Library Board - Regular Meeting

Looks like it's six o'clock. So welcome to the Apache Junction Parks and Recreation Commission meeting here on Wednesday, September 2nd to 2026. Please join me. Oh, that was the beginning of the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you so much, and may I have a roll call, please?

Yes. Dee Alkine? Here. Lamont Klepper?

Here.

Felicia Madrid? Here. Judy Borey?

Here.

Manny Vega?

Here.

Frank Schoenbeck?

Here.

Heather Moeller?

Here.

Thank you very much. All right, the consent agenda.

The Commission may at this time take single action on any or all items listed as consent agenda items. These include acceptance of agenda and acceptance of minutes. Any member of the Commission may remove any item from the consent agenda for discussion and cause a separate vote on the matter later in the agenda. May I have a motion for the approval and acceptance of the agenda meeting minutes?

I move that the Parks and Recreation Commission accept the agenda as presented and approve the minutes from the August 5th, 2026 regular meeting.

And may I have a second?

Second.

And may I have a roll call, please?

Lamont Klepper?

Yes.

Felicia Madrid?

Yes.

Judy Borey?

Yes.

Manny Vega?

Yes.

Frank Shanebeck?

Yes.

Dee Alkine? Yes. Heather Muller?

Yes.

And that motion passes.

Thank you. All right, commissioners, if you have anything that you would like to share from the last time we were here for AJ Parks and Rec, now is the time to boast about anything. Anything?

I'm still going to the gym.

And I finished up my aerobics class, water aerobics.

Water was a little cooler finally, huh?

90, what was it, 95, something like that, at the hottest. So it was like bath, like taking a bath.

I was super excited to see the youth public artists. I thought that was very enjoyable, right before the rock painting class. And I was super excited to see who the winner was.

I don't know these people, but I was super excited because I was like, oh, I voted for you.

Yay.

All right. Thank you very much. We would like to have the presentation and update on projects and opportunities in the parks and other service areas by Superintendent Dave Butler, please.

All right, good evening, everyone. I have two that I wanted to show tonight. One of them was from a question at our last meeting about the CAP trail head, or just the CAP trail in general, actually. This is the newest set of plans that we got just a few weeks ago. You can see the entire trail all the way from baseline well down to Arizona Farms Road. The Apache Junction section is just that very first kind of in that box area. I know it's kind of hard to tell from this just because it's such a huge area. But this is actually our portion of the trail. And Liz might be able to tell you for sure. I think it's six miles if you include the loop. Okay, a little over seven with the loop. What's unique about our portion of the trail is we do have a loop. So most of it is just a straight shot of a trail. We have about a mile, I think it's a little over a mile of a loop. And then just off of baseline is actually the trailhead, and this is just the layout. You see there there's a single ramada, some parking stalls, and then the horse question yeah what is it oh trailers not a stable what is it trailer parking yeah but where they hook the horse up pitching post there you go I got it we got there we went the long way for all of you that was good participation trivia yeah we went the long way but we got there So we just wanted to kind of bring this out so you guys could see kind of where the trail is. Like I said, it starts at baseline and then runs about six miles south.

This will touch the community down south, right? It'll connect us?

To Blossom Rock? It will not. It is on the wrong side of the CAP canal.

To the west or east side of it? To the east. Which would be east of Ironwood.

So just as a little bit of reminder of background from when we shared this before, this is Pinal County's master plan. You guys should still have a copy of it someplace. But it started down way south and the very farthest end of Pinal County. And this is their master plan. It goes through Coolidge, through an incorporated Pinal County, Florence, an incorporated Pinal County, and then us. And so this is just our portion of it. Pinal County is the leader on all of this. It is not connecting anything in Blossom Rock because it's, like Dave said, Blossom Rock is on the west side of the canal. This is on the east side of the canal.

It just seems like a real opportunity to connect the two communities besides Ironwood, which is just It's a horror story for anything but cars.

Yeah, so it's because of the CAP trail is part of a national, a whole project. They have to pick a side. They can't get across it over and over and over again, so they have to be on a certain side. The next development of stuff will probably put us where we would be doing that, but that is actually Pinal County, not Apache Junction.

Right, right.

So this plan has been in place for, 10 years or so, and we don't own that other, or we don't have that other portion.

Is this blue loop we're seeing the trail?

It is, yes.

Can you zoom a little more on that?

Maybe, I don't know that it will show up great.

Okay. Yeah, that looks good. Perfect. And then the trailhead is what I was really wondering about.

So it's kind of an odd layout. This is baseline here, if you can kind of see where that cursor is. And then the trailhead is just right in here.

So that's east of Ironwood on baseline?

It is.

OK. Is there any kind of signage or markings yet for that?

There's not anything yet. And it won't be until the trailhead's actually built.

OK, got it. But it's still accessible? Right now it is not so this is not built. It's not even right. These are just designs. Got it.

Okay And so just to give a little background to of kind of where we're at timeline wise so this has been in The master plan was over ten years ago There are 30 plus landowners within the whole length of Pinal counties They just completed phase two which got them from Coolidge to Florence or to the south end of Florence and We've been in design for, this is considered part of phase three for Pinal County, and they hope to be wrapped up with design sometime in January, but it's been a very long process because every public landowner, BLM, State Trust Land, McFlood, all of the two railroads, there's so many different landowners that have to weigh in and give approvals, and we haven't even begun having the conversation about easements, and all that until this design is approved by all of the partners. Then we'll go into that. Then we'll go into construction. And so probably the earliest construction might be calendar year 2028-ish.

Maybe. If we're funded. If we get everything right.

Yeah. So that will be our part. We'll kind of begin in that.

That's what we think.

Those later years. Yeah.

Maybe 18 months to two years later.

And also, it just depends on which direction. I mean, we would probably move south to north. And with ours being the very last piece of phase three that would be constructed, I would say 29 would be optimistic.

And you say there's a loop, that loop. Can you just show that?

Oh, yeah. So...

I think mainly you just want to see.

Sorry, this mouse is.

I know. I thought you guys were messing with me earlier, and it's really just none of the mice are working with the computer right now. So it's that top portion that's near baseline. So there's the trailhead, and then the loop is right up there at the top.

Yeah, so if you see the blue line kind of isn't a straight line, and then we have that loop out to the east, that connects the whole loop of the trail.

Mm-hmm.

The other just important thing to think of, so to Frank's point, we did share this with State Trust Land whenever we've been going through all the processes with Superstition Vistas. And so they've made comments like maybe we'll put it on the other side also. But that's just more money. That's not what's being designed right now because it is not approved. Eventually, there will be a crossover in the next, I don't know, 10, 20 years. As that transportation study happens, someplace there will be some way of getting people over the CAP, but it still weighs out until we have more people, more money in that area that all the partners would be doing.

Thank you.

If anybody would like to go out and drive it or a portion of it, we're happy to take you. You can email Christy and she'll coordinate with Dave and I and we'll... We've only been out there a couple of times. It's really hard to tell because it's not there. But most of this is along maintenance roads, so it is not going to be a super expensive project. We'll use existing maintenance roads for a lot of portions of the trail. It's in the desert.

We'll do our best not to get lost on the drive.

It's exciting, though.

Is there planned development already east of what we're looking at?

Is there any development there now?

Like in the future.

Not that I'm aware of, no. It's all state trust land. BOR has some land down there. It's all.

And the landfill is just to the east, too. So I don't think they're going to put much between that and the landfill. Yeah. Yeah.

