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PRC 2014 02 25 CHANHASSEN PARK AND RECREATION COMMISSION REGULAR MEETING FEBRUARY 25, 2014 Prior to the meeting the commission interviewed the following applicants: Curt Kobilarcsik, Tyler Kobilarcsik, David Wisniewski, Elizabeth Ahern, Jonathon Myers, and Tom Doll. Chairman Kelly called the meeting to order at 7:30 p.m. MEMBERS PRESENT: Cole Kelly, Steve Scharfenberg, Elise Ryan, Brent Carron, Jim Boettcher, Rick Echternacht, Luke Thunberg, Jacob Stolar and Ryan Lynch STAFF PRESENT: Todd Hoffman, Park and Rec Director; Jerry Ruegemer, Recreation Superintendent; and Mitch Johnson, Recreation Supervisor APPROVAL OF AGENDA: Kelly: Anybody have anything to add to tonight’s meeting? Ryan: Could we add a quick discussion on the closing of the ice rinks? Kelly: Yep. We’ll put that under Reports. Number 2. Closing of ice rink. Ryan: There’s a 2 already so it needs to be number 3. Kelly: Oh I’m sorry. I didn’t turn over the page. Yeah let’s make it 3. Thank you for the correction Elise. And under New Business, add number 3. Recommendations for appointments to the Park and Rec Board. Hoffman: Thank you. Kelly: Anything else? Okay. PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENTS: None. VISITOR PRESENTATIONS: None. APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Kelly: Anybody have any changes they want to make on the Minutes? Or go to the question. Carron: I make a motion to approve the Minutes. Kelly: Is there a second? Boettcher: Second. Carron moved, Boettcher seconded to approve the verbatim and summary Minutes of the Park and Recreation Commission dated January 28, 2014 as presented. Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 PIONEER PASS PARK: RECOMMENDATION CONCERNING PROCESS FOR PURCHASING PLAYGROUNDS AND PICNIC SHELTERS AND CIP BUDGET AMENDMENT. Hoffman: Thank you Chair Kelly, members of the commission. Tonight I’d like to give you a short update on what’s been happening at Pioneer Pass Park to prepare it for it’s final year of construction and it’s opening at the end of June this year and then talk about CIP, recommended CIP budget amendment based off some cost overruns that we had experienced with the project. So load up the power point. So that’s an image in about September of Pioneer Pass Park. So we’re going to talk about those two items. So if you recall it’s 8.7 acres of parkland. Very nice sized neighborhood park. It has a basketball court, which was extended to include two hoops so it’s a larger area. It’s got that natural wooded area to the south. The ballfield with the backstop and the player benches. The neighborhood trail connections to really two neighborhoods and then farther to the north to the Preserve neighborhoods as well. Two playgrounds. One for age 2 through 5 and one for age 5 through 12 children and then swings. Picnic shelter. Large open playfield. It’s got a one-third mile trail loop which is a nice amenity for the park. And 24 stall parking lot. And that parking lot was upsized to accommodate teams so parents can schedule practices on an impromptu schedule. Not on a really reservation basis but we allowed enough cars for that to happen. There’s the park plan. One of the items that we’ll talk about in that was some of the extra dollars, there was a property line on the south end and so there was a property line discrepancy so this property line was not known to the contractor or the architect and the original grading limits, seeding limits was farther up in here. So this area was added to the contract after the fact so that’s one of the additional items that we’ll talk about. This is a line drawing of the future playground and picnic shelter so you have a very nice sidewalk coming down the center to the, directly to the shelter. Two park benches which face each playground. On the right hand side is the 5, or the 3 to 5 age playground. The smaller of the two and then the larger playground. The 5 to 12. For children 5 to 12 and then the swing set. And this structure is spec’d for anywhere from 28 to 32 feet depending on the dollars that are left when the different representatives are making proposals. So this is the RFP that’s in your packet that is currently out to 6 different manufacturer’s representatives for their solicitation. Scharfenberg: And when does the RFP close? Hoffman: The date is in March. th Ruegemer: 12 I think. th Hoffman: Yeah, March 12 sounds about right. Scharfenberg: Okay. th Ruegemer: March 14. th Hoffman: Okay, 14. Yep. And then there’ll be a neighborhood meeting which commissioners will be invited to. That’s going to be at the Rec Center the following week and then it will go to City Council on th the 14 for their authorization to purchase the equipment. So these items in detail, the original contract is $185,000. That was between the City and K.A. Witt. That was a very aggressive price on their part which was to our benefit. The additional grading and excavation that we talked about, some of those areas are in here. We added a section of trail back which I felt was important to the plan. This section of trail was not in the original bid. Our Water Resources Coordinator thought it should be eliminated to try to limit hard surface above, at the top of the slope. I talked to Mr. Jeffery as we neared the award of the project and really wanted to add this back in for the benefit of all the community and I think it’s a good addition back and so it did raise the contract amount a little bit. Soil corrections. I’ll show you some images of that. So we have some poor soils. They were saturated. They were black organic material in 2 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 both the parking lot and the basketball court. We made the call to export those soils and import some compactable material just for the benefit of a long term sustainability of those two improvements and so we could have tilled it up, which they did and dry it out and try to compact it but we just weren’t meeting the roll test so we wanted to take that material out and make those areas last. Three was, this we added in. So this $14,000 really is in a change order that you know just happened because there was some soil conditions. We were either going to do that last year or this year. We got very good prices from K.A. Witt so we went ahead and added that in last year. We added two river birch trees because they were just missing on the plan, and then that’s the additional seed fertilizer and erosion control blanket that I talked about so we just had the quantity. It was the quantity was low on the original bid because they had that property line issue. So those dollars took the contract to $240,700 up from the $185,000 and we take out, so our Water Resources Coordinator, their budget. The stormwater budget paid for $19,000 of the pipe and the stormwater improvements and so that’s, park funds are back at $221,700. We invest the planting and landscape architecture at $18,000 and the engineering and surveying at $13,000. Material testing at $5,000 so those are the professional services that went into that plan. I can tell you those are a real bargain so we didn’t go out and solicit this on an RFP basis to an architect or an engineering firm. We did it on an ala carte basis. Said we just want to pay for what we need and that’s a pretty good value for all the work that we saw done out there. So that brings us at $257,700 and then these are the dollars we really need to invest to make that park complete. It’s $15,000 for the small playground. $55,000 for the large. The picnic shelter $25,000 and that’s installed. That’s a price installed. Concrete surfacing so all that concrete we saw in the borders and in the picnic shelter slab and in the sidewalk, that’s $20,000. And then the wood fiber resilient surfacing for the playground, $5,000. So that brings us to $377,700 which is $27,700 over our budget of $350,000. You know the park commission’s in a position, if you really wanted to meet that budget you could cut one of these items off. You could you know for example put the, take the shelter off but when we come this far in a park project of this significance I still believe it’s a very good value at $377,700 so staff’s recommendation is that the commission recommend the City Council amend that budget to add that $27,700 into the project. Kelly: So Todd how did it come to pass that the architect didn’t know where the boundaries were? Hoffman: It was a deviation in the upfront information that was put out so the upfront. Kelly: So it was information we put out? Hoffman: Information that was gathered either from the developer. Information that the City put out. I’m not sure where they grabbed that land information from but yeah there was a change in the property line. Kelly: Okay. Other questions? Echternacht: Has the community decided they’re going to put the equipment together? Hoffman: Yep. So we have a neighborhood with 500 homes. 