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PRC 2015 10 27 CHANHASSEN PARK AND RECREATION COMMISSION REGULAR MEETING OCTOBER 27, 2015 Chairman Kelly called the meeting to order at 7:30 p.m. MEMBERS PRESENT: Cole Kelly, Steve Scharfenberg, Brent Carron, Luke Thunberg, Jim Boettcher, Rick Echternacht, Jennifer Hougham, and Lauren Dale STAFF PRESENT: Todd Hoffman, Park and Rec Director; and Jerry Ruegemer, Recreation Superintendent APPROVAL OF AGENDA: The agenda was approved as presented. PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENTS: None. VISITOR PRESENTATIONS. None. APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Carron moved, Hougham seconded to approve the verbatim and summary Minutes of the Park and Recreation Commission meeting dated September 22, 2015 as presented. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 8 to 0. 2015 RESERVATION PICNIC SITE EVALUATION. Kelly: Jerry, I think you’re on deck. Ruegemer: Thank you Chair Kelly. Good evening to the rest of the commissioners. I’m glad you’re here tonight. Just wanted to go over briefly the 2015 picnic site evaluation. We had a total of 125 paid picnics this year at 3 of our sites. At the Lakeside Pavilion at Lake Ann, the Klingelhutz Pavilion at Lake Ann and Lake Susan shelter. As you can see the most popular was the Lakeside Pavilion with 45 paid reservations. The Klingelhutz had 41 and Lake Susan was third with 39 so this year with the 125 reservations we generated over $15,000 in revenue. And that totaled over 14,000 picnic people kind of participating with those groups so. Kind of attached is the kind of the breakdown of how the categories were broken down by, kind of by resident, you know school district, non-resident and non-resident school district with that so you kind of see kind of how those fared out per location per days of the week with the grand totals on the right hand side of the column and down is how they totaled out cumulative so. The council or the commission was well aware of the, it certainly is important to us to gather feedback from our participants so evaluations were sent out immediately upon the conclusion of the picnic, along with their deposits to solicit feedback from all of our guests that participated in the picnics at our locations. Certainly it’s our, always our goal is to exceed expectations and make sure that Chanhassen Park and Recreation Commission – October 27, 2015 people have a great place to attend family reunions and different birthday parties, company picnics, that sort of thing. Certainly Lake Ann is a very popular area throughout the course of the summer. We have been attracting larger groups throughout the year for both company picnics and large family gatherings and reunions, weddings, that sort of thing. Certainly one of the obstacles that we faced probably about the last 2 or 3 years was limited parking in the kind of the Klingelhutz beach area with a number of athletic tournaments and general beach use. Boating and other types of general uses of the park itself. This year we had, or 2014 evaluation we had kind of talked about scheduling. Or not scheduling the Klingelhutz picnic pavilion during those CAA tournaments, that sort of thing. Staff did do that this year so we had a grand total of 4 weekends. I think it was like a total of 9 days plus for the Klingelhutz Pavilion that we did not book so that was one of the reasons for the dip in revenue. Last year we were over $17,000. This year about $15,200 so, but overall that was a much better situation out there for the CAA tournaments when they’re getting you know 30 to 40 teams out there for these tournaments between the Rec Center and Lake Ann and all the rest of that. We had a great summer for the beach so it was really a hot year and we needed every really available parking spot that we could do staff will intend to do that practice again for 2016 just to get those dates kind of put it in the books and get them reserved. And then also, staff also looked at the, those days of those tournaments and what was being booked in the Lakeside Pavilion too to make sure that we really kept the number down on that area as well so we tried to really make sure that the most available parking was there and present for the tournaments as well as the other general uses for the park. So overwhelming you know Lake Ann’s a beautiful place. We have a lot of great comments, as you guys have seen throughout the course of the summer with the evaluations. We’re extremely fortunate to have 2 beautiful picnic sites at Lake Ann that are extremely popular and people are really you know gravitating to those on an annual basis, whether it be company picnics or family reunions, that sort of thing so we’re always looking to strive to better the experience of our people and our guests of the park so attached is the kind of the categories that we had talked about. The picnic attendance. The picnic revenue and just the general picnic reservations over the last several years to kind of see how we’re kind of charting and kind of where