So right now, it's possible like between AJ and Gold Canyon over here somewhere that you can't see on the map. There's lots of talks in general with developers about other portions of land that are on private property. Some of them are talking with the state about these. You know, the current folks that have the four square miles, they're talking about other areas, but they're still really pretty far in the beginning planning phases. But we'll definitely share that with you as we learn more.

Okay, the other project I wanted to bring up was the new city south campus at Radiant. This is just to give you an idea where our parcel is. So this is Ironwood to the right here. And this is, there's a light, it's gonna be Horton Drive, which is just south of Elliott. This will be a park, most importantly, and there will also be a library branch and police substation. We did want to bring this just to show you this is the concept. It's as the park is right now. Don't get too attached to anything because we've just started designing everything. The lake. is just there as a placeholder. We don't know how big, what kind of shape it is. Uh, the things that we're really looking to keep are the two ball fields and then also the two multipurpose soccer fields. Uh, there's also in this bottom left corner, a park maintenance facility. So there'll be a shop and office and our South team will eventually move down here and this will be their new home. And then I just wanted to put these in here just to give you some views of how the concept sits now. Like I said, don't get too attached to anything because it could change as we go through the design process. We hope to have our first... set of plans, the SD 30%, hopefully by January. And then it's about a year long process to fully design the park. And then it'll probably be 12 to 18 months construction timeline once we get those plans in.

What are we calling this?

We don't have a name yet. So council just approved the final design. That was design, right? Arrington Walk-In. Yes. That was last night is the final for all of the design work that's going to be happening. So we'll kick off here in September with our first meetings. DR Horton will be very involved because they will be paying for and constructing the park portion. It will be the lead on design for this one, unlike Blossom Rock, which is they take the lead a little bit more and we weigh in. This will be kind of the opposite of that. But they will be physically involved. building it with the CFD fund. So think about this just like Blossom Rock. And as a reminder, as people ask questions, the developer for the park portion is upfronting all of that money. They are paying for it at start. And then the CFD, the people who buy homes in the area that the CFD is in, that part of their mortgage is money that contributes to paying that money back that the developer will draw against. And then we will physically maintain it as well as pay for all of the maintenance so that it is a public park just like Painted Sky. Unlike Painted Sky where they do maintenance and we just contribute our fair share, we will physically be maintaining it, which is why The south shop is moving over to that side as well. The south, I just said it wrong. Maintenance. Thank you. Maintenance facility.

How many acres is that total?

The entire site's about 22. 22.

There's no pickleball courts there nor in the other part I'm not in this one.

No, we just built ten pickleball court, so we're not putting in more pick up yet Yeah, any public pressure in the Central District and North District will probably somewhere in one of those two on the Boston Rock side will likely have pickleball courts for the north I'm sorry the south side of town But right now these were the next features Beyond what is happening at Central District Park? And the lake, again, try not to get too caught up on it, but it's probably getting to be close to painted sky size, like two and a half acres, two and a quarter acre lake. It will be a fully fishing, a full community fishing lake.

Not just catch and release. Correct.

Question on the design, like how does a lake come up versus like a pool?

So these are all reclaimed facilities. They are holding places for reclaimed water, so reclaimed. The community itself, as well as the park, will use all of that water. So this is a water conservation effort. We've talked about pools coming up, and we would love to have those. They're very expensive to build. Developers typically don't build aquatic centers. So I would say probably in a future phase of the next iteration of annexed, I'm sorry, not annexed, but auctioned land, the city would probably be looking for land to be able to build something like that in the future. But as of now, no. And on the DR Horton side, they have two pools in their community, so it does not benefit. You know, they are already providing that to their community. On the Blossom Rock side, they feel like the people that are building houses there that want pools tend to build them in, you know, in their facility. Our concern is programming, so not enough swim lessons, those kinds of things. So we'll be definitely, you know, asking for things like that.

did anybody have any other questions we'll keep you posted as we learn more on it perfect very good thank you all right presentation thank you very much presentation and discussion an update on upcoming events and activities by superintendent jeannie sullivan i do not know what's wrong with this mouse it's ours is the same

All right, good evening. A couple of things that I want to start with as corrections is last month I mentioned the taco event, and I mentioned that I was going to be out at the rodeo grounds, and I was wrong. So we are having a taco event. It's taco and margs, meaning margaritas, and it's being put on and hosted by 520 Events, and that event will be November 7th at 1 p.m., It is not our event. It is 520's event, and event tickets will be on sale for $20, or they already are on sale. So I just wanted to give you guys a little bit of information on that and correct myself. Also, we were thinking that Julia was going to come this month and present on aquatics, but the pool isn't actually closed yet. So I wanted to be able to give an opportunity for us to get all the numbers. So I asked her to come next month. So just want to share with you guys, while the photos run, they're from things over the past couple of months, or the past month. Mainly a lot of our artist photos in there, so you can see that. But we did have our first young artist of AJ, and we opened it up to 75. 60 canvases were taken. and we had a little over 40 were brought back. We enlisted three volunteer judges in the art community to come and judge their artwork. And then you could see we had them put on display on a Friday evening. Heather, thank you so much for coming. I do appreciate that. It's a Friday and it was, you know, really kind of nice to see the parents and the grandparents and they had close to 100 people come to look at their artwork. We've done a wrap-up meeting with the artists that, with the judges that were involved and we are already excited for next year. We have some great ideas. So, yes, it was our first one, and there will be a second one. The purpose of this program was to really give kids something creative to do during the summer, but to be able to do it in their own environment. But we were able to provide the canvas for them, and some of them just came back and used different medians. We were very, you know, excited about their work, and they also were very excited. So there will be more to come on that. We've started up baseball. That's our next youth sport right now. And our youth advisory council attended the League of Cities and Towns, and this is a pretty big deal for them because they get to go hobnob with all the mayors and politicians around the state and represent the youth in our community. So Jodi and her team went out for that. I'm not going to go through all of September, because we do have a ton of things coming up in September. And you can follow us on Facebook. You have an event list. But we are starting off concerts in the park this week with rain and country. And like I mentioned, our last splash is on Monday. That will be the final day that the pool is open for open swim. That day is going to be free, as it is sponsored by Lost Dutchman Marathon. And Creamy's reached out to us and offered free ice cream to everyone that day. They're ice cream pops, so we'll be giving out free ice cream. And then we have been working with SRP on our Saturday swim lessons. They made those free for all AJ residents. But they are also really big in water safety and we've been able to give out free life jackets at our past event and we will also have free life jackets on our last splash as well. So we're very excited for SRP. Our Saturday swim lessons are finishing, they have finished up and we offered three different time slots and we had over 50 kids on the wait list. So the intention of Saturday swim lessons was to keep kids in the water that maybe don't have pools or because they're only there on Saturday. They're not getting that repetition of every single day but we are hoping that they are learning water adjustment, water acclimation, and still maybe being able to practice some of those skills that maybe they took earlier in the summer. So I have tasked our aquatics team to look at how maybe we can get an extra lesson in that day, or maybe two. So we'll have more to come. But it is very difficult because our WSI's, they are back in school. They are burnt out. They have worked all summer. They are ready to be students again. And so it can be a little bit challenging there. September 11th, there will be a memorial service out at the gazebo that is hosted by Bambi, but I don't remember which, VFW? Yeah, so VFW has kind of taken the lead on that. There is information out on Facebook for it, but it will be that Friday morning here at our gazebo. So if you're interested in that, I can get you more specifics. And then one of our very favorite events is coming up, which I mentioned before, is MAD Science. That will be hosted on September 19th, where we transform the entire multi-gen center into a MAD Science lab, complete with an egg drop contest, where kids bring their own eggs in their own cartons and they drop them from the second story and see if their egg can make it to the bottom and be unbreakable. Let's see. I think, oh, also Frank, you'll be the first one to notice this, but the end of September, we will be changing out all of our strength equipment. We are working with the high school to be able to take the pieces that they can use and that are still in operable condition and good condition that maybe they want. But, and when I say our strength equipment, so think about like your leg press, your leg extension, your arm curl machines. We have never replaced those in our facility. So this will be our first time exchanging those out. So there will be a couple of days where that area will be closed, but you can still come to classes and walk the track, maybe walk the track, but walk indoors. But it will just be a couple days inconvenience, but then they'll be pleasantly happy when they come back to brand new equipment. Lastly, I want to share that we just finished our APRA conference. So for some of you that are new on the board, our state association has a conference every year. Our state association supports us through providing our education sessions that are necessary to retain certifications, but also just necessary for us to be able to keep up with trends that are happening They help give us statistics on a national level. We have presenters from all over the country. We were fortunate enough, our general session speaker was Anthony Robles, Arizona state wrestler who only has one leg, who has won the state championship. I don't know much about wrestling, but national champion.