100 single family on the one side and 400, the multi-family on the other side and we’re going to gather up enough volunteers to put this in as a true neighborhood install so there will be no input from the City of Chanhassen. It’s going to be all neighbors and then the manufacturer’s installer and it’s a great way to build a playground. Scharfenberg: Todd, the additional change order number 5 for the additional seed. Hoffman: Yep. 3 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 Scharfenberg: Fertilizer and erosion control blanket. Is that in any way associated with the issues that we were having with that contractor? Okay. Hoffman: No. I’ll show you a couple of images that will answer the rest of your questions. So that’s the basketball area with the soil corrections underway. That’s looking north from about the entry of the drive. That’s the parking lot soil corrections and so you see in the inset picture they’re attempting to get the roll test so we had aerated that and dried out those soils and then re-compacted them and then you drive a dump truck, a loaded dump truck over them to get the roll test and you just couldn’t meet that. And so that material you guys see in that inset picture was then excavated and the material you see in the big picture was imported so that can be compacted. There’s draintile on the outside of this as well. This is the $14,000 we invest in the backstop, the concrete for the player benches and then the inset photo shows an example of the player benches are there. That’s just an example photo. So that’s ready to go. Then these are the dollars that we’re recommending that you invest in those playgrounds, the picnic shelter, the concrete and the wood fiber surfacing. The RFP is for the top three items. It’s the $95,000 and then the City will contract the concrete and then they City will also purchase the wood fiber surfacing and bring that in after the, when the playground’s being constructed. Thunberg: Have those amounts been adjusted at all or are those still the original amounts… So this overage… Hoffman: Close to the original numbers. These have gone up if anything. So then it, go ahead. Ryan: When the RFP’s come back and they have our budget, do most of the companies then say this is going to be $15,000 or is there a possibility that the companies will come back you know under the $15,000 for the small playground and under the $55,000 for the larger playground? Hoffman: This is a contest to see who can provide the most equipment in the best configuration and so they’re going to max that budget out. So they’re going to come back and say this is, your budget is $95,000. Here are the two playgrounds and the shelter that we’re willing to sell you for the $95,000. Because the neighborhood’s going to select what they think is the best proposal and so it’s unlikely that they would come back and say hey, here’s our proposal for $85,000 because they’re just leaving $10,000 on the table. Ryan: Okay, thank you. Hoffman: Again that’s staff’s recommendation concerning the budget and the process to purchase and then install the material and that’s the schedule. That’s all I have for you tonight. Be glad to answer additional questions and then wait to hear from the commission. Kelly: Any other questions for Todd? Thunberg: I just have one. On the soil, going back to the soil corrections and, does that have anything to do with, when Ryland was preparing right so there was some difficulties going back and forth between the City and Ryland and the dirt, or the material they were putting in there? Hoffman: No. Thunberg: That doesn’t have anything to do with that? Hoffman: Those soils were all on top and these organic soils were underneath the original grades so these were below. Anything that was ever disturbed and it just happened to be some organic pockets down 4 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 there. It wasn’t material that would support those asphalt improvements. So they were digging back through the farm field. We actually could see the layers. They were digging back down through the top of the farm field and then in sub-soils. Kelly: Other questions or somebody want to put it to the ultimate question? Scharfenberg: I make a motion to amend the overall Pioneer Pass project CIP budget from $350,000 to $377,700 per staff’s recommendations. Kelly: Is there a second? Carron: Second. Kelly: There’s a motion as proposed in front of us and a second on the board. Scharfenberg moved, Carron seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission recommends the City Council approve the purchase of playgrounds and park shelter for Pioneer Pass Park using a competitive request for proposal (RFP); including supervised neighborhood installation of the playgrounds and amend the overall Pioneer Pass Park project CIP budget from $350,000 to $377,700 to accomplish these purchases. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 9 to 0. Hoffman: Thank you. DISCUSSION CONCERNING FUTURE PROGRAM, EVENT AND RECREATION FACILITY PROPOSALS. Kelly: Todd, you want to speak on it a little bit? Hoffman: I sure will. Chair Kelly, members of the commission. At our work session with the City Council, which is annually held the first Saturday of January, some of the council members were talking about how we, how are we going to continue to, you know they talk about competitiveness and livability and quality of life and those type of things so they really just put a challenge or a job in front of the commission to come up and see if there is the next facility program, event that can maintain Chanhassen’s reputation as a good place to live. Raise a family. Build a business and so things like skate park, disc golf, you know some of the programs. Even as recent as this last Friday night. Mitch introduced a luminary walk which was very popular on a very cold and windy night. There was about 75 people out and I really see that growing over the next few years. You know that will probably be a 200, 300, 400 person event on a Friday night out at the Holiday Inn Express and it’s a great event because it’s using that one mile trail or that half a mile trail that we have out at that 100 acre nature preserve so I think that’s going to be a hit. A program here that Mitch introduced a new program. So it’s that kind of thinking. And then we can have a conversation with the council at your joint meeting and see if they like more of your ideas and then if they do, if you get that affirmation from the council then you can continue to work with staff and direct us on how you would like to get going with that program. You know if it needs budgetary money, that will have to be something that will be a conversation for the council and it’s just a matter of adjusting some staff time or getting volunteers to put on the program…as well. Kelly: So any current ideas out there or questions for Todd expanding on new programs? Any thoughts on where we want to go in the future? Do we need to have some off site commission meeting to talk about bright ideas and feed off each other? 