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Park Board Minutes 2009 08-27-09 Yorkville Parks & Recreation Department awe Administration Office 201 W. Hydraulic St Yorkville, IL 60560 6305534357 Park Board Meeting Agenda Parks and Recreation Administration Office August 27, 2009 7:00 p.m. Call to Order: Ken Koch called the meeting to order at 7:20 pm Roll Call: Ken Koch -Yes, Kelly Sedgwick- Yes, Garrick Gillette-Yes and Vickie Coveny- Yes Introduction of Guests, City Officials and Staff: Interim Director of Parks and Recreation — Bart Olson Superintendent of Recreation — Sue Swithin Superintendent of Parks — Scott Sleezer Ward 2, Alderman Gary Golinski (arrived 7:51 pm) Public Comment: None Presentations: None Approval of Minutes: Park Board-August 13, 2009" Ken Koch asked for a motion to approve the minutes of August 13, 2009. Garrick Gillette made the motion and Kelly Sedgwick seconded the motion. The motion was unanimously approved by voice vote. Bills Review: Cosh Analysis & Bill List" Bart Olson noted the memo that Barb put out, listing the reasons why people received refunds for classes they signed up for. Olson said that they made up a column for reasons for refunds and one evaluation was for expectations not met. One unmet expectation included people getting into a class which was different than they thought it would be. Another complaint was that running was a part of the curriculum, and there were individuals who did not like to run. Ken Koch asked for a motion to approve the cash analysis and bills list. Kelly Sedgwick made the motion and Vickie Coveny seconded the motion. The motion was approved by voice vote: Ken Koch - Yes, Kelly Sedgwick- Yes, Vickie Coveny— Yes and Garrick Gillette—Yes Old Business: 1 Fox Hill West Park Naming Request* Bart Olson asked for the Boards direction on what they to do with the naming request put forth by Bob Allen. Olson recommended submitting the new policy to Allen. After the Board discussion, they felt that Allen should invite one of the Bretthauer's to come before the board and ask Allen to submit the additional materials per the revised Park Naming Policy. Olson said he would go to Allen with the Board's direction. Jaycee Pond Ownership Bart Olson said it was still available for purchase from the YSBD. Olson said he talked to Ralf Pfister and he had expressed some interest in trading the ownership of the Jaycee Pond parcel for the waiver of fees that the YBSD paid the City for a number of years. He said the YSBD paid about $70,000 per year to process and collect all YBSD bills, and the number was expected to increase to above $125,000 next year. Olson said that they could pay for an appraisal for the property and then start negotiating for a payment. He noted that the Mayor was not in favor of this. He said if they did that, they would have to acquire their own funds for the properly. He went on to say that if this were long term, Pfister was willing to take a decrease to his fees perhaps over 20 to 30 years then the City then would consider it. However, the Parks and Recreation would take most of the financial hit. Olson said that is something the City would look at however just to do the appraisal it would be a couple hundred dollars. Scott Sleezer said that they had been mowing the property for at least four times a year and had kept it usable for the last 18 to 20 years. Olson said it was not really something they should pursue right now because of the budget. It is open for public access and someday it would be a good idea to take title of it. Park Review— Grand Reserve Parks A & 8, Stepping Stones Park & Rotary Park Bart Olson asked the Board if they still felt the way they were reviewing the parks was acceptable to all of them. They agreed that it was easier for them to look at the parks on their own time rather than decide upon a time they could all get together and look at them. Scott Sleezer said that they would like to take video of each park. Ken Koch felt that those videos should be posted on their website with directions on how to get there so they could be available to the public. Olson said it was something they definitely would like to do. Koch asked after Park A & B, Stepping Stone Park, and Rotary Park was completed how many parks in Grand Reserve had to be done? Scott Sleezer said that there was Park C in Grande Reserve but he did not believe it had to be developed. He said that there is nothing wrong with having green space there where kids could go out and play and fly kites. Sleezer said it was 5 acres about a block away from Stepping Stone Park. 2 Athletic Field Policy Revisions* Ken Koch said they changed some wording in the policy. Bart Olson went over the changes outlined in his memo. First of all, Olson said, they combined categories "D" "E" and "F" into one category "D". This was done to simplify the categories. He also said that all participants in category "A" had to be Yorkville residents. Olson said they also changed the lighting times of the fields. He noted that they moved the lighting shut off times to an earlier time due to resident complaints. Olson said that the games had to end at a certain time and the lights had to be shut off at a certain time so they could get everyone out of the parks at a reasonable hour. Garrick Gillett recommended getting the software to get