He won state, too. He won state, but his...

His goal was to be a state championship. Very motivational. It was very exciting because he is right here from Arizona. So we are a little tired, but we are jazzed because we've been sitting in sessions listening to the best of the best and learning new leadership skills. The very last session that I attended that wrapped up at 2.45 today was about how to effectively communicate to your commission members and your councils. So I am excited to see what next month's presentation should look a little bit better. I got some good tips and tricks. So I'm very excited.

Did you attend that course or teach it?

I attended it, but thank you. Thank you for that. The highlight of conference was, well, there's lots of highlights, but we did take home an award, and we took home the partnership award, and I will share a little bit about that next, but I think you have to say it first.

Yeah, make it official, yeah.

Okay, but before we do that, are there any questions in regards to any of our recreation programs upcoming or past?

End of the month for the new equipment?

Yes, end of September. And we'll want a full report.

Oh, I will have one.

And you should be checking your emails because you will get some email notifications about the process and what it's going to look like, and then we'll have some postings up around the center as well.

Perfect. All right. Thank you very much. For the presentation of 2026 Arizona Parks and Recreation Association Award, we have Superintendent Jamie Sullivan.

So like I mentioned, our state conference is made up of a committee of 20 individuals around the state, and they get the privilege of scoring all the submissions that come through. Our submissions are open October through the end of April. They could be scoring anywhere from 30 to 35 awards. We have 23 different categories, and this year we had over 100 submissions. I am very blessed to be the chair of that awards committee. And so I get some of the insights that other people don't get. It does not help us win awards and I do not get to score any of the awards. But what I do know is I know things that historically the partnership award is one of the hardest awards to win. It's a very tough competition. We are going up against the entire state. So Phoenix, Scottsdale, Tucson. So it's a pretty tough category to win. I'm going to just go ahead and show the video because it does most of the talking, but we are very lucky to be taking home the partnership award with Las Dutchman Marathon.

Well, this has nothing to do with size. This is just the whole state.

It has nothing to do with size. We compete with all of them.

Since 2002, the Lost Dutchman Marathon and Apache Junction Parks and Recreation have built a strong, mutually beneficial partnership that has become a signature regional event. Over 25 years, LDM has significantly supported AJPR's scholarship fund. helping to remove financial barriers so residents can participate in recreational programs. The marathon also contributes to local youth athletics, reinforcing community values of teamwork and opportunity. AJPR plays a central role in organizing Race Weekend, managing logistics such as start-finish areas, aid stations, volunteers, and key events like the Fun Run and Wellness Expo. This involvement ensures a smooth experience while showcasing city facilities and staff expertise. Throughout its years, this event has drawn over 200,000 participants and spectators. The partnership thrives on shared responsibilities, trust, and collaboration with agencies like ADOT and DPS, as well as local businesses and residents. Supported by a volunteer board and over 400 volunteers, the marathon has donated more than $1 million to local nonprofits. Ultimately, LDM is more than a race. It strengthens community connections, promotes health and recreation, and showcases the spirit and collaboration that define Apache Junction. Congratulations to Lost Dutchman Marathon and Apache Junction Parks and Recreation, this year's recipient of the APRA Partnership Award.

That's very awesome.

So we received this award on Monday night, surrounded by 500 of our colleagues from around the state. So attending this awards banquet, our dignitaries from all over the state, usually if they're winning an award, they go. So it is kind of nice that AJ gets to totally shine and be a part of that spotlight. Riley did submit this award on our behalf, and we were kind of waiting until we hit that $1 million in donation, because that's a pretty significant number that they have brought all of that money back to our local nonprofit organizations. So sometimes we bring home three awards. Sometimes we bring home one. Sometimes we come home empty-handed. But this year, we scored one of the most prestigious awards, in my opinion. And LDM did get to be there. They had two representatives that got to go up on stage, and they also received an award as well. Any questions?

That's wonderful. Yeah. Wonderful.

And you guys are the second group to see it behind our 500 colleagues. I hope you feel for that. Oh, we're honored, too.

Thank you. That's neat.

All right, well, thank you very much. For old business, next we have the presentation and discussion on the next steps to update the annual Parks and Recreation Strategic Plan. Larry Binion will present.

All right, so I want to talk to you guys about this next iteration of our strategic plan. And as we go through it, first off, I want to go over some of the cover options. And as you'll see, where are we going here? There we go. All right, I was on the wrong page. Technical difficulties. The tech guy has technical difficulties. She's correct. It's been a long week. We're a little tired, so bear with us. So as you can see, I kind of have a favorite, but I'll keep that to myself. I'll let you guys let me know what you think. So I'll click on the first one here, blow it up a little bit. Riley King took this photo, and I absolutely love it. I got to give her credit because she was the photographer on this. But I think it really captures what our parks crew was able to do with the pool and just build up the aesthetic. I tried to take some aerial photos of the entire facility, and it looks fantastic, but I think this image does just such a really good job of really zooming in on the beauty. So that's one. This one I like. I really just like the colors of the tree, and I think our holiday event is one of our signature events, and I think it's really good to highlight. And then just a very different image from any of them, it's our beautiful slides with just some different font. So obviously, yes, I am a little bit biased towards that. But I am not married to it. So if you guys say we want the tree or we think of something different, I am definitely open to that. I didn't include one of the MGC just because it's a really good picture, but it's way too cinematic and dark. So it's kind of like that golden hour movie scene type of thing. And I like these because they really bring out color. They stand out a little bit more.

Can we see one again?

Not the end of the slideshow.

Why is this thing bringing struggles?

I'm telling you. Okay, so what was that again? You wanted to see which one? You guys want to vote? Thank you. We just want to look. We're just comparing. Okay, we'll just leave that up there and let you guys think.

Because I think it'll break if you try this.

So here's the beauty of the software that we use for this. It's Canva software. All the fonts can change. The colors are interchangeable. We can do some different things. I think last year, the one we liked... I think, Felicia, you actually recommended going vertical along the side with the text, and it worked out great. So if you guys have a better graphic design mind than me, which I'm guaranteeing you all do, and you have a better thought process of some of that, I'm certainly open. But in my limited creative ability, this is the best of what I got.