5 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 Ryan: Well I’ll throw some out there. I asked some neighbors and friends about different programming or things that they thought could be brought based on different things that they’ve done in other cities or through schools. A couple years ago I had brought this up and I know Steve brought it up at our last meeting about a splash pad. I know there was some concern from the City on how we would do that but a great location at Lake Ann to provide a, you know we have the park there. The swimming facilities. Baseball. You know there’s a lot going on there but it’s a great, it’s a really fun activity for little kids and right now most families go either to St. Louis Park or to the one in Eden Prairie so it’d be nice to have something like that for us in the city. Another thing that was mentioned was a, and I don’t know if we do this now but it’s called something along the lines of Art in the Park and it would be for, well it could really be for any ages. This would be more directed at the youth and you would bring an art instructor and go to a park and teach kids how to paint landscape as best as they can on little canvases. And they could go experience different parks and see different settings and learn how to paint so that’s something that my kids have done and have really enjoyed. Another thing that was brought up, we do the Klein Bank Series in the summer but something at the Rec Center during the wintertime. I know some schools do movie night but bring something along those lines to the Rec Center where you have family night at the Rec Center and set up a big screen. You know big screen and play a movie and sell popcorn and similar to what you do at the Klein Bank Series but do it in the wintertime because we all know that winter gets very long around here. Two more. Or actually three more. I don’t know how cool it is or if kids would feel weird about doing it but a skateboard clinic. Learn, you know utilize, get more kids to the skate park and learn new tricks or how to ride a skateboard. I’ve heard other communities do that across the country so that was another one. And then the last one that I mentioned earlier in the evening was bringing a race to Chanhassen. So a triathlon or a half marathon. You know there’s a lot of interest for runners to get a, I know Excelsior has one. Minnetonka, I know there’s a lot of them in the area but there’s the triathlon community is really growing and there’s a lot of interest to have one here in Chanhassen. So those are the, kind of the programming ideas. And then one other thought that has been brought up to me a number of times is just what are we doing on an environmental level, and I know we have an Environmental Commission but you know is there a better way that this commission can work with the Environmental Commission in terms of recycling at parks and having recycling bins available. When I go to the parks I see bottles all the time in the trash and make recycling more available at all of our parks so just playing a bigger role as park and rec to be green I guess. So those are the ideas that I have. Kelly: Other ideas out there? Thunberg: And also talking to neighbors and friends, one that did come up a lot was the splash pad. It came up a few times. Also a city pool since I think a lot of folks see the Chaska one but knowing that that takes significant resources an alternative to a pool, one idea was I guess Savage, they don’t have a city pool but they’ve worked out a program with Lifetime where you can, if you’re a resident you get a daily pass so I don’t know if the Lifetime here would be able to do something like that to, you don’t have to necessarily be a member to use their pool but it would be a daily fee. For the splash pad, I think Lake Ann sounds like a good spot. One that was brought up was somewhere around City Center Park. I don’t know if we have the room here but if it did have room it would kind of add to the landscape where the concert series could be and things like that. I did try looking online to see how much one of those things cost and it said small commercial for one company is $30,000 so but if it’s something that could be done for under $100,000. Obviously there’s maintenance cost but it may be something that would fit into something if there was a discussion if it’s a CIP item if it got that far. Some other ideas were community gardens. Somebody said like a yoga in the park series which maybe could span through beyond that. More like a healthy living so if you incorporate it with a race or running or walk group, you could do the yoga in the park. If you had other kind of like art in the park as well, of like a photography for beginners or something which then you could incorporate Chanhassen’s photo contest. Somehow leading up to that. Getting them to submit into that. And then I’ll just throw out the rest of, some of them were city golf 6 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 course. Continuing to expand dining and retail options. Garbage cans and waste bags along walking trails for dogs. I know that’d be possibly hard to maintain since we have 90 miles of trails but. And with all of our trails if there’s something with the trail map or routes that we could designate certain ones. Kind of like in the city, in Minneapolis you have around the lakes. You have the grand rounds or whatever that’s called. If there’s something where we had kind of specified trails that were based on destinations or if there was a link or something to kind of call out some of the more main ones we have. And then I think that is it. There was another, there were some people brought up just continue and more support for schools and the programs that we have. If there’s a way to better organize or bring to light the areas that may need volunteers, just to continue to garner support for the community and the school. One thing I did notice when hearing a lot of feedback from people, a good percentage of responses I got were, I could reply to them and say it’s something we already did. Have a summer concert series in the park. Have some ice skating rinks for the city. Have a farmers market that we could all come to. It was numerous so I think one of the things, and I know we have a Facebook page and things like that but could we do something on the Facebook page that is a daily did you know and have it be, even if it’s something that’s a couple months out but just a constant because I think part of it is just awareness of some of the things we already have. Because then when I was able to reply to them and say here’s the schedule of our concert series or here’s the place in the parks that we have the skating rinks and you know we can talk about it in the fall if there’s additional parks or something they, it was a welcomed surprise to hear that we already have that so just anything we can do to continue to promote and get the awareness out for the good stuff that we already have I think would be a benefit too. Thank you. Ryan Lynch: …Chan has a Twitter page? Hoffman: Got a Twitter account, yep. Ryan Lynch: Yeah so like…a guy with Twitter is going to check Twitter more than Facebook… Hoffman: Great. Wonderful. Echternacht: My neighbors talked about the pool also somewhere in the community. Possibly by the community Rec Center but perhaps elsewhere by the high school. Also soccer and lacrosse players and so on talked about a dome. We’ve talked about that before but also going more green, like has been mentioned already. Having the containers in the parks and so on. Also possibility of having an arts and craft actually show in like at Lake Ann like they do kind of like in Excelsior. Downtown in their park. Bringing more traffic into the park and more people. And I think otherwise some of the other similar ones. Kelly: In my readings I came up with, I can’t remember what city was doing this but they had a Daddy/Son Get in Shape Walk. You read that? Hoffman: No. Kelly: No. And basically to get, I think to get dad’s in shape and have their sons out walk with them but it’s something that you know the City’s facilitating getting in shape. And another thought I had is you know how you go down to the Chaska Rec Center and you can walk, what is it? 500 miles and you get a shirt and I was thinking you know we have what? Almost 100 miles of trail but not quite and map it out and have people sign up in the summer and at the end of it they can say you know whether it’s 95, 100 miles, I walked all 100 miles of Chanhassen trail. You know something like that would get people out on our trails and give them a purpose to do something and then you get a shirt at the end for doing it. You know our costs would be you know setting it up and then giving out t-shirts. 