the lights shut off at a certain time if it became a problem getting people out of the parks at a reasonable hour. Sleezer said it would be a possibility; however, they would have to purchase software for that. The next change Olson reviewed were the rental fees outlined in his memo. Olson noted that they had to raise the fees due to the cost of maintenance. Sleezer said that they looked at what other City's were charging. Olson talked about the non-resident fees and went over the changes in the categories. They increased the tournament fees by $50. Scott Sleezer said that he would like to add the verbiage in the Athletic Field Use Priorities regarding the drop-in use play. He would like it to say, "Drop-in use is limited to 2 hours once a week to any organized group." He said there were a couple of reasons he and Tim would like to add this to the policy. He said that they are starting to add to the premium. They were starting to get baseball groups and other groups wanting to use the space every day. He further said that the issue they were having is that practices by these groups were putting wear and fear on their fields. He said they felt that they should have some control over how much use they get. Sleezer said his concern did not include the hypothetical dad who wanted to pitch to his son every day. His concern was with the eleven soccer players that want to show up every day to play or groups that wanted to do line practice or baseball drills every day for a month long. He felt some organizations could get around their fee schedules by saying they know no one is out on the fields every day, meanwhile they are creating wear and tear on the field and for that they should be paying fees. 3 Vickie Coveny wanted to know how they would monitor these groups. Sleezer said that they knew they were out there because they see them while they are working. Sleezer said it was a matter of them going up to them to address them regarding the athletic field reservation policy. Sleezer said he would like this to be added to the policy. That way, they would have an ability to tell them it was not allowed and that they needed a way to control it. Sleezer reiterated that the major change he wanted to make was to limit play and practice to once a week to organized play. Sue Swithin brought up a good point in that this is an Athletic Field Space Policy and now there is an issue with field space versus open space. Sleezer said that parks had not been torn up but said it would happen. For example, the front of Beecher would be used for drills. He said they had to find some way to control this. Swithin said they could define areas that could be used as athletic fields and there was some Board discussion about combining the Park Policy to this one. Sleezer said organized groups should pay and Garrick Gillette agreed. He felt he should get ahead of the problem before the problems came to fruition. Coveny felt that if a park was getting over use, they should post a sign saying this park is not being used for organized play at this time. Sleezer reiterated why he wanted to do it now. He said that there was an organization out there right now doing this and he wanted to stop it and was looking for Boards approval. Kelly Sedgwick wanted to have Sleezer come up with a couple ways to add the verbiage he wanted to add to the policy and bring it back to the next meeting. He felt that the wording needed the to state "organized groups." Sleezer said that he welcomed the Boards ideas and said he would bring it back. New Business: YYBSA Agreement for 2010* Bart Olson said there were five significant changes and they were listed on the memo. 1 . Olson said the first concern was the concern over fields being reserved by the YYBSA but not using them. He said that they suggested they be required to notify the City of any changes by 9:00 am the Friday before the week in which their changes would take place. Sleezer said that they are making up rain games within the same week when it would be much more efficient to do them the following week. He felt that they could have one field they held out that they rented out and that would solve the problem of other organizations that wanted some filed time. Ken Koch felt that was a good idea for them to make up rain 4 games the following week and said it should not be a big deal since they used to make up the games at the end of the year. Vickie Coveny felt the available fields should be listed online and organizations should be able to pay with their credit card right on line for convenience. Sleezer thought it would be a good idea to list them every Monday what fields were open. 2. Alderman Gary Golinski said that there should be two separate agreements here and that the travel section should not even be a part of this agreement. He noted that Yorkville tax payers were subsidized 50% of the children from other areas in Kane County to play on our fields. He felt they should be paying rental fees. Sleezer agreed that it was a good point and asked the Board how they felt if they doubled the fees for travel players. Golinski felt 50% in the fee was not unreasonable and said it should be addressed somehow and it would create more revenue. After some discussion the Board felt that it would be acceptable that the fees should be outlined as follows: $10 per player and $20 for each traveler player. 