I think the tree is nice, but it is very specific seasonal, whereas the slide kind of is a longer season. True.

But it's still a season.

It's still seasonal, but it encompasses more, I think, of the speech.

You get the mountain there, too, in the background a little bit, which is nice.

Personally, I would leave it up to other judges.

We can always go down the line and say one, two, three.

Right? I like one. I like the way you have Apache Junction Parks and Recreation. I like the 2027. Maybe, I don't know, a little something so it sticks out on the 2027 a little more, like the outline. Maybe a little darker. Maybe a little bit thicker outline? Maybe thicker or darker, yeah. It just feels like with the lightness of the pool it blends. And then the strategic plan feels a little, like maybe that could go just a little smaller. Those are my, but I really do like number one. And I like where the 2027 is.

I'm team tree.

I like three.

We're all over the place. Okay, here, let's put a tree up at the pool, retake the picture. Yeah, we're, yeah, left to right.

Yeah.

I like the tree. I know it's seasonal, but I like the tree. Sorry. Sorry, I put us fully divided.

Slide, tree, slide. It is a beautiful picture.

But I'd also say I'm not married to the tree. I just like what I really drives me to the tree is I like that parks is one color, the ampersand is another color in the recreation. I feel like it pops my eyes to parks and recreation. And then it draws me in that there's a tree. It just, I feel like if I saw that, I'd be like, ooh, what's this thing? I like the slides. I think you could play around with the thought, like Felicia said. Because I really did like this 2026. I liked the side part, and then your eyes just drive to the strategic plan. And then I was like, oh, OK, this is. And if anyone's in the city, I already know kind of it's your strategic plan and where it's from, because I can see the landmark.

I have a suggestion for one, just like putting strategic plan to the right of 2027 strategic plan. OK. That's a thought. But I like what DL is saying too with the variation in the fonts from the tree photo.

I just really like the layout of it. If the slide had a similar layout, I think you could team slide me, but it's currently team tree.

So are you saying doing something like the font Text on number two over the slides.

Part of me is like I think you could take that bottom part of two to put it on the top and take out the 2027 on the bottom. I kind of would like the image itself to speak more to speak more and you have the top part in the sky. because I do think sometimes I'm like, what's in that water? They're like, oh, it's 2027's in the water. But you can Photoshop Liz going down the slide.

Right? That's a good idea.

I like that. I vote yes on that. If you ask nicely, she might do it in real life.

I like the first one. I kind of agree that I like the font of the second one. I like the first one, too, because I can't see that pole in the back in the sky as much. But the font of strategic plan, I'm not a big fan of that. But I would go with the first one because the colors are really eye-grabbing, for sure.

Yeah, the more I look at it, I do really like that font and the way you placed the... The font on number two. I can see how that might work. Maybe 2027 reduced down on number one and the outline darkened or something might make it still pop in the water but not consume that corner.

OK. Well, you still plan to keep the tree on the organizational chart?

Well, so if we end up not going with the tree, I have not a plan B. It's still part of my plan A with the tree. So if that's what we decide. But what I'm hearing is we want to think of probably the slide.

Has everybody else already weighed in? Because we haven't heard from Heather or from Annie.

I like the first picture. However, I wish that it was slanted a little bit so you can see the blue a little bit. You see how your green cover? I wish there was a little bit of background.

I know it's a different picture, but it's kind of the same. I don't have that picture. She wants you to retake the photo. But I do like the slide.

Yeah, the slide for me and the font in the middle one is spot on. The Parks and Rec really pops. I like the multicolor, just kind of figuring out where you want to put it. I would say just big picture, though, like the tree. I don't know. I feel like you go to different cities. Different cities are known for something, especially holidays. I think this tree, like, really, you know, be doing a little bit more marketing on it and, like, exposure with it. It's amazing. Because it's pretty cool. It's really cool.

Yeah. And I think the slideshow is fun. Like, a lot of, you know.

What about you guys?

What do you think?

Do you guys have an opinion on what your favorite is?

We know Larry. We know we got you. I like for us to pick things that are like depicting what we've done that year. And so to me, it's really about this is a recap or a what's coming up kind of thing. And so I think that they're great ones. We have used the tree last year within the document. But, yeah, I think they all look great. I would also add that, you know, the marketing team, the city that's up here at City Hall, has helped often with lettering and things like that. So, again, Larry can share some of that feedback you guys have given, and they can put a more graphic expert eye on it and probably give us some other options once you guys have weighed in. It sounds like the majority of you are saying the slide.

Yeah, I like number one, too.

So let's slide and work with, see what Kayla or Jorge can help you guys with.

Jorge was the one that helped me with last year's. Oh, he already has.

Oh, last year. Perfect.

Yeah.

And I agree. I like the font. I like the way the Parks and Recreation looks in the second one. Personally, I'd like for you to Photoshop the red fence is all I would say because it's actually painted now. Okay. it just detracts a little bit from the picture.

And then you would have your clue.

Yeah. I was just going to say, it seems like I could go back out there. I'll ask Riley. Riley, go back out there, but take three steps and angle.

Get a little mountain. Get a little blue. New fence.

There you go.

And I think Liz makes a good point. We had the tree last year. I did fact check her.

Thank you. I appreciate that, Dean.

And I was like, how big was the tree? And I'm like, oh, yeah, it was pretty big. I think, too, this is something else that we've had. And I think that's a good point of every year kind of just what was the focus.

Yeah, last year was the art on the MGC, right? Yes. Okay. I was trying to remember why the MGC was the front. Yeah, it's because of the art.

I think the mountain is one of those things that just, it's the monolith of Apache Junction too. So if we can get a little piece of it in there, I think that just reads, you know, our city. So no matter what the forefront of the photo is.

All righty then. Okay, so this technology has been helpful. We're going to actually not bring that up. Which one was it? It's in one of the tabs?

I think maybe that one. That one?

That one.

Oh, my. No, click me, and I'll just type in mine. What happened? Did it go to sleep?

I guess so.

Tech issues today.

Too many people driving a mouse. All right, so I... Just kind of went ahead and took the liberty of putting that in so far. But I did put it as draft in case we wanted to modify the cover. So as we go through this, again, I opened it up last time for thoughts, questions. If some have come up, feel free to share. This is going to be a little bit more of a collaborative effort with Jamie and Dave on their parts as well. And then Liz, obviously this introduction is the letter from the director's spot. She will modify this. And we have another award we can add to our ever-growing list. That's awesome. I have updated the picture of our staff with Felicia, as you'll notice.

A question for you, Larry. If you want to go back up the vision, how often do you guys revisit what that says?

I mean, like, usually bring it up in meetings.

Do you remember when we did it last, Jamie, like 20 years ago? What? I don't know.

That's our original vision and mission.

So that's a great thing. Changing it?

Reviewing it? Yeah, reviewing it. I'm not sure. Like, things change?

Yeah, probably with our master plan. Right, guys? That's next year.

Okay.

Yeah.

And you can see we like to keep it simple.

Yeah.

But you guys will have a part in that when we do master plan next year.

I see the vision.

This is what's on all of our materials currently, and we'll get an opportunity to redo that.

In our organizational chart, we took a look at it. We've reviewed it, and we believe all the positions are accurate. Just need to make sure the numbers of staff within those positions.