7 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 Hoffman: Great list. Kelly: Any other thoughts at this time? And it’s, you know we don’t have to have all our thoughts now because we have more time. When was our meeting with the City Council? Hoffman: It’s not currently scheduled. Kelly: So we don’t have a meeting scheduled so I think what we need to do is have some of, you know these ideas we’ll see in print and then try and figure out what some of the costs are of these and then maybe next meeting have some more ideas but thank you everybody for the great ideas that you did present. And then try to filter what we think are like the top 5 or 10 to pass along to the City, depending upon how many we have and depending upon what we see the costs as and the likelihood of the City saying yeah, it’s a good idea. We want to move forward so I think that’s what we have to come up with so obviously we’ll all see this in print because it will be in our Minutes and then I think at some point, and Todd I don’t know if that falls on you to try and figure out what the cost of these various things might be. Hoffman: Sure. Yeah we’ll put this list together and I’ll include it in your next Admin packet and then you can bring it up at a future meeting and discuss your ranking. Ryan or Jacob, anything else? This is a good topic for you guys. Kelly: And again if just you don’t have ideas right now, you come up with an idea, send out an email to everybody and say I’ve got this. I want it on the agenda and I want Todd and Jerry to review it for next time and, because we’re looking at all ideas right now and that’s what we’re, this is the whole thing is just, it’s an idea. You know we’re going to throw it up on the board and see what stays on the board and what falls off the board. Hoffman: Yep. I appreciate Commissioner Thunberg’s, there’s a couple of items on here that we, that were mentioned that we also currently have. We have a community garden and we have skate board clinics so Mitch, do you want to talk about those briefly? Just what they, they’ve been going on for quite some time. Johnson: Yeah. Jerry probably knows more of the history on it. Ruegemer: Yeah we’ve done, Third Lair’s provided skateboard camps for, oh probably going on 10 th years. Part of that kind of going on that we have added the summer series, skateboard series at the 4 of rd July celebration on July 3 so that’s confirmed again this year. We’re going to try something a little bit different. We’re going to go into the evening a little bit more. We’re going to go 7:30 start this year and then hopefully we can kind of go under the lights a little bit for that too to try to get some more interest in that. Chan’s always been a strong area for skateboarding with that. Third Lair loves coming out here because our numbers are really good for that summer skateboard series so, and we’ve done at least two camps a summer for the past you know, quite a few number of years. We’ve done skateboarding camps over MEA breaks in the past. Those numbers are a little bit lower. Kind of getting into the fall but you guys can kind of see our skateboard numbers are up there pretty good on a daily basis when we have skateboard attendants. Skate park attendants on duty so yeah, those are certainly things that we’ve tried through the years and we’ve had get out and kind of check out the parks with that. We gave away t-shirts and photographed all the parks and stuff like that too so, so we’re all ears for programming ideas and certainly try to implement if some kind of percolate up to the top 5 and that sort of thing so we can kind of take it and run with it. Carron: I just have a couple thoughts here too. After reading the Chanhassen questionnaire that came out. Survey. One of the things that really stuck out to me was the amount of attendants, on that survey at 8 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 the Chanhassen Rec Center. It was a majority of maybe once a month or not at all and knowing all the programs we put together and the quality of them and how it’s run, that kind of surprised me. So getting back on the whole thing of just maybe knowing but then also maybe looking at possibly, maybe a little bit outside of this is, what do we do to improve the Rec Center? If we can. Maybe just an open idea. I’ve been thinking about that for a while after reading that. I haven’t come up with an answer yet but something to get some more awareness out there but not only that but maybe if there’s something that we can improve to get more people to the Rec Center because it is a big portion of what we do and we oversee. And then Todd when you put the ideas together, can you also give maybe if there’s a little history. Hoffman: Sure. Carron: Because a pool came up quite a bit. My next door neighbors are competitive swimmers at Minnetonka. My other one’s within Chanhassen so I hear pool all the time and I don’t know the whole history of why District 112 only has one pool in the whole entire district but I know that the people that move to Chanhassen like myself who are schooling. Good school. Good place to live and activities for your kids and I think a pool is pretty high priority. I know it was when I was in high school so, maybe just a little bit of a background… Not saying that we can afford it but. Hoffman: And those that mentioned a city pool, are you thinking an outdoor pool or an indoor pool? Kelly: If they’re talking competitive swimming they’re talking indoor pool. Hoffman: Correct but you’re talking recreational… Thunberg: I think from the folks I talked to were referring to indoor because then you could have swimming lessons and different programs as well. Carron: Just basis I think Minnetonka Aquatic Center was somewhere in the neighborhood of 6 1/2 million. Just to throw out. Looking up online so. Not saying that we can afford that. Ryan: …for their swim community center, and didn’t Eden Prairie just do that? Hoffman: 10 or 12 million yeah. Ruegemer: And there were short courses and long courses too in their pools. Rochester has at least…so there’s a lot of activity for swimming. Hoffman: Great list. Keep your ideas coming and we’ll put it together. That’s how these things start. Start right here. I’ve seen many, many crazy ideas. They’re right up there and then pull it in and then now they’re out in the community. Everything from dog park to disc golf to referendums to trail referendum. We’ve had community center referendum. We’ve had a history of golf course initiatives so there’s a lot they haven’t even mentioned. Probably the most mentioned recently is the splash pad concept and I think it’s very similar to some of the other conversations that you’ve had is that, it’s going to take that great location so that great location will be what will make the splash pad so you study City Center Park. You study Lake Ann. You know what configuration is going to make that great location for that facility…but we have to take that first step of having the Park Commission and the Council say yeah, let’s take a look. Ryan: Todd just from a number…back when a friend was talking to me at the Rec Center, the space right now that has the fitness equipment, is that utilized? How has the number, how have the numbers been 9 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 with all the Fitness 19’s and the, you know the…expense of equipment only type facilities, how has that impacted user? Hoffman: That’s one of the biggest revenue producers in the facility is the fitness area and it’s small. People would like to have it larger. A number of years ago there was a push to eliminate all the meeting rooms and make that one big fitness area. Then we would be running a fitness facility, not a community Rec Center so that didn’t pan out. Keeping up with the, all the new machines is a challenge because you have to reinvest so we’ve done that. We keep it somewhat fresh but it is affordable. There’s a certain sector of the community that likes it and really appreciates that facility but there’s a limited, you know the time that you can be busy are limited and so…there’s many hours when there’s nobody there because they’re just, those are our low usage times at any club so there’s lots of competition obviously in town. We’re the world headquarters for Lifetime Fitness. We’re the world headquarters for Snap Fitness and we’re the world headquarters of the Chan Rec Center so we’ve got three of them right here. Our world headquarters in the fitness business and then we’ve got all of the others as well so, but that Jodi does a great job of managing that… Keeping it clean. Keeping it programmed in. People that run the programs. Private programs out of there for weightlifting and strength training and they purchase those punch cards for their clients and they train there. So it’s well used. The dance facility also is well used. The Rec Center was actually originally built for the meeting space so, we didn’t have large enough meeting