we’re going and give a quick snapshot of the previous years here so I’ll entertain any questions that the commission might have. Kelly: Questions for Jerry. Hougham: Yeah I’ve got a question Jerry. I noticed on the comments everything you know pretty much like once they’re signed up they love it you know so congrats to your team on a good season. Just a question about how they reserve it. Do they physically have to come in person to reserve it or can they like call or email? Ruegemer: All of the above. Hougham: Okay. Ruegemer: You do not have to come in physically to city hall. 2 Chanhassen Park and Recreation Commission – October 27, 2015 Hougham: Okay. Ruegemer: So we do probably 90 percent over the phone. Hougham: Okay. Ruegemer: And start the dialogue either that way or through emails so it’s kind of going back st and forth and what’s changed this year now, as of October 1 we can’t accept credit cards over the phone anymore so I would say the large majority of people do pay with a check anyway. Hougham: Okay. Ruegemer: But you know if folks to choose to pay with a credit card they’ll need to come into City Hall and we take payment that way. Hougham: Okay, thanks. Echternacht: Jerry there was one comment about signing to try to find the pavilion. They said a couple of their guests were driving around because it was to find it and I was wondering if that’s been addressed or do we have the signing? Ruegemer: Well each location does have a sign as far as who has the site reserved. I think we could probably do a bit better having some signs internally as to you know directional signs. Similar to what we have at Bandimere with, at the entrance as to what direction you know Field number 2 and number 3 is so I think that would be a prudent idea to get that taken care of here before next year to kind of get a little bit better signage. Echternacht: Okay. Ruegemer: I think that was a valid point. Scharfenberg: I just wanted to say Jerry based on you know the evaluations again that in this day and age where customer service is kind of a big deal and the Emerson reference of you going out there and being on hand to help them open, you know that’s great because that just kind of paints the picture for them of the City and gives them that first impression so thank you for doing that and all that you do with that. The one thing I think I’ve seen on a couple of the evaluations they’ve talked about electricity and having electricity issues. Is that something we kind of follow up at the beginning of the year and at the end of the year and kind of have that all checked out? Ruegemer: That’s a continuous, you know we do check on that continually. The Klingelhutz in particular is maybe a little short on electricity out there. It wasn’t maybe wired the way it maybe should have been so when we have family reunions or company picnics, those type of things 3 Chanhassen Park and Recreation Commission – October 27, 2015 when the crock pots come out and the roasters there just isn’t enough capacity for electricity out there so a lot of the, obviously the electrical outlets are all GFI so if they pop them for the most part they probably pop right on the pole. Scharfenberg: Yeah. Ruegemer: But at times they’re, there is a main box where the breaker pops so what I certainly try to do is try to gauge what electrical needs are going to be taken care of or what they are present prior to the picnic and then certainly make people aware of the power situation out there and try to kind of alternate poles to make sure that people don’t have problems so. We’re aware of it and certainly it’s an ongoing where we do check. Carron: Jerry, any idea on the huge draw to Lake Susan on Sundays? Ruegemer: What’s the large draw? Echternacht: There’s zero. Ruegemer: Well that is, we have an adult baseball league that plays out there on Sundays and it’s a fairly large league so staff had taken that upon ourselves a number of years ago that, not to rent any picnics out on Sundays. Carron: Okay, so it’s not available. Ruegemer: It’s not available. Carron: And can you just remind us again where, what you guys do with the revenue that you collect for the. Ruegemer: It all goes into the general fund. Carron: Really? Thought it would have been more exciting than that. Hoffman: That is exciting. For our Finance Director. Ruegemer: Just trying to do our fair share and help with the overall revenue of the city. Carron: Fair enough. Hoffman: Commissioner Carron we spend a lot more than we make so he’ll remind us of that. Kelly: Jerry, did we put in a water fountain over at Lake Susan? 