And again, I like the picture, but as you guys already done fact check, it's already in there from last year.

Yes, I can take it out if we don't like it. But it is such a cool picture.

So I think to your point, you're right, it's something that we need to add more marketing to.

You're right, Chandler's got their tumbleweed tree. I grew up in Chandler, so that's a soft spot to me with their tumbleweed tree, the lighting.

I think this is fantastic too.

So I'm gonna turn it over to Dave. I did put the picture of the Central District Park plan in there. Again, it may not look exactly like that, but I think it really kinda highlights what we want to get going. You wanna jump in, Dave?

So then just as we go through the park section, so this will be where we update all of the development that we've done this year. So obviously this is all of last year's info, so you'll see the rodeo grounds, phase one construction, all the things we've accomplished this year. And then just the expansion improvement section. Again, you'll see the pickleball courts. And then we'll update all of the budget numbers as well. So the 6.21 million was, I think we were closer to eight last year. So we'll go and update all of that and then get all of those in for the October meeting.

And can you go back up? So what today is for is for you guys to just share, are there some really important things So the very next meeting, you'll get this in advance with our changes, but this is your chance to tell us on this page, are there some successes that you want to make? Or I'm sorry, this is new park development. If there's some achievements you want to mention or things you want to make sure we don't forget that is coming up, this is your chance to tell us, and then we can look through the next one as well. So that was kind of what we left you with last month. Was anything in particular you'd like us to make sure we don't miss? No? think we have lots of confidence in you guys that you're gonna get all those accomplishments in there you do you really do a great job so and probably when you get it with all the new data you can see what's missing sometimes so just again we really want you to be thinking about jot down notes of stuff we did this year that you you know just if you think of it during the month we can definitely add

And again, these are just our bigger, you know, our bigger kind of projects and things that we're just trying to highlight. So it'll be the same on the expansion. So you'll see the pickleball cords, phase one, the bigger, big, big projects that we were able to do.

Yeah, rodeo grounds, aquatics grew. It feels like everything grew, honestly, this last year so much, so.

And then remember that the objectives and policies on the left do not change. Those come directly from our general plan. And so they are basically what our measurement is. And off to the right is, you know, whether or not we're, how we're going to get to it next time or how we've already achieved it this past year.

Larry? I think I get to be sandwiched in between. Actually, I don't. I lied.

You do get the sandwich in between her two items.

And I will say, I was looking at my phone earlier. That's because that's where my notes are. My young staff taught me how to put notes on my phone. But then I realized sometimes it might look bad.

Did they get lost in cyberspace like mine do when I put them in my notes?

They showed me how to search for them on my phone. Good job. Good, good, good. Yeah, I'm learning. That should be one of our strategies. A couple of key points that I do want to point out, and it carries over to Parks, too. Sometimes when I'm working on this, I kind of struggle with dates. And so really, that's why we actually put in here fiscal year 25. So we're well into our new fiscal year, fiscal year 27. So you're going to see that change to fiscal year 26. So for example, the new strength equipment will not be listed on here because that's actually going to be listed next year. in the new fiscal year, if that makes sense. So a lot of times when I do-.

If it's a goal, though, right? If it's a goal that we're going to put in here, we will list it.

Yeah, it'll be on the goal sheet. But so sometimes when you're looking at it, you're like, oh, I thought we did this. Just kind of try to remember when, which year did it kind of fall in? And it's also about strategy. So how might we be working on how to fix a challenge? So last year we kind of struggled with YAC and our recruitment because we had a bunch of seniors all graduate. So a strategy might have been recruitment and we're going to focus on recruitment. Or if we see a decrease in an area and we want to focus on that strategy of how to improve on that. So, but this will, so like I'll be adding in, you know, maybe our APRA award will come in here. But a lot of the things that we come every month and I share with you, oh, we hit this high number at this special event. This is going to be kind of that numbers game where we're going to be sharing with you, you know, We added this to this new event or this was successful. We will be adding or growing or that. So as next time when I bring this and I think I am pretty good because I'm pretty proud of all the things that we do. But you might be sitting there and maybe I forgot to put in the turkey trot and you'd be like, hey, I don't that was brand new. It was the first time you ever did it. I went to that. I think that needs to be mentioned. And so that will kind of be your fact-checking, Dee. When we put all of our stuff in there, if you remember hearing something or seeing something that maybe we just omitted, that's where you're going to kind of help us fill in those blanks, if that makes sense. And I am quite proud after looking back at this that most of these things we've been able to do this year, and hopefully you guys were able to take notice of that. Obviously can't go through all of that, but adding the sensory bags to events, adding the rodeo grounds, using the rodeo grounds at Easter to get people over to the fields, those are all pretty big accomplishments for us last year, going back to a free Halloween event. So those will come out and we'll have new things come in for those.

Yeah, I feel like there will be a big spotlight on aquatics too. It just felt like it grew and was supported through the year. Added a second swim team. Yeah, and what you said earlier about lessons on Saturday.

Once Julia presents, you'll see those numbers in here too, but I already kind of have an insight on where we landed with swim lesson registrations and stuff like that. So like I said, that's where you'll kind of see these things in here.

Okay.

All right, back to me with our marketing and promotions. Again, like Jamie said, if we put something in here and you guys say, hey, I remember you did this or that, feel free to send it my way. You know, I know a lot of these numbers, I haven't done finals, but just kind of keeping up with them, we've exceeded these milestones from last go-around. Our Print media is out there. The one thing I have to double check with Jorge with will be our welcome bags, because we did a mass blitz right out of the gate for Blossom Rock, and that kind of slowed down. So I don't know if that number is going to go up, but it's still a program that we're assisting our city manager's office with to really continue to try and keep that outreach.

Anything else for now?

Yeah, and little numbers. So again, I'm going to leave it up here so you guys can kind of look through this. And also, if something doesn't hit the mark when we change this, we are completely transparent to be able to say, Yeah, we went down in this, and we will be able to explain, because unless you put them side by side after it's done, you won't know if something came out or why or whatnot. So as we do make these changes, if there is a reason why something is drastically decreased or omitted for that reason or, again, we've hit that mark, so we're just going to kind of move on to the next one as well. So... You're going to see a lot of stuff in outdoor recreation because it's a fairly new program area for us. It's not that we love one program area more than another. It's just that the potential growth for that program area was much more in that year for whatever reasons there may be. And then also in regards to funding sources you're gonna see things like corporate sponsorships Because we have taken that on from the city and each department kind of took on their own so you'll see more Either accomplishments in that area or when we get to the future planning of those as well updates on our partners, you know LDM and LDD and That's where you'll kind of see some of those things. I Great Hearts new partner came on, so.

And then as we come into the parks and facilities plan, this is just to give you an idea, that's two years at a time. So you'll see the column shift over. What was listed for fiscal 27 should move into the current year and then what we're planning next year. I do want to caution you that because we're already into fiscal 27, there might have been something that was not funded in the budget and will stay in the next fiscal year. That future column is just there because that's really long-term planning. We just want to keep it in your mind. So we'll get that updated.

What I looked at was I looked at our budget, and there's things in our budget that don't appear on the plan, like the dugouts for the Little League Stadium, the strength equipment. For the MGC isn't on the plan, on this part of the plan.