space for public meetings in our community. Often times the City Council would have to vacate these chambers and go to the Chanhassen Elementary School so they were meeting in the school facility and the community said you know we need a larger meeting space and so that’s really what that started at and we added a gym and we added a fitness area and a dance room and so you know it’s somewhat limited in what it can offer but we give away $90,000 to $100,000 worth of space to the community…every year so if you add those dollars in the facility does cash flow which is a challenge when you’re operating that kind of a facility so. But without that, if you don’t add in that free space you know there’s that subsidy… Kelly: Thank you Todd. One second here. The Gophers won 95-89 just in case you’re curious. Hoffman: Thank you for that. Really enjoyed listening to those and there’s a lot of history there and we’ll get them written down and get them priced out. One that, some additional comments on recycling. That is one of Adam Beers new charges and so we’ve asked Adam to work with our existing refuse haulers and providers to see what we can bring in just on a, you know so will they give us recycling containers and will they pick that up as a part of our garbage program. Refuse program. Do we have to add onto that and so that’s an area we want to improve on. It’s not always easy. In Three Rivers Park District they spend, they invest a lot of dollars to get recycling back out. The biggest problem is cross contamination when you have recycling in park settings. Public park settings so that can be a challenge but it’s an area we want to improve on so we agree with that as well. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PARK AND RECREATION COMMISSION APPOINTMENTS. Kelly: Okay, moving onto item number 3. The recommendations we made for Park and Rec appointments for the next 3 year term. Since we have junior commissioners I’m going to call those other commissioners senior commissioners. I hope Luke doesn’t have any problem with that. So our recommendation is as follows. For senior commissioners, number one Brent Carron. Number two, Luke Thunberg. Number three, Steve Scharfenberg. For junior commissioners our recommendations are number one. Jacob Stolar. Number two, Tyler. Would you say the name for me Todd? Hoffman: I will. Tyler Kobilarcsik. Kelly: Kobilarcsik, thank you. And that’s all I have to say on that. 10 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 Hoffman: Thank you. RECREATION PROGRAM REPORTS: FEBRUARY FESTIVAL EVALUATION. Kelly: Mitch I think you’re up. st Johnson: Yes I am. Good evening Chair Kelly and Commissioners. The City hosted our 21 Annual Feb st Fest back on Saturday, February 1 out at Lake Ann. Staff estimates about 1,200 people probably showed up that whole day. Kind of partake in the different activities and obviously the ice fishing contest is kind of the centerpiece of that activity. In your report there I kind of broke down the event by the different aspects of the event so we’ll just kind of go through those and I’d be happy to answer any questions at the end. As far as the food and drink concessions with the Chanhassen Rotary Club and Culver’s out again. They continue to do an awesome job and kind of provide that service to people looking for you know a lunch break or snack break. The Rotary Club does an awesome job doing all the beverages. You know then Culver’s does the food tent so we certainly appreciate the service that they have. You know they had a long line out there all day and they do a great job for that. Had a couple bonfires this year. Of course they were a popular place on a cold day like it was this year. The wind was pretty crisp coming off the lake but we all survived the polar vortex. No negative 40 windchills or anything so that was good on that date. Moving down the list. The S’more cookouts and the bait sale, the local boy scout Troop 330, they were out again this year. They’ve been out there for several years now selling the little S’more kits out of Ziploc bags and then a variety of bait that they had out there as well so we appreciate their participation. They look forward to it every year and do a great job with that. For the skating rink we plowed a rink out there through all that heavy, wet snow and slush. That was a big challenge this year. In my couple years in this position, either we didn’t have enough ice. We had too much ice. This year we had too much snow you know so winters in Minnesota. Always something that we complain about I guess but we were able to get a nice skating rink plowed out there and we also brought the loop back this year so that was great. You know a lot of people out there skating and stuff is always fun. With the thick ice we also were able to plow a track for the sleigh rides. We brought those back on the lake this year with the amount of ice. I believe our operator said that every trip was full except two of them so he brought the horses on the lake and there was a line of people already waiting for them looking. I believe Chair Kelly, I think he took a first ride on them. Kelly: Yes I took a ride. It was wonderful. What a hoot. Johnson: So you know I heard people say, you know the sleigh is so much different than if you’ve ridden in the wagon so kind of a fun experience you know for people to come down, for that so we certainly appreciate that and hope to have them back in the future as well. Moving to the next page, we brought the ice fishing demonstrations back again this year. The Tips Outdoor Foundation came out. You probably saw their gear they had out there. The fishing houses. The ice augers. All the you know different rods and reels and stuff like that. Tip up’s. You know it’s great. Kind of an informational thing you know for people who maybe have never been fishing before or just want to learn more about it. Maybe get a few pointers before the contest starts so you know it’s great to have them out and we look forward to bringing them in the future. The medallion hunt was a ton of fun this year. I worked with Linda Landsman of the Friends of the Chan Library and we came up with the clues so we had a real good hoot putting all those together and it’s kind of a great way to build excitement I think for the event. You know they go in the Villager every day of the week leading up. We put them on the City’s website and Facebook and Twitter and stuff but also at the library, right at the entrance. They post the clues there. Byerly’s had the clues posted too so you think of all the people that come in and out of the doors. They see that and maybe think, what is Feb Fest? You know and then they’ve got the link there that they can check it out. They 11 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 bring more people out so the Friends of the Library did a great job. They put a little basket together valued at over $500 for the winners. We got a little nervous. They found it on Friday so after 5 clues you know typically it seems like you spend all the time on the clues and after day one they find it but we lucked out and got them, strung them along a little bit but we had a ton of fun driving through town. You’d see people out here out the window with shovels digging through all the snow you know and I’m like aw I wish I could tell them that it’s on that side of town. You know they’re about 12 miles away but, so it’s a ton of fun and then I talked to the people who won it too and you know just their excitement is just, you know they’re out of this world and kind of talk them what was there, what clues gave it away and stuff but it’s a great, fun event and glad to have the Friends of the Library involved again. The ice fishing contest, this year we sold 518 ice fishing tickets for the contest which is up from last year. We had 73 tickets were sold in advance here at City Hall, Ivan’s Food and Tackle and Cabin Fever in Victoria and then you can see 445 were sold on the ice at the event. I thought we did a great job with the crowds you know coming in. There never seemed to be a long line of people trying to buy tickets. You know we had enough volunteers I think that worked out good to kind of separate that out. We had over $6,400 in prizes this year. You know just through the sponsorship program, people contribute that or they contribute cash that we can purchase some prizes with. This year we caught 33 fish. Only 30 made the board because