experience and enriches the students' lives. They are essential not extra. The reason why we are in such a poor position with a$1.5 million shortfall is because we are under-funded by the state. It is not the district's fault or overspending. Currently, 70% of all the schools in the state are running a deficit, and we are one of them.. Based on what we do with the money that we do get,the district does a good job. It spends $2,000 per child less than the state average. The salaries of the educators are $5,000 - $9,000 less than the state average and there are fewer administrators than average. Many people ask why the developers are not paying for the growth. The developers are contributing and the district believes they are doing their share. A developer can pay up to $13,000 per home,but unfortunately,the school district does not see all that money. The City Council can try to get more from the developers. 2 The bottom line is that on March 21, 2006 the people of this community will have a choice of what is a priority to them and what they value. According to Sean Schumacher, education—academically and through extra-curricular activities—is what is important. Although no one likes to have their taxes increased, it is very important to the children of this community. The way the schools go will reflect on how the community will go. They are looking for everyone's support. Chris Rollins wanted to add that he believes that we need to pass.a referendum in support of our schools. The connection between schools and Parks and Recreation is direct as we do not have a community center to use for our programs. If the school board suffers, so will Parks and Recreation along with it. He wanted to make it clear that the referendum is not on the superintendent. Citizens should not use their opinions of the superintendent as an excuse to withdrawal their support of our schools or our community. If people are unhappy with the superintendent—his demeanor/performance—they should take it up before the elected school board officials and seek to do something about it. But this is not the issue that is before us in the referendum. Chris Rollins also stated that the schools do not have a spending crisis but instead have a revenue crisis. Our schools stand in a critical juncture in its history and development. The district takes'good care of the brick and mortar that it has and in spite of their age the schools are well maintained and used to the fullest degree. One of the things that we must keep in mind is that communities are known and judged by the quality of the public institutions in the community. If we want to continue to be proud of our community, we must make the investment to help our schools' infrastructure keep pace with community growth. Chris Rollins will pledge to do all he can, both individually and as part of the Park Board, to encourage greater cooperation between the City and schools on the development of joint school park sites that provide the greatest utility to our citizens at the lowest possible total cost to taxpayers. There is much that we can do to enhance the well being of schools and parks in these joint site opportunities. He believes that reforms like these can ensure that the need to go to the taxpayers to ask for funds can be reduced to a minimum in the future. Right now, he believes our only option is to support school funding through the referendum process. He wanted to note that there are tax caps for our older members of the community who are on fixed income. We can either have low taxes and little else in our community or we can bear slightly higher taxes and have a much better quality of life here. The schools sit at the very heart of the community. It brings people together in a way that few other things in the community can bring,through its sports,plays, and concerts. Even though our state school funding formula is inadequate, our kids should not be the victim of that. Chris Rollins' personal feeling is that all board members throughout the City need to demonstrate leadership. And leaders need to be optimists and must have vision beyond the present situation. If no one demonstrates that and do not have the qualities to be strong in our beliefs to stick through popular and unpopular things and to explain to the community that we are keeping faith with the paths of our community and keeping the . promise of the future for everyone,then we will not serve any one well. 3 Chris Rollins is disappointed that the school board has not taken full advantage of the situations that the Parks and Recreation Board had offered. It has been an interest of the Board to have a liaison with schools with the liaison being a full voting member of the Board. This would give schools an opportunity to be fully aware of developments that become before Parks and Recreation and to understand what is going on with the land cash formula,particularly for Parks and Recreation and to observe whether or not the formula is serving schools well. He recommends strongly that the message of the school board needs to be present at the Parks and Recreation Board meetings. Ken Koch wanted to clarify that the education fund is only enough money to fund the Grand Reserve School if the referendum passes. The other schools that will be built if the referendum passes will still not have the funds to put teachers in these schools. So in a few years we will have to go back for another referendum. Van Truman questioned when the resolution would take into effect—if one referendum failed or if both. Sean Schumacher responded that it would take effect if both fail. Sean was unable to answer Van Truman's question about the inflation adjustment cost per child. Van Truman's final question was if the dollar amount or the tax rate would decrease each year due to the tax cap and the answer was the tax rate. Heartland Crossing–Concept PUD Plan John Philipchuck,the attorney who represents Richard Marker Associates, Inc.,presented Heartland Crossing which is adjacent to Route 47 and south of Ament Road. It is approximately 514 acres with 833 lots including several commercial sites. They are currently contiguous with Yorkville but they are working on an annexation corridor. Richard likes innovative designs that are pedestrian friendly communities. Ninety-five percent of the lots back up to open space and seventy