So the strength equipment isn't part of parks and facilities. It's an item that recreation funds. So it's not necessarily something that will be there. Also keep in mind, Larry's already updated the years on here for the column heading, but we have not moved over, right? We haven't moved over the projects yet. So you won't see it yet, but good point. The other thing that we were kind of sharing, we only have so much space. We could make this really big. There are so many projects that we did this year that did not make it to it. But to your point, Frank, maybe it's looking at our CIP list, making sure that those things that council approved for sure get on the list. We can definitely do that. I like that idea.

And just to kind of touch on that, there are a lot of operating projects that are not, like capital projects that our parks team does that we don't put on here either, but we'll make sure we get at least all of the CIP stuff in there.

Thanks for bringing that up.

And then the last little box there is just all of our future sites, and we'll just get all the info on there updated because some of that has changed.

And then, yeah, same goes for our park ranger program. We'll make sure we get those changed as well. And now it's Jamie's turn again.

I don't have as much as Dave, so I can take a little bit more time, so it's fair. So these are broken down again by those program areas. And some of these things you're just going to always see, because the goal in program areas is to always improve. And it's really hard sometimes to break it down to something very specific, unless we know of that niche need. So we did implement a year-round staff training program for aquatics. We offer two trainings every single month, one virtual and one in person. I'm not going to do every single one. Don't freak out. Okay.

We're all freaking out a little.

I know. I know. But it talks about expanding our events by one event. So what you'll see is if we were able to do that, that accomplishment will be shared in the accomplishments, and then this is going to be replaced with whatever else we're looking forward to the next year. Again, like I said, when we're not able to do something, we did not do this because we closed our pool to do all those renovations. We were hoping to add a winter event, and we weren't able to do that. So this might actually just stay right where it is because they really want to do that event. So just kind of going down in those, you know, working with Painted Sky and offering partnered programs. We checked that box off, but we're still growing and we still want to do different kinds of programming down there and working with them and what their needs, and it is ever-changing. So some of these things will look kind of the same, but there are things that we definitely want to make sure that, you know, pickleball courts, our goal was to expand on that and to be able to offer a bigger league or youth programming and maybe a second tournament out there. youth programming here was where our recruitment and our youth program survey we did both of those we had Jody did an amazing amazing job with recruitment now they might focus more on to their programming or what they're going to if they want to increase events or whatnot. And every one of our coordinators are working on these simultaneously. And by next month when you meet, you'll see some of those ideas that are coming from them as well. Our outdoor recreation programs, our moon hikes are completely maxed out every single month. Our scorpion hikes are maxed out every month. So again, this is something that we've achieved. Now we might get more specific with the next year of drilling it down maybe to something more niche that he wants to do or a specific age group. And then special interest is almost always going to be just to expand and keep up with the trends of what the community is asking. And we might share what we feel that is at that time. But special interest is always just kind of a revolving door. And then we have our administrative and marketing. So Larry, you have two boxes. but just to kind of sum that up that's kind of how we're uh that's how we look at it is uh what are we going to be working on and ours is just the next year and then future and that could be two years it could be five years for programming so what will you be doing excuse me will you be doing on another survey

the community?

So we did a youth survey this year. We have on our main page that it's up where people can go and fill out a survey. It says we're working on our strategic plan. It asks about the community. It's there. So when people ask us, well, when are you going to do this or I want this, we do try to direct them back to that survey so we can capture that information. But we don't have like a

Full-blown.

Yeah, we don't have a campaign prepared to go out and do, you know.

So we do that probably about every two to three years. So when we did this a while back, we did a real push with our strategic plan. We took that map out. A lot of you remember that the strategic plan map went out to all the major events. Larry was at those events with the little pins. We had a full-blown questionnaire that people could fill out. We had a lot of input. That is what drove But now we need to implement some of those. So we don't want to just keep asking and not sharing what we have done. When we do our master plan next year, that'll be the time to do another major community outreach for our master plan because that's like the next 10 years. And so we just really have that link so that way whenever they do see things, like Jamie said, it's really helpful to be like added on there because we will take a look at that and make sure there's not something in the meantime that's that isn't already coming. The other thing is that it educates people that, you know what, you want there to be splash pads? We already heard you, and go look at our plan, because this is where they're going to be added. These are the facilities that are going to get that kind of thing. So yeah.

Sounds like getting more finite with the goals that are already existing.

Yeah.

And then I know Manny had mentioned, you know, when we did one of our initial meetings about, you know, some of our KPIs, our key performance indicators, Jamie only has one page. So maybe the second page is something that has a little bit more of that side-by-side comparison. So what are our numbers last year to this year? I get nervous about doing that sometimes. You can't increase forever. Like there's a time when you will level off at certain things, but that doesn't mean we don't do it. And then like Jamie said, there could be, explanation of, you know, why it either increased or decreased. So that might be something we want to add this year. You know, give that some thought. That might be an easy thing to stick in there or it might wait until a master plan and we continue with this model for this year. But I'd love to hear your thoughts on that or what you'd like to see differently.

I mean, I do like year over year, but I agree with you. I think you eventually... you're going to reach capacity of the space or things like that where you truly can't expand on Mother's Day tea or things like that where every chair is filled. So you can't always control that. I think in some instances, yeah, I'd love to see it. Part of me is almost like I'd love to call out huge increments. So if it were to be a threshold of, say, an increase or decrease by, say, 25%, then we can maybe kind of leverage that. Just because I think if it's a negligible like, ooh, we went down by two people, I might be like, that's a lot of work.

And I think we'd be picking like categories anyway. So again, how much grant money did we bring in? You know, looking year over year over year of what that looks like. I will warn you, ARPA was a major funder of a lot of projects. And I think we already got through that. We might have been partway through that year. This past Well, then we got CDBG, so it might work out. But those are just some things to think about, you know, why they might go down or up depending on the year. So it won't necessarily be just about programs. It'll be about social media milestones. We do have some of those already in the accomplishments, but we don't have enough room to say this is what it was last year and this is what it is this year, and that next page might be a way to do a side-by-side.

The other thing I would say, too, is there's still growth within the city as well. You're seeing more people moving into town. Obviously, down south is really growing exponentially between Blossom Rock and Radiance, I feel like, on a monthly basis. You know, with programs, I mean, you have your existing programs that are still, they're really full, they're really thriving. But as you get more people into town, more kids into town, like, you know, what do we do in a service like that new population? I think maybe adding, you know, congruent programs, you know, additional programs. Maybe you do two sites, you know, you have mad science over here, you have mad science over here in the same weekend. Obviously, it's going to put a lot more work on your plate, but there's a lot of growth going on as well. Yeah.

Well, and I think that's a good point. Like, we've had years where I'm sure things plateaued because AJ was not having these big growth years. But now here we are in some bigger growth years, and it just seems like things are kind of on a constant upward. And it feels like we'll probably plateau again. And we only have so much space here.

One of the things I learned at my conference today and talking to your commission members, sometimes it's not about the numbers, but it's about what is your capacity. So if my number was that we are at 98% capacity for our swim lessons, there's not much more we can do, right? But if we're only at 70% capacity, that means that there's some work to do to fill, you know, how much room we have. If we're at 100% capacity for our sports teams, that means we're there, but it does show that there might be a need then for more sports teams, like how many are on the waiting list kind of thing. So, you know, I mean, you take a Halloween event, if we know our capacity is 10,000 and we have 7,600, I don't know what that math is, but that's not 100% capacity. I know that. So... I think that there might be some different ways of looking at it, so it's not just, you know.