you can only have one fish up there. We had 50 prizes to give away so at the end of the contest we drew names out of the fishing contest participants to get rid of those last 20 prizes so, so it’s fun you know to, one thing we did this year. We shrunk the contest area down a little bit and we continue to kind of move it closer to shore to kind of get the fish numbers up there but you know some years are good. Some years are slow so continues to kind of be the marquee event of Feb Fest so that’s fun. With that we also did the door prize drawings. We had over $3,000 in door prizes that were contributed. You know and people still come looking for their tickets. It’s fun and you know thanks to all the commissioners. You helped giving away the prizes and stuff, it’s fun. You’ll see in the bottom there we have a couple kind of just general comments and suggestions. Got to give a big shout out to the Chanhassen Rotary Club. Not only do they do the concessions on the ice, they also came out and drilled over 1,200 holes in the ice that morning so I don’t know if they had to use extensions this year but there’s a lot of ice and snow to dig through and yeah they worked hard and we certainly appreciate that and all their service to the community. I also put the smaller contest area on there. I think we’re going to continue to do that in the future. And then another kind of common suggestion we put on our to do list for the summer is to rebuild our bonfire pits. They’re pretty seasoned. Pretty weathered. See what we can do to maybe if we’ve got to make them bigger or just kind of a different design element to them. I think that’s something we can do but also we’ve got to, you know obviously thanks to you guys, also the Chanhassen High School Key Club. They provided volunteers for the event which is great. And then also members from last summer’s teen volunteer program that we had. A couple of them came out for this event too so just kind of our goal with the program you know, work them hard in the summer and then once school starts as events come up we can just email them and I think we had 4 of them that came out for that so that’s always fun to get them involved again. So that’s kind of my general recap. Does anybody have any questions? Be happy to answer. Kelly: Questions? Carron: I have a couple of comments. Next time…right on the front door of the medallion. Hoffman: It was close to home wasn’t it? Carron: Yeah it was and then I had a great idea, I was going to take a picture of my son’s pound 5 ounce winner and send it to you but my wife was playing Candy Crush… I had it all planned out all day I was going to send in that picture…but great job. Wish we could have been there. Johnson: Great. 12 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 Hoffman: So that was the delivery day? Carron: Yep. Noon. 12:38. It was during the time too. Hoffman: Congratulations. Kelly: Congratulations is right. Boettcher: The only thing I did hear from some people they said they couldn’t hear the PA system. Johnson: Okay. Boettcher: They were out from the tent where we were doing the weigh in out to the left. Southwest or whatever. That corner. They said they were sitting out there and they see people getting up to go, to get door prizes or their name’s getting called in the raffle or something, they couldn’t hear anything so I don’t know just wind or whatever. One more speaker out there or something. I think the best part of the whole ice fishing contest, Rick was, we were both doing the weigh in. Was a little girl, what was she 3 1/2? Echternacht: Yes. Boettcher: I think and she came up with her mom and she had this little sunny. She had this pink snowmobile suit on. Had the big over sized sunglasses are cocked on her head. Never said a word. She just came walking up to me and had this sunfish like it’s just mashing it. The fish is looking like, and she came in fourth place. Well her dad got a fish finder but that was the best one. We were trying to find the photographer for the paper. Couldn’t find. I think Jerry you got a picture. Yeah there she is. Her name was Claire wasn’t it? Ruegemer: Rodenz. Boettcher: Rodenz, yeah. Ruegemer: Yep, there’s the picture right there. Boettcher: It was just hilarious. She never said a word. Her mom’s going on and on saying you know her grandpa helped her do this and all. The little girl never said, and then Jerry comes up to take her picture and he says now hold the fish up so she’s holding the thing this way instead of sideways. Upside down and they’re like, no turn the fish. Turn the fish and she’s like, so she deserved two prizes for that. It was hilarious. Ruegemer: That would be Al Klingelhutz’ great grand-daughter. Boettcher: Great grand daughter, yeah. Johnson: I think the winning fish was .32 pounds so yeah, it didn’t take much to get on the prize board this year so. Kelly: Mitch it was a fantastic event again and you did a great job with everything that you did and it was, for me it’s fun to be a part of that deal. It’s just a great outdoor event. Thank you. 13 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 Scharfenberg: Mitch just a couple things. With the prizes, if we could keep that other sheet because it was difficult having people come in for prizes and then having them out trying to write them down so if we could have that for next year. Johnson: Okay. Scharfenberg: And then I know, I don’t know if it’s because it’s considered a raffle but I know some people came in that were late comers and were asking about getting tickets and being disappointed that they couldn’t get their ticket for the raffle and that so I don’t know if there’s a way to do that for keep it open for an extra 15 minutes for people, for the late comers that are running in but I know that you have to, if there’s rules you have to shut it down by a certain period of time if it’s considered a raffle so, I’ll leave that up to you guys but just to know that there were people in asking about getting, being able to get a raffle ticket. Johnson: Yeah it’s tough and we’ve tossed it around too you know but unfortunately we try to people when they come to the ice, because then you have people come up, oh I didn’t get a ticket. Next thing you know they’re in there 10 times or you know what I mean. I think the volunteers can certainly do a better job of initiating that, hey did you get your ticket and kind of gathering the crowds because I do think a lot of people do kind of just walk by but. Ruegemer: We can take a look at it next year to see if we can, you know you can put it back 15 minutes and go to 1:15-1:20 and that will allow more people to get in so. Ryan: Or just signage to make it a little bit clearer of timing and the different table…people kind of come and look around and they’re unsure of the tables…communicate the time that it closes that would be helpful too. Then another question about the sledding hill. People couldn’t seem to find the sledding hill. They were asking me was there, and people said…where the sledding hill. I was asked a number of times where the sledding hill was and was it open and could they go and all that so… Kelly: Mitch one other comment is the DJ and I, and I brought Todd over. We talked about ways to make it better set up in the DJ tent so they can hear better from where it is and so you can talk with Todd about that but address what Jim mentioned because we did have a few people come up to us and say, we can’t hear a thing and of course once everything’s set up you can’t really readjust it and especially in that weather so he had some ideas and I brought Todd over so Todd could see what the ideas were. Johnson: Okay, sounds good. Kelly: Okay. DADDY/DAUGHTER SWEETHEART DANCE EVALUATION REPORT. Johnson: Thank you Chair Kelly. So the weekend before Valentine’s Day it’s become an annual tradition that we have the Daddy/Daughter Sweetheart Dance over at the Rec Center. We had it on a th Friday night, February 7. We had a total of 70 dads and daughters in attendance. It’s a really fun event. You know I just get a kick out of it and I think all of the families really come to expect it. Talked to one th dad, he said this was the 12 year he’s been there so he’s had a couple different daughters kind of go through the program. His latest daughter is like 6 years old so he’s got you know a few more years left of it so they have a ton of fun. So with that you know I do my best to try to keep things fresh