Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutPRB Minutes110310WUP Parks and Recreation Board MINUTES NOVEMBER 3, 2010 6:30PM REC CENTER - CONFERENCE ROOM TYPE OF Monthly Meeting MEETING CHAIR Russ Schulze SECRETARY Mardi Turner ATTENDEES Russ Schulze, Janine Schueppert, Mardi Turner, Teresa Edmondson, John Cadena, Charles May, Kathleen Colt, Sona West, Tim O'Connor (staff) VISITORS George Boehme (City Council) I. Call to Order: The meeting was called to order at 6:38 pm by Russ Schulze, Chair. II. Review and Approval of Minutes of the October 6, 2010 meeting: The minutes were approved as submitted. III. Citizen Comments - none IV. Friends Board Report - Leah Ragiel - attachment #1 V. Colonial Concessions - Russ Schulze Russ told the Board that we have received a request from Council to evaluate the concessions at Colonial Park Pool (CPP) and make recommendations for next year. We are to report back to Council by the end of January with a recommendation on how to proceed with the vendor RFP for CPP concessions. George Boehme (City Council) reported that based on his experience this season there will definitely be some challenges. The biggest issue is that there is no real kitchen at CPP and that makes logistics difficult. The vendors who respond to an RFP will be interested in making money. He said that we need to determine what we want and figure out how to make it attractive to vendors. Teresa asked if there has been any thought given to having a portable kitchen on CPP grounds. George said that a portable kitchen has the same health code issues as a restaurant does. Janine pointed out that Noah's Ark (a popular water park) has pizza delivery and a drink machine. She asked if we definitely want to contract out the concessions. George said that there is probably not enough revenue to justify ordering pizzas from the outside. The revenue average for this season was only $500-600 per day, and the shelf life of pizza is only 25 minutes. Tim said that staff has done the research and will make the information available to the Board. He also indicated that we do not want city staff running the concessions. He thinks we may have difficulty finding a vendor when there are only 400-500 attendees at CPP a day. We might want to go with vending machines and/or allow people to bring in their own food. In response to Russ' question about the revenue from vending machines, Tim said it would Parks and Recreation Board Minutes be 10% of sales, and he thinks a vending machine company would be very interested in the idea. Kathleen feels that we ought to poll the members of CPP about what they would like. Tim said that both quality and personnel are critical elements. He estimated that it would take $500 per day in revenue just to pay personnel. Charles thinks that the CPP members want good quality food and that we need to investigate further. Mardi asked why we think things will be different this year when Edloe Deli was the only vendor who responded to last year's RFP. Janine thinks we should continue to utilize the space as it was designed and built, for concessions. Russ asked Tim to forward the information from last year's search to the Board members so that we can discuss the issue further at a specially scheduled meeting before our regular December meeting. VI. Park Signage Subcommittee - John Cadena John and Tim met with Dr Kwon of the University of Houston's Industrial Design faculty. She suggested having a team of students come up with some design ideas as a student project. There is a new group of students starting in January. John said that the next steps in this process are to perhaps attend a UH industrial design exhibit in December and then invite some students to come and visit the parks to get ideas. VII. Huffington Park Neighbors Parking Issue - Sona West Sona has met with her neighbors on Milton to discuss the ongoing parking problems. The number of park visitors and parties has picked up. People from other cities are holding parties at Huffington and parking is becoming a problem. The neighbors are interested in making parking only on one side of the street. Tim responded that if we make it one side parking on Milton, that just shifts the parking problem to the neighboring streets. However, he will take Sona's summary information and request to Michael Ross and Chris Peifer for review. VIII. Party Package Subcommittee - Sona West Sona reported that she has a very enthusiastic group of 8-9 people for this committee. She will be setting up a meeting for next week, including a tour of the facilities. IX. Staff Reports - Tim O'Connor - attachment #2 X. Board Reports Janine reported a problem with the Judson Park tennis court surface. Charles asked about benches for the Colonial Park tennis courts. Tim said that a shade structure and benches are in the budget for 2011. The west end Colonial Park fence did not make the budget. 2 Parks and Recreation Board Minutes page 3 XI. New Business - none XII. The meeting was adjourned at 8:32 pm. The next meeting is scheduled for December 1, 2010 @ 6:30 pm in the conference room at the Recreation Center. Parks and Recreation Board Minutes page 4 Friends Report - Leah Raaiel - Attachment #1 Hi, Tim and Russ, I am sorry but I am going to have to miss the parks board meeting tonight. My husband had to leave town on business and I don't have a sitter since this came up last minute. Here is the latest Friends news. * We had another successful Fathers & Flashlights event and thank our chairs, Donna Lamond, Tim O'Connor and the PARD staff for all of their contributions. Final numbers will be available next week, but we feel confident that we raised at least as much as we raised last year which was a net of $37K. We will provide final numbers when they are available. * We have added a new board member, Katie Hill, a West U resident and marketing communications professional with Chik-fil-A. We have also identified a prospective board member to take over our Public Relations role, Heather Chilivetas. * We held our first guild meeting of the year last week. It was not well attended, so we will be redoubling our efforts for a greater turnout. The Guild will be having a holiday coffee in December at a private home. That is about it! Leah Parks and Recreation Board Minutes page 5 Staff Reports - Tim O'Connor - Attachment #2 CITY OF WEST UNIVERSITY PLACE, TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF PARKS AND RECREATION Board Update - November 3, 2010 2011 Budget has been approved. PARD Revenues are up and we had no significant changes in our budget request. Council took away the Retirement COLA benefit of the employee retirement plan. Merit only salary and wage increases have been budgeted - 3% overall. WUPRC playground has been completed - keeping an eye on the artificial turf. Huffington Park Playground safety base work has been completed. ➢ Library Courtyard drainage project has been completed. Community Building / Senior Center renovations are scheduled to begin after the first of the year. Budget is $250K ➢ Staff, a Parks Board member and several Scout Leaders met with RUSSO Services at the Scout House. RUSSO will be submitting an estimate for interior and exterior renovations. ➢ Staff has been meeting with KidVentures, negotiating their taking over the WUP Summer Camp Program. ➢ Colonial Park wooden play structures - we have met with an interested Eagle Scout candidate to take- on this project and are waiting for his Board of Review to approve. Fibar upgrades at the Colonial playground are complete. ➢ Senior programming continues to steadily increase. ➢ Judson Park re-development sub-committee has met initially. ➢ Movies in the Park 10/8 - Mary Poppins and 10/15 - Swiss Family Robinson were a huge success, realizing record attendance at both showings.