percent of the lots backup to the open space corridors where they intend to put in the pedestrian path. As a result,they will have over 5 '/2 miles of pedestrian paths within the subdivision so that there are minimal areas where they will have to cross public streets. They are looking towards establishing three smaller park sites. There will be a possible junior high school site in which Dr. Engler, Superintendent,would like fifteen acres. In return it was suggested that the possible school park site on the Montalbano plan could go to a total park site. They are looking at establishing a community center with a pool near the commercial sites that will include a restaurant and a daycare facility. They would like Parks and Recreation to consider giving them some credit for some of the open space areas, such as the path system which will be privately owned by the homeowners association. However,their trails are eight feet and the City standard is ten feet with five feet easement on each side. Their trails are,though, designed to link up with a regional trail and will be open to the public. The land cash allowance is approximately thirty-one acres. Scott Sleezer mentioned that if Parks and Recreation does a swap where they would get the land on the Montalbano plan and give up the land in Heartland Crossing, it would give them ten acres of land for athletic fields. Dr. Engler is receptive to this idea. 4 Chris Rollins mentioned that there is a good deal of density building in this area and schools want to take fifteen acres without Parks having any ability to get one contiguous larger site. We will now have a school and a park in close proximity but not adjacent to one another. That does not benefit either schools or parks because both will need to develop separate amenities and parking. If we had better planning where we worked together,we could save money. It is important to find some means to come to dialogue for instances like these. We have park development standards that we are trying to adhere to also. Since Heartland Crossing does not offer contiguous large open space, it puts Parks at a disadvantage because we end up with a number of very small park sites of two to three acres. The Board is trying to get away from these small park sites. They are in favor of larger open space sites that offer more utility for active recreational purposes. These presents a lot of maintenance challenges for not a lot of recreational utility. Instead they will have to migrate elsewhere to go play baseball or soccer. John Philipchuck indicated that we have to think about the adults,too, who get a lot of use out of the trails. Chris Rollins indicated that the Board does think about the adults but has the trail standards so bikes, strollers,people skating etc. along with walkers can all use the trails. Unless it is a retirement village, everyone must be considered. Parks and Recreation would be glad to give credit to the part of the trail system that allows a connection with an existing trail system and is built to the City's standards. For those sections of the trail that only serve the citizens of Heartland Crossing, do not meet City standards, and are privately maintained and are situated primarily for the subdivision, Parks and Recreation does not intend to give credit. Mr. Philipchuck said he would consider making the Heartland Crossing trails to the Board's standards. In the past, against the Board's recommendation,the City did give credit for their trails for the other Heartland properties,but the Board still does not recommend it unless it meets our standards. Chris Rollins would like some type of dialog on the strategy for the school sites to give him some sense why such balance of land is being requested and why so many schools are being sited in this particular area without doing some consolidation of these sites. Scott Sleezer believes the schools are just trying to do the same as what Parks and Recreation is trying to do. Chris Rollins indicated,though,that we don't bus people to parks. John Philipchuck indicated that as long as it is open space, it does not matter who owns it. Contrary to that thought, Chris Rollins does believe that it does make a difference because if the open space is used as a paved area for vehicles then baseball and soccer cannot be played there. Chris Rollins was interested in the Community Center as it has potential acreage around it,is connected to the central trail, and can possibly be used for some of our programs. Scott Sleezer needed direction on where to go with Park D. It is two acres and typically the Board does not take this type of land. The people who live around these parks love them,but the Park Board does not want private parks tucked away behind houses. Scott Sleezer does not believe that these parks are not watched because the homeowners tend to 5 watch them even closer than the police. The argument is that it makes it very difficult for people who do not live there to find the park or to find parking to go to the park. They will open up Park D for more visibility from the roadway. It will also be a potential trail head that will link to the school, commercial, and park sites. Travis Miller recommended that the developer preserve some of the natural features to be incorporated into the subdivision, even if it requires rerouting trails and roads. Rush-Copley Development adjacent to Fox Hill Subdivision This has been rescheduled. APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Minutes from the January 12, 2006 board meeting were approved on motion by Heather Fiala and seconded by Tammy Smock. The motion was unanimously approved. BILLS REVIEW: Cash Analysis & Bills List Van Truman motioned to approve the bills list and was seconded by Ken Koch. Roll call vote: Chris Rollins—Yes, Ken Koch—Yes, Van Truman—Yes, Gary Golinski—Yes, Heather Fiala—Yes, and Tammy Smock—Yes. The motion was unanimously approved. OLD BUSINESS: Parks Maintenance Building–Public Works Joint Use Scott Sleezer will draft a letter and move it forward to the Public Works Committee Meeting. Then he will have Joe Besco move it forward to the Committee of the Whole who will probably bounce it to Finance. When the discussion gets to these meetings, Scott Sleezer mentioned that it would be nice to have representatives from this Board there. They may possibly have Public