for the returners like that and you know to make sure everybody’s having a good time. Same kind of thing, I broke down the event by different aspects so I’ll just kind of go through those. The event is two hours long. Kind of the first hour of the event we serve dinner and do games. Things like that and then the 14 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 second hour we do the dance so during dinner we cater through Chuckwagon Charlie’s. The barbeque pit here in Chanhassen. It’s always great to buy local. We try to do as much as we can here in town so they had pulled pork sandwiches, macaroni and cheese for the kiddos. Coleslaw, carrot sticks and then dessert as well. To save on some costs we just went to Cub Food and the City purchased the beverages and the dessert separately so it was a good way to kind of save and kind of keep the fees low for that. For the dance portion, the second hour we went through DJ John Vavrin. First time we’ve had him here. Came on a recommendation. Did a great job. Very reasonable. You know brought all the lights and things like that. Played kind of the soft dinner music during the first hour and then kind of kicked it up a notch for the second hour so…did a great job. For the different activities, we continue to do the heart count. I think this year I only had about maybe 150 hearts I hung up. In the past I think the most I had was 600 so took it back a notch to save on time but continue the heart count and the candy guess continue to be popular. We also set up different craft tables where the girls could make little crafts to bring home to their mothers or anybody else. Did kind of different coloring and carnival games and stuff too for them. Another thing we do is for the door prize drawings. We do two separate ones. One for the kids and then one for the dads as well so the daughters, they receive this great big gift basket from ABC Toy Zone here in Chanhassen who donated this real nice prize for them. Then we put another package together from a gift card to Byerly’s and dinner and show for two to the Dinner Theater so the dads can take out another Valentine if they wanted so. Turning over the page, we also had a face painter again this year. We used a new face painter, Lynda. She’s from here in town so great to have her. We do that first hour during the dinner aspect of it and then on a recommendation from Commissioner Carron from last year we brought a photo booth in this year so, and rather than doing the formal photos in the lobby, we brought in a photo booth where they could take unlimited photos throughout the event. They brought their little basket of props and the boa’s and hats and the sunglasses. It was a ton of fun and then they were printed right on scene there within seconds and they could take them all home. Some girls you know had a fan of them that they could take home and you know wore every single prop in the basket so it was a ton of fun. The company then puts them on their website and it’s password protected so all the families can then go home and log in and see some of their pictures. They can see their friends on there. They can order prints if they want. You know great big 5 by 7 so it’s real fun and it was a local photo booth company out of Eden Prairie so that was nice to bring them back. And yeah so on the bottom, just some more general kind of comments, suggestions. One thing I thought would be fun maybe for next year is do like a mother/son kind of Valentine’s theme party. Maybe that Saturday night. So do like a Friday-Saturday. You know so maybe a family, a couple kids. Can kind of split it up to everybody can come out and have a good time. Then just continue to make the event fresh every year. Add something new and keep things on track so. And then on the last page you’ll see the kind of breakdown of the expense report. So the Daddy/Daughter Sweetheart Dance is one of our revenue generating programs so you’ll see the registration and the expenses and then the ending balance. So any questions for the Daddy/Daughter Sweetheart Dance? Thunberg: Just wanted to pass, a couple of neighbors said to pass along the compliments that it was, they called it a wonderful and a special event so good job. Johnson: Oh, thanks. Kelly: Any other questions, comments? So Mitch I like that idea of a Mother-Son dance. I think that should go over well you would think. Johnson: Yeah. Kelly: Thank you. Nice job Mitch. Moving right along here. ADMINISTRATIVE UPDATES: ANNUAL BLUFF CREEK/CHANHASSEN REC CENTER JOINT POWERS MEETING. 15 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 Hoffman: Thank you Chair Kelly, members of the commission. Just want to give you a short synopsis of what this is about so the commission is educated on how we operate the Chanhassen Recreation Center. We have a lease agreement with the District to operate that building and the basis of that is that we own 20%. 24% or operate 24% of the footprint and they operate 76% so that’s how all our bills are separated and so heating, cooling, air conditioning and then any major improvements. For example this summer we’ll replace both boilers and so the School District will replace both boilers. Take out a wall. Replace those. We’ll pay 24% of that cost and the School District will pay 76%. The second part of that agreement is that the inside maintenance of the Chanhassen Recreation Center, so janitorial, cleaning, they perform those services without charge or without a separate agreement with the City of Chanhassen. In return for the School District doing that, performing those services, we perform all exterior maintenance. Snowplowing, grass mowing on the facility so it works very well. We do meet annually as a group, joint facilities commission group and talk about what went well. What needs improvement. What’s on the radar screen for upcoming large improvements. Capital improvement programs so like the roof is coming up in a few years and so then we can get budgeted dollars in our CIP for those type of improvements. So just wanted to bring you, make you aware of that’s how it operates and answer any questions of the commission. Kelly: So I know in the past the City’s had to push the School District a little bit to live up to their full potential and how is that working these days? Hoffman: It’s always, that’s a two way street and so they often feel that there are things that we can improve on and vice versa. That’s part of this meeting is to have that conversation in a formal setting and so I encourage Jodi to build those relationships that will really benefit the City’s side of the equation because you know there’s a couple ways to get things done. You can kill them with kindness or you can try to hit them over the head with a stick so I encourage her to kill them with kindness if she can and then when we have to we’ll talk to the superintendent or others about some of the larger issues that we have out there. Kelly: So the relationship’s working quite well at this point? Hoffman: Working very well. At least once a year state, cities and school districts from across the state come and visit that facility because it has worked so well. Kelly: Any other questions for Todd? Thank you Todd. Moving onto item number 3. CLOSING OF ICE SKATING RINKS. Kelly: Mitch, can you comment on the closing of the ice rinks please. Hoffman: Do you have any specific questions or just want to go over? Ryan: Well more of a comment. Hoffman: Sure. Ryan: Questions and comments, or we all got the email about the closing of the rinks and just was wondering if there was, and I understand the expense and the time to do it but with the weather, you know over the course of the next 2 weeks, was there any consideration or could there be consideration of keeping one rink open like the City Center because these kids use these rinks all the time and ice time is valuable, especially outdoor rinks. 