3. Scott Sleezer asked if they wanted to raise the tournament fee to $1000 from the proposed $900. Kelly Sedgwick said felt if the maintenance fees had not gone up they should not raise the fee to $1000. Coveny felt they should raise it to $1000 and Koch said they should keep it at the proposed $900 this year and raise it gradually and perhaps raise it another $100 next year. 4. Sleezer noted that they would like to change when YYBSA paid their fees. He felt 50% by March 1" and the other 50% by May 1" rather than 100% by March 1". He said they wanted to do it that way for budget and accounting reasons. He said it would end the fiscal year strong and starts off the new year's line item with revenue. 5. Sleezer said that the other change was that tournament dates must be set by November 30'h of the previous year. 6. Olson said that they would be clarifying the standards for allowable advertising by TTBSA on the City ball fields. Advertising on Bosebo//Pie/ds Bart Olson said they touched on advertising on baseball fields it before, and they had talked about putting side banners on their outfield walls at Beecher Park and Bridge Park. He said that the proposed banners would be placed under the scoreboard from March through October; two at Beecher and three at Bridge field. Olson said that, per the zoning code, advertising is not allowed. He stated that he would take the Board's proposal to the City's Economic Development Committee to amend. Currently, the YYBSA has been violating the City's sign code. 5 Olson iterated that they could do anything on their own property as long as it was related to the program or event. Olson asked for the Board's approval to amend the sponsorship policy that was included in the packet. He said they would include an approval to put advertisements on the actual outfield and we could start soliciting for it. Garrick said he was not a fan of littering the back stop with signage, but is in favor of using the outfield fences for advertisements. Koch also felt that signs would clutter up the back stops and, felt they should start with selling fence space. Olson said that they were missing out on revenue if they did not advertising on the backstops. Olson proposed that prices for the banners on the fences should be $600 per season. He also noted that they were proposing $2,000 per season for a banner to be placed under the scoreboard. Sue Swithin passed out an idea of what the signs could look like and thought they should be all uniform in size and look. The Board said they liked the uniform look and concluded that the size of the banners were acceptable. Swithin said that there were three spots to a backstop and felt that they could advertise on the immediate left and right. Olson said that the staff would decide where to place the advertisements once the space was sold. Olson is looking for a recommendation to amend the code to say where the signs could be posted. Ken recommended getting banner space sold on the fences first to see how it went. Ken Koch asked for a motion to allow staff to pursue banner space to be sold on the backstops and fences. Kelly Sedgwick made the motion and Vickie Coveny seconded the motion. The motion was unanimously accepted by Ken Koch, Kelly Sedgwick, and Vickie Coveny with Garrick Gillette opposing to selling space on the backstops. Code Blue Unit— Update Scott Sleezer said the unit was up and operational and it was currently getting hooked into the emergency equipment. He said that the camera was operating and was hooked into Ameritech and could be viewed remotely. He said he had tested it and looked at it from his computer. He did say, however, that it was not open to the public for viewing. Kelly Sedgwick asked if it was a fixed camera. Sleezer said it was a fixed camera that pans. However, when someone hits the button, the camera is programmed to look down to record who pressed the button. 6 Sleezer reported that by next week the unit would be fully operational. Leose of Riverfront Buildings—Discussion" Bart Olson said that he had two separate companies interested in touring the preschool building and river front building. He wanted the Board's direction on whether or not they would entertain the idea of leasing either of these buildings out. Olson said he was looking for a user agreement from the Board. He further said they could talk about a price in closed session but had to talk about use in open session. Olson noted that he would rather not lease the buildings because there is a lot of undeveloped land around the outside in the TIF district. He said the one thing that they would lose, in a TIF district standpoint, is that if anything is located on a City property, the City would not see any jump in property value there because they could not charge property taxes. He said there would not be any added benefit to the downtown as a whole for redevelopment. The other thing, from a logistical standpoint, is that there are two perfectly situated buildings right in the middle of the park on perhaps one of the biggest kayaking attractions around. He said there would be plenty of opportunities for others to move in elsewhere; however they had talked about renting out kayaks and perhaps leasing it out to a business. Vickie Coveny said that they once talked about having an