Works share in the cost of construction for the projected time they intend to be there instead of paying rent. They will have the finance director determine what the best course of action might be to commingle funds. The building will be built for park maintenance, not Public Works. With the new treatment plant Public Works is limited on what they can store there so they may be putting salt storage on that site. The Board would like some written agreement that the salt storage will look nice, preferably a rectangle,barn-like appearance as in Montgomery. NEW BUSINESS: YYBSA—Youth Baseball Agreement There are a few minor edits that need to be made to the agreement. (1) The season will end July 31 (not September). (2) Delivery to City of Certificates–This has always been our practice,but the City attorney just wanted to have it in writing. (3) On page four of the agreement a number eleven will be added listing the policies dealing with parks. Scott Sleezer requested the Board's permission to have Chris Rollins sign this agreement after the revisions have been made and then forward it on to the Committee of a Whole. It was unanimously approved by the Board. 6 REPORTS Parks 2005 Year End Report Scott Sleezer highlighted in his report the things that have made a difference. Chris Rollins wanted to make special mention about the significant staff contributions and development of the staff this year. Chris Rollins wanted to commend all the people on Scott Sleezer's staff that have participated in educational and certification opportunities who are putting their skills to work on behalf of the City—Tony Houle, Ryan Horner, Jaime Jackson—to be better professionals and to serve us. We have some parks to be truly proud of that show significant accomplishments. Thanks goes out to the Board for their contribution and efforts in the planning stages of these parks. A thank you also goes out to the professionals who carried out the daily work and to Schoppe Design. People can look around their neighborhood with pride about their parks. ADDITIONAL BUSINESS There was a change to the layout of Park F because of detention in the final engineering for Unit 19 in Grand Reserve. The acreage will remain the same but is wider instead of deep. This park will only have the trail head, a shelter,and a picnic table or two. The Board unanimously agreed to the change. Scott Sleezer has addressed a letter to Dave of Pasquinelli. This has not been resolved but Scott is working with the City Administrator and City Attorney to get it resolved. Their concern on the annexation agreement is that Pasquinelli is thinking we will be building certain dollar amount parks, which may not be the case. It will be based on what the City feels the amenities should be for these parks. When Scott Sleezer was talking with the developers, it was found out that they were not intending on putting in the concession. There was a developed plan for the regional park and they will need to reinstate the concession. Scott Sleezer is working with the City Administrator and the City Attorney to get the situation straightened out. Travis Miller has just started with Community Development, and he is working on filling some positions to populate that department. He provided a draft job description for the position of City Park and Urban Designer. His purpose is to share it with the Board and to get some feedback in what they would hope to envision for the staff services to the Board. He is working on determining the work load and wants some clarity before he makes his final recommendation to City Council. On February 2,2006 he will be going to the Administration Committee with this draft and hopes to come back to Parks and Recreation next month with some final input. Because there is a lot of redevelopment opportunity in the downtown area,he would like to get someone not only with landscape architecture as well as urban design so he can maximize the resources. Chris Rollins asked how much filling this position would reduce our dependence on outside service contracts. Travis Miller indicated that this is his goal,but it will be a case by case situation in working towards that goal. Scott Sleezer indicated that we will probably never be able to get rid of consultants 100%. Travis Miller plans on getting someone in this position by May which will be the beginning of the fiscal year. Although it was not 7 planned, it will be a great way for the new hire to get knowledge in what is going on by working on the master plan update. City Council hopes to take the comprehensive plan to the next level to get a finer level of detail. In the job description Heather Fiala noted that the person should represent the Community Development Department in bi-monthly Park Board meetings—not monthly. Sue Swithin indicated that the holiday schedule has been provided and that she has also given everyone a copy of an article titled For Better Parks and Recreation that is about Parks and Recreation forming a partnership with other government agencies, such as schools. Gary Golinski provided an article titled Grants Outlookfor 2006 in'the packets, and he wanted the Board to know that the last opportunity to hear the Protect Kendall Now presentation will be on Monday at Newark High School. He encourages everyone to attend. Chris Rollins wanted the Board to take note of the less well known grants, such as recreational vehicle use for trails for snowmobiles, go-carts, four-wheelers, etc. There is a recreational vehicles manufacturers association that provides matching grants for communities that choose to develop special use trails for that purpose. They may be something worthy of consideration as there may be less competition for the grant because not all communities would have the same character as Yorkville in favor of establishing a trail for that type of use. There are a lot of grants available for a lot of different situations and should keep them in mind in order for us to qualify for the projects that are on the drawing board. Richard Korinek will be presented with a plaque on February 14,2006 at the City Council meeting. It would be nice to have representatives from this Board there. ADJOURNMENT: The meeting adjourned at 9:20 p.m. following the motion by Heather Fiala and seconded by Gary Golinski. The motion was unanimously approved. Minute Taker—Jeanne Arbet 8