Plot numbers. Yeah. Yeah, that's a great point. And then, Frank, I know you want us to talk. Somebody brought up Placer AI, and we will be bringing that to a future meeting, but we now have some numbers that we can actually use, whereas in the past we really didn't, except for registered programs for the most part. And Jamie's recreation map that decides how many people came to an event. But we have some great things that we'll be sharing with you when we share about Placer AI, and those can be things that we incorporate into this. So the last thing is really just a strategic plan map. And so we'll kind of bring to you maybe some thoughts on that, and you can say yay or nay, or it doesn't fill up enough space, let's wait. We'll make sure that we have that ready for you to view next meeting.

Yep.

And then you said we would get this in advance before we talk about it?

Yes. I'll make sure that you guys have it at least a week or two, maybe two weeks in advance for the most part. And we'll put in red things that are like maybe we're still crunching numbers or something, like we did last year. There'll be some placeholders for things.

I have one question real quick just I know we serve our community where you guys serve our community well the department does and I'm sure we get feedback sometimes or I don't know if there's a way to get some solid feedback but it would be nice to see a quote or some of that positive feedback from community members somewhere.

So we do, I'm sorry, I did not mean to cut you off.

No, no, no, you're fine. And I was thinking the citizen or, but just to show, like, it's not numbers, but it's still data, you know.

And we have lots of that, actually. So almost at every event we do surveys. Statistically, you only get about 10% of those back. So if we have 100 people, we might get 8 or 10 of them, but it is still feedback. But another place that we get lots of feedback is social media. And so we have used that before in presentations because, I mean, I've read some things that have just torn up my heartstrings and made me cry. And I'm like, I'm framing this. And then I've had others that I'm just like, oh, we need to do some more education on this. So I do feel that we have that information and could definitely help.

And our software system sends out a survey for every single program we do. And so Jamie, their team has done a great job of keeping those.

We review those every single month. So every month I sit down with coordinator and I'm like, let's review your program surveys. Let's look at the good, the bad, the ugly, and we go through them.

Yeah. And I just think it'd be cool for the community to access that, you know, just to see it somewhere sometimes.

Yeah, so we also had the National, what is it called again? The National Citizens Survey. I think that's what, or Community Survey. So that we do that every two years as a city. It's lots of areas, but there's a section for Parks and Recreation. So we wouldn't have new stuff every year, but every other year. So that might be something we could add into that one page or. that has some of the stats as well as Jamie. So again, they keep that running list of all the surveys and it has all very common questions. Well, they're almost all common, but you could see here's the average rating of how much they like, and I'm saying it wrong, but the facility condition and the blah, blah, blah. And we could add that average onto there. And certainly that could be something on that page. We will make a note of that. The map really won't get updated very much, and then we'll finish off, you know, just our last page is usually our contact page.

All right, next steps, Larry. That's it. Any final comments?

Just to clarify, at the events, there's usually QR code, right? We're not handing out papers, or are we?

We've done both. Sometimes we do one or the other. Sometimes we do both because if we can't get enough QR codes, I tell them to take out paper. That works. Okay.

We'll bring back the draft for next time, and then you'll give your chance to weigh in. And then if we're ready, we will vote on it in November. If we're not, we'll vote on it in December.

All right, next we, thank you very much. Appreciate that, thank you.

Next we have new business discussion and update on Flatiron Park's water features from Director Liz Langenbach.

So this is just kind of a quick update, and then if there's other things you want us to look at, we certainly can, but Frank had mentioned last, right Frank? Okay, had mentioned just wanting an update because we've done a lot over there and kind of how the usage of the splash pad is, some of the issues we were having previously. to kind of bring back to you guys. So just kind of as a reminder, we were having a lot of transient issues there, just a lot of people congregating, working on bikes, leaving a lot of garbage, having lots of food that was just left. It was just trashed. And so we did some major things. And one of them was during the overseeding season, we fenced off the park, closed it down to kind of have a good little fresh restart. And prior to that, we had implemented a code of conduct that you guys voted on or that the commission at the time approved. And that was implemented facility-wise. So at our facilities as well as all of our parks, all it really did was reemphasize what our current rules and regulations that are in the city code. This is some of those. on the site how we expect you to behave, just like our sports code of conduct, several other things like that. So that was implemented in 2023. We also started working with the PD on our whole campaign of see something, say something. We have this card for our park rangers. People now have a texting mechanism, as well as calling directly a park ranger when they're on duty. And so this is shared widely. And the park rangers on their business cards, the back of their business card has this information. So they're constantly sharing this out in the field. We have this on signage at our parks. It's on our front page in the website. We really try hard to get the word out on that. In 2024, we implemented a new process for families to activate the splash pad. So early in, well, in the fall, so at the end of 2020, 23, no, 24. We had, at the end of 2024, we had decided as we were bringing, we were having some issues with the splash pad, I think in general, before we brought it back on, we had determined we were gonna not make it so that it could just be operated at any time. We just still had a lot of problems. Families couldn't enjoy the splash pad because there would just be lots of other things going on there. And so this is the signage that is out there. We implemented this that if somebody wanted to use the splash pad, Dave and his team made it so that way the splash pad could be activated from the park ranger's phone or from any of our maintenance team's phone. So families call or text. And I thought they were cutting us off. Families can call or text and the park rangers will turn it on. They can also look on their phone on the camera to make sure, you know, that everything's okay, that it's actually a family that's there. And so we did have a few numbers from Kelly of how many of those we had in 2000. So this is only April to August because we wanted to use the same timeframe. And that was really the first good year that we really started it. So just April to August, this is the whole year We had 60 activations. This year, April to August, we had 75. This number only represents the text because that's the only thing he can count. We don't have a way of tracking it any other way. But we do get actual phone calls where they ask it. Or if the ranger's down there and they see family members arriving, they will just turn them on. So this is not the amount of people. This is just the amount of activations that we got through the text number.

Does it also need to be turned back off?

No.

Or does it stay on first?

Dave, can you just share how that runs?

No. So once they turn it on, it runs for a program. And they can select 20 minutes, 30 minutes. And then it goes back to just being off.

OK.

So if it goes off, you can call up and have a chat?

You can call again. They usually start them for about an hour, is what Kelly and I were talking about. The rangers will turn it on for about an hour. And then if somebody is still there after that,

OK, I see. So they don't have to call every 20 minutes.

They don't have to call every 20 minutes. OK, that makes sense. They give them time to play.

They're like, get out.