4 Chanhassen Park and Recreation Commission – October 27, 2015 Ruegemer: We did. Kelly: Does it work? Ruegemer: It does. Kelly: Okay, I noticed one of the comments was we’d like a water fountain at Lake Susan. Was that an old one or they couldn’t find it or? Ruegemer: It’s pretty obvious where it is when you kind of come in the main driveway right by the well house there. It’s mounted right on the north wall there so it’s in plain sight. Kelly: Okay, that’s good. We might want to let them know for the next time they reserve it that there is one out there. I noticed in, and of course the season it’s hard to handle at the end of the season but one of them complained about bees and I don’t know if there’s anything we can do about it or not and that’s you know it recurs every fall and do we tell people that it’s, there’s bee time and they should bring their own spray out or how do we handle that? Ruegemer: We certainly manage that on a daily basis. We’ve tried a number of different remedies from pellets to sprays to you know keeping the garbage units clean itself so that’s an ongoing you know I guess problem that we have. Even when you have a number of food items and sticky things. Kelly: As soon as you’ve got the first pop going in the garbage there’s bees. Ruegemer: Yep. It’s, and quite frankly I think it was better this year than it has been. Kelly: Good. Ruegemer: But you know Dean Schmieg, our park foreman and our park maintenance crews are always looking for kind of new ways to remedy that situation. Kelly: Thank you. Hoffman: Over 300 species of bees in Minnesota. Kelly: I know it’s unimaginable I realize that but when you see the comments and you know right at that September-October. Hoffman: Yep. Some years, and Jerry’s correct. Some years are worst than others. Typically we use these pellets in our garbage that helps but you can’t get rid of them all. 5 Chanhassen Park and Recreation Commission – October 27, 2015 Kelly: Great thank you. Well Jerry you get lots of nice comments and I think you deserve all of them and thanks for the great job. Anybody else have a comment or a question? Okay. Moving right along. COMMISSION MEMBER COMMITTEE REPORTS. None. COMMISSION MEMBER PRESENTATIONS. None. ADMINISTRATIVE PACKET. Hoffman: One note. Kelly: Oh sorry. Oh I’m sorry, there was the administrative packet. I’m sorry. Hoffman: One note, as commissions you should make a note that the City of Shorewood, at least at some level is interested, and I don’t know if it’s at their administrative level, they’re getting calls from some of the folks in their admin group that they would like to revisit the joint agreement between the City of Chanhassen and Shorewood for Cathcart Park. This goes back to 1993 when there was quite a bit of involvement between the two commissions at that time. Shorewood Park Commission and the Chanhassen Park Commission. Cathcart Park is in Chanhassen but it’s owned and operated by the City of Shorewood. The church to the north gave the property to the City of Shorewood for a park and it just happens that they gave the City of Shorewood land that was in Chanhassen for the Shorewood park. As Chanhassen grew and there’s more and more residents from the Chanhassen side around the park Shorewood said why shouldn’t we ask Chanhassen to participate in this and so currently we mow the lawn and we maintain the trees and the shrubbery and then they’re responsible for capital improvements and long term maintenance of the facilities and any scheduling that takes place. Now they’d like to revisit that. They would like us to participate in the capital improvements and so my recommendation was that, I’m not sure if this commission would like to revisit that so why don’t they send a representative from their park board to talk to you as part of visitor presentations so nobody arrived this evening. So that agreement goes back quite some time and Cathcart Park is a nice facility. Residents from both communities use it but we currently have, you know what I think is pretty equitable operation. We maintain it. We’ve never had any issues with the maintenance of that so that’s up to you if they show up at a future meeting and if you want to take that up and investigate that. Scharfenberg: Todd did they give you any indication as to what the capital improvements were that they were looking at? Hoffman: They did not. Kelly: Are they looking to give us the property? 6 Chanhassen Park and Recreation Commission – October 27, 2015 Hoffman: I don’t believe so. Kelly: That’s going to, I meant to ask you. I said this is the second year in a row we’ve had this, after not having it for a number of years so I thought oh something’s up. Hoffman: Some commissioners may, I think we had a joint meeting there with their park board, do you remember that? And talked about some different things. There’s a hockey rink there. A tennis court. Playground. Ice skating and then baseball field. Kelly: Yeah Terry and I will park over there once in a while and get on the bike trail over there. Looks like a nice park. Anything else? Okay let’s go back to the question. Carron moved, Echternacht seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 8 to 0. The Park and Recreation Commission meeting was adjourned at 7:45 p.m. The Park and Recreation Commission met in a work session after the regular meeting to discuss park, recreation and trail projects to be included with a possible future park and recreation referendum. Submitted by Todd Hoffman Park and Rec Director Prepared by Nann Opheim 7