ice cream shop in the park. Scott Sleezer felt they should lease it out for something to do that or do it themselves. Garrick Gillette pointed out that if they did run their own ice cream shop they would be only making money seven months a year. Olson said that the lease could be short term, for example for five years. Olson said that there had been many calls from kayakers who are interested in renting the building for business. Olson said that there would be some limitations to their lease, etc. Koch and Sedgwick said that they are in favor of leasing the buildings. The Board talked about the pros and cons of leasing for a short term lease agreement and they were in favor of discussing its pricing. Olson said that in the next meeting they would discuss in an executive session pricing and go from there. Reports: Director's Report Bart Olson went over a visual of the REC Center reports he put together. He showed a slide show outlining the Parks & Recreation Budget Discussion. Olson went over the pie chart that he handed out in a previous packet. He noted that the pie chart was for the previous year. It showed how much they were spending on maintenance versus part-time salaries. The graph also showed other expenses and their values. 7 Next, Olson showed the pie chart from the current year's budget and pointed out how not much had changed from the year before. He then showed the pie chart for the next year's budget and this one showed property tax at 8%. Olson then showed a graph of the Membership Revenues Actual Compared to 1/10" or 1/12'h of budget estimates. It showed when memberships spiked. Next, a graph and line chart showed that there were about 30 or 40 different choices in memberships. The graph showed the different pass types and how they differed from one another in revenue they brought in. Olson showed some of the memberships broken down and how they compared to each other. Olson pointed out how the premiere membership and long-term memberships were their biggest revenue making pass types. Olson said that they budgeted last year for $330,000 and that they were going to end up with about $320,000; the new fiscal year they budgeted for about $400,000 and it is really adding on two extra months of revenue. He said their expected deficit should be about $77,000; the amount of money they had in membership revenues that fluctuates up and down will show how well they are doing at the REC Center. Olson said he went through each membership and calculated how much they paid last fiscal year, how much they paid this fiscal year as well as how much they would spend next fiscal year. Olson said that the membership revenue could make or break the budget, however he felt confident that they would do well. Olson said that he would get the Board a copy of the spreadsheet; they could familiarize themselves with it and therefore recognize changes he would be making to it. Pocks Report Scott Sleezer said that he pointed out that they used all the flowers off the float they put together from the parade. He said that they planted the materials from the float around City Hall. Sleezer reported that they had been pruning a lot of trees and shrubs around the City. He also said that they were looking into planting certain things to keep the geese away. Parks Designer Report Scott Sleezer went over the Park Designer's report. He said that he and Hooke attended Go to 2040 Workshop at the Health Department on August 12' and did an online class. He said Laura was working on the Integration Transportation Plan and noted that the document went to to Council on 8/8 for approval. 8 Sleezer said that he and Haake set up the Bristol Bay meeting for September I O'h from 5:30 to 7:00 and he would bring meeting details back to the Board. Additional Business: 1 . Ken Koch said he was personally addressed regarding the men's basket ball program. He said he wanted details so he could relay facts when he was confronted. Koch was concerned that the fee went from $725 last year to $935 this year. Bart Olson said some referee costs had gone up. Koch wanted to know what those costs were so he could forward the appropriate information. Sue Swithin reported that they hardly ever made 10 to 11% profit at $725. Swithin listed all the costs of balls, trophy's, etc. Swithin said there are always two officials a game. Referees were making $25 per game when she it broke it all down. Swithin noted that they were looking at getting a 30% profit and they had to raise $725 to $935 to make that profit margin. She reiterated that a 30% profit was the direction the Board had given her and her staff. Swithin said the men's basket ball was the only program that had a significant fee increase. The Board had some concerns that people would not sign up if the fees were too high and Swithin said that is something they would watch closely. 2. Bart Olson said Hometown Days was next weekend and they still needed volunteers for Friday night's beer tents from 4pm to l Opm. Board members were asked to contact Scott Sleezer. Adjournment Ken Koch asked for a motion to adjourn the meeting at 10:36 pm. Kelly Sedgwick made the motion and Vickie Coveny seconded the motion. The motion was unanimously approved by voice vote. Executive Session: None Next meeting: Thursday, September 10, 2009 Respectfully Submitted by: Jamie Cheatham 9