20 minutes is up. And then the sign is sharing with people. So this makes it more easily enforced by police department and the park rangers to have signage that says the purpose of this space, that it is for children and for their families. We have rules about what it's not for, but that has not proven to be successful at times. And so really saying this is what the only use that this is for has been helpful for us. And then... So we have seen a major decrease in transient use since 2024. So kind of looking at these numbers, that kind of final year, we had 7,372 counted transient individuals that were there doing different things, 82 write-outs from the facility, This is really just, so think of this as not the total amount of people that ever came or the total amount of transients. These are when the rangers show up to every facility they go to, they do a head count. They count every person. They log how many people they made contact with. So we have metrics of what they are. They count the people. They count dogs in a park. And they also count how many people they individually came and talked to in the park. In addition, we have added that we do count how many transients. And so this was an effort with PD just to kind of get an idea and to get a handle on where some of our issues, where we needed to have maybe help with social services, some of those different types of things. At the time we did this last, and we were not doing these logs in prior to, July of 2023. We obviously had some problems in those couple years and decided to really try to see what was that problem. So our first year for counting was fiscal year 24, which is July 2023 to June 2024. Like I said, 7,372. They might show up at Flatiron three or four times a day. And over the year, that's not the total number of transients that are there. Those are the amount that were counted and the moments that they were there on site counting. July 24 to June 25, that number, so that was after all of these things were implemented, that number decreased down to 2,516 with only 53 write-outs. And then this most current year, we're down all the way down to 1,804. We do have probably some more write-outs. And I want to mention write-outs could be anything at that facility. It doesn't necessarily mean it's transient activity. It could be youth or it could be an adult that is fighting or bringing alcohol and they shouldn't have or something like that. So that is that figure. And then increase in family usage since 2024. We've had, so with our placer data, we'll show you a little bit. It's a little hard to tell at Flatiron because we can only zoom in on a particular space. It has to be a big enough space to be able to get that data. And unfortunately, that includes like the restroom and other things. So it could be people that are at Flatiron for the Blues and Brews Festival. are going to get counted in that number. So it's a little bit difficult. But overall, we saw a 30% increase in families from 2024 to 2025 based on that PLACER AI data. And then as preparing for this meeting, I did talk with Kelly and all of our park rangers. And they have a lot of anecdotal observations. So whereas we would have people camping out or putting all of their belongings at the splash pad they now know that that area is designated for families. So it doesn't mean that there isn't an occasional person sitting there or whatever, which is fine. But we're not seeing that 20 or 30 transients congregating and preventing other people from being able to utilize that space. Generally, people are coming for the amount of time that they're supposed to. So one of the Code of Conduct's items is that you can only use a Ramada for up to three hours, maybe two, I think it's up to three hours. And then you have to go someplace else so that other people can use it. You can't stay there all day long and monopolize a facility unless you have a reservation. So you're welcome to reserve it. It goes back to our whole fee philosophy. If you want to monopolize an amenity, you have to pay for that. Otherwise, it needs to be available to the whole community. So we really feel like we've had a great increase in our usage Definitely, if you go by there, I think this summer it's very obvious we have a lot more families utilizing it, feeling more confident every month that they use it. And our rangers really feel like we've been able to get a good handle on that with the help of AJPD, our park rangers, and then some of the policies that we put into place. So with that, whatever questions you might have.

It's all good to hear. I'm glad to hear that. Could we promote it maybe a little bit more?

Promote what?

The splash pad. I don't see it.

So I will tell you, we might. Every time we put a picture of the splash pad on social media, all we get is negative. And it's really people who absolutely don't, might not have ever been there. But it's that it's full of... math addicts, or it's full of homeless, and it's not. So it's really not helpful. But unfortunately, it does not draw positive feedback. And in addition, the other most common comment is that's not a splash pad. They see a splash pad as a big featured amenity. This was always a water feature in a downtown event facility. It was just supposed to be a nice place for people to play while they're doing other things. It's not meant to be a full blown splash pad. We have two of those coming in later projects. So we are able to share that with people. But, I mean, it would be 100 comments of, why don't you care about the kids in Apache Junction and build a splash pad? This is nothing. So that's our main reason, Frank.

Yeah, it makes sense.

Yeah.

And I've seen it. It's every time I'm like, why are you?

So even if the splash pad just happens to be on the flat iron, like we're talking about flat iron or something, it's like just inundated with those comments.

Yeah, it's gonna take some time to turn that around on social media, but do we have any programming there that includes the splash pad? Or have you guys talked about that?

Not necessarily, but when we have our movies, if it's warm enough, they use the splash pad. Because we don't do a ton of programming there during the summer when it's hot. So if it's hot enough for them to be in the splash pad, It's probably too hot for us to be there for a length of time. But like we have our Power Wheels Derby coming up in September. If they want to use the splash pad, they'll be able to use the splash pad. Read and Rec is probably the only one that has actually really programmed the splash pad into what they're doing. Otherwise, like Liz said, it's just an extra amenity if somebody wants to use it. You know, it's not on year-round, so if we happen to be having an event there in February, the splash pad won't turn on. Or we might be using that space. We don't go on top of the splash pad, but we might have a food truck there, and we don't want the food truck and generators and whatnot. But it wouldn't be the right time of year anyway. Any other questions? That's the answer to your question, sometimes.

Yeah. Any other questions that you might have for now?

Is it the park rangers or is there like a park attendant or who goes through and makes sure that there's nobody, when they lock up the parks, that there's the bathrooms, no one's hanging out there or any damage?

The park rangers close the parks at night. The parks maintenance during the week open the parks, restrooms and things like that. And then we have three different individuals. So park maintenance in the morning will check and make sure things are clean. We have a midday that's either the janitorial crew or our park. We have one park attendant five days out of the week on our busiest days. And then the opposite. So if the janitorial crew comes in the evening, the park attendant comes early in the afternoon. So we try to have about three checks on those. And then park rangers, they go through those all the time. And it is not beneath them to pick up or to do whatever type of quick maintenance that they could if they can.

Out of curiosity, when was this photo taken?

So this is actually our, I don't think this was our grand opening, but it could have been.

I was just seeing a lot of people. I was like, that's one big family.

Yeah. No, this is probably one of our events that we had them at. Generally, it's like two or three families might be there at the most. At most. Yeah. It's generally a family at a time. It is pretty small. But a lot of fun for people.

I will say it's about the size of the one at Disneyland, so people need to stop. There you go.

There you go. Anything else?

All right. Perfect. Thank you very much. Looking out. I don't see that there's a need for a call to public. So we're going to go ahead and skip that. So we're going to do a call for future addenda items. Commissioners, if you have anything to suggest or recommend being added to the next agenda, there's no discussion of topics suggested are taking place at this time. Just something you want more information, a follow-up. Now's your time to throw it out there.

We will put Placer AI. If we can, it'll be on the next agenda. It's just getting, because we're so busy with the strategic plan, it makes it hard to really get into that. So we'll do our best.

Is that the phone one? Is that what that is? No.

It does come off the phones. Larry will explain it whenever we present. Placer AI will be a topic. If it's not next month, it'll be the month after that. And then aquatics, as Jamie had said, will definitely be on the list for next month.

Are we going to have anything to do with CAC remodeling and the water diversion?

No.

I know we got involved.

I know what you're talking about, yes. No, Public Works is in partnership with CAC on that whole project. We're not in it. Nope. Anything else?

I guess we have nothing else. Maybe on the Superstition Basin.

Yeah, we can do that when we get into it. So again, it's on our CIP list, but until we have development fund money, it won't be any more than what you guys have seen before. As soon as we are able to move forward and have enough development fund money on this north end of town, then we'll get started with finding an architect and moving forward on that. So we will definitely have that in the future.

All right, thank you very much. Looks like we're going to have a selection of meeting dates, times, location, and purpose. I need a motion, please.

Madam Chair, I move that the Parks and Recreation Commission hold a regular meeting on October 7, 2026 at 6 p.m. in the City Council Chambers located at 600, 300 East Superstition Boulevard.

And may I have a second?

I second.

And may I have a roll call, please?

Felicia Madrid. Yes.

Yes.

Judy Borey?

Yes.

Manny Vega?

Yes.

Greg Sheenbeck? Yes. Dale Kine? Yes. Lamont Klepper? Yes. And Heather Moeller?

Yes.

And that passes.

Perfect. Thank you very much. All right. Then it looks like we're going to go ahead and adjourn this meeting at 7.28 p.m. Thank you, everyone, for attending.