16 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 Hoffman: I’d be glad to go over it. There’s quite a history in the rinks. How long they stay open. Should they be closed or should they, or should we keep them open? We always advocate to try to keep th them open and in operation as long as we can. So many cities go to where it’s just February 15 and they’re done. They just name a date. It doesn’t really matter what the weather is. In this situation with the extensive snow we had on Thursday and so everything’s snowed in. All of our facilities. Parks, trails, parking lots, ice rinks and so we met on Friday morning and first call was we’re not going to start clearing anything on rinks until Monday at the earliest and so we have public facilities to get open. Really life and safety type things at that point over the weekend that we were trying to open up. Then as we thought th about it in more detail, we’re really getting, anytime you get past February 15 you get to where the sun angles starts to really increase and we have a challenging time just maintaining those rinks in any kind of, even with the cold weather that we have today, and so it’s a point of limiting returns and so I can give you th some history. Since ’82 we’ve been open 5 times later than we closed this year on February 19. And th we’ve been closed 18 times earlier than that so the dates are, we closed on February 19 this year. In stthstth history we’ve stayed open to the 21. The 20 once. The 21. The 27 of February and then even stth recently one of those March dates, March 1 or March 8. And so we have extended it farther but when you get all that snow and you have to get in there, it takes, that would have taken two days and so we, Adam and I met. We talked about it so we would have to call everybody off the trails. Stop the trail cleaning on Monday, Tuesday and dedicate all 7 of our forces to those ice rinks for Monday and Tuesday, get them clean and then continue to maintain them after that and continue to staff them. So our conclusion was that it was not worth the investment. Was not worth the return on that investment and so then I met with City Manager Gerhardt and his first opinion was he would like to give it another go and see if we could open them back up. Keep them running but as we reviewed all of the historical data he st again agreed so, after March 1 it’s really a challenge to keep them open so we were you know just a st week from March 1 by the time we hit this past Monday so that was the decision. That’s certainly something this body can talk about. You already, probably about 15 years ago the commission set some parameters on the front side so how late are we going to go before we just abandon the rinks, and you could do that on the opposite side because it’s really, where do you want to put your resources. And so do you want to pull everybody off of trails and open up rinks and then have trails that are not open? That’s another thing that people appreciate is our trail system as well so, it’s just where do you put your resources to get the most return on the investment. Once you get these rinks open you have to re-flood them and you have to do that on a daily basis. Some numbers, the ice rinks in aggregate are about a $10,000 to $40,000 business annually, depending on how long they’re open. And then the per day cost is anywhere between $350 and $700 per day to keep them open, and that’s just for maintenance. Then you add on the cost of the rink attendants. Ryan: …I get the historical numbers and I understand maintenance. What I don’t understand or necessarily agree with is that it has to be an all or nothing proposition. Hoffman: Sure. Ryan: And I get that taking 7 rinks is a lot and I’m not suggesting, there would be the people that I talked to, to pull them off the trails because at the last meeting I brought up the importance of clearing trails so, I’m not trying to…with that but at the same time to maintain the rink at City Center. Let the 6 other rinks go and then maintain you know the City Center rink for the next week or two considering and having the flexibility to look at the weather and see that you know over the course of the next 2 weeks, I mean we’re lucky to hit the teens and so I get the sun during the day melts the ice but with the refreeze and maybe not the rinks aren’t perfect but at least give, instead of having the rink closed sign and have it as an option for one rink in our city to be open. Hoffman: Sure, I understand. 17 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 Carron: I agree with Elise. I like the idea. Maybe we should, Chair Kelly bring that up next month for a topic. Kelly: Yeah, let’s add it onto our agenda for next month. And part of the question would be, you know which is the best rink to keep open? Which one gets the most use, and I think you have those figures. Hoffman: The Chan Rec Center right? Johnson: Yeah. Kelly: And so we’d look at that and say you know we’re closing down because of the cost, the expense and we don’t want to, I don’t think any of us want to see the trails get short changed and so maybe it takes an extra day or two but if we can keep one rink open, I think as you told me, there’s kids out shoveling over here in City Park. Hoffman: And I talked to Adam today. I said if you have time, if you can get out and at least push the snow off to the edges and so people could, they could still go play pick up hockey, then we’ll do that. The maintenance process is, it’s more involved than most would realize to get those cleared and re- flooded on a daily basis and so it’s a significant investment in time. And then at some point where staff is, we don’t like to make arbitrary decisions based on okay, let’s just. It’s kind of an equity thing. When we stop things we, we’re just like okay it’s over for everybody because the people on this side of town would say well why did you keep that one open. You didn’t keep our’s open and so there’s some of that so that should be a policy set. If you want to ratchet them down. You know we have done that over the st years. There’s a lot less rinks than there used to be and so, and do we want to set a March 1 date? Right thth now it’s kind of a February 15 date. After February, up until February 15 we’re going to give it everything we’ve got to have those open but after that we really start seeing where we’re going to start to lose them. Kelly: Yeah I think making a hard and fast date is hard because you know, well 2 years ago I think we couldn’t even flood the rinks practically because it was so warm all winter. Hoffman: Correct. Kelly: So to have a hard and fast rule doesn’t make sense because you’ve got to really react to the weather and it’s, and I know my son before he went to college, he’s a hockey player. He was out shoveling over at the Rec Center once the City was done and that’s what, and you know there’s nothing wrong with that either if the kids want to play but I think if you can bring up to us what you think the cost, the time and the effort are to keep one rink open at the Rec Center since that’s the most heavily used, at this point that’s something we might want to look at, and obviously not every year is going to be like this year but when we do have years like this, and we’re going to be zero for another 7 days according to my Weather Bug on my phone. The kids could skate and at some point maybe we just say we’re going to let it re-freeze and we’re not going to make it perfect because we’re not going to put that effort into it. Then if the ice gets really bad we just close it down you know so we work with it and see how it works. So I think it might work better in a year like this, obviously if we’re hovering at 15-20 degrees and the sun is out, that’s not going to work and it’s probably not even smart to keep it open but you might as well take advantage in years like this, which we hope are rare but we do have them and so why not make it available to the community in the rare years that we have. So yes I’d like to see it on the agenda and the costs associated with it and then we can talk about it next meeting. 18 Park and Recreation Commission – February 25, 2014 Hoffman: Great be glad to. Yeah 2 years ago we were open 28 days. This year 61. And then last year st 59. And last year was a similar winter and we closed on March 1 last year so, a few days longer than this. Scharfenberg: Can you just confirm that up until the snow storm this past weekend, were we flooding up until that time? Hoffman: Yes. Scharfenberg: Okay. Kelly: Any other comments or thoughts? It will be on our next agenda. Thanks for bringing that up Elise. Ryan: Thank you. COMMISSION MEMBER COMMITTEE REPORTS. None. COMMISSION MEMBER PRESENTATIONS. None. CORRESPONDENCE PACKET. None. Carron moved, Echternacht seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 9 to 0. The Park and Recreation Commission meeting adjourned at 9:00 p.m. Submitted by Todd Hoffman Park and Rec Director Prepared by Nann Opheim 19