Parks and Rec Commission - Regular Meeting

This is what it did before though. Okay, I'm just going to sit here so I make sure it stays on. I believe you are good. All right. Got it. I'd like to call this meeting uh the parks and recreation commission to order on Wednesday, March 4th, 2026 30. Can I please have a roll call? Reeves here. Bending here. Tusky here. Jordan here, one absent.

All right, moving on. Uh, general public comments. I don't see that we have any. So, we will move on to item number three, approval of the m minutes. Has anyone has everyone had a chance to review the minutes from January 7th, 20? I have a motion to approve the minutes. We have a second and a second. All in favor? I. Minutes are approved. Number four, approval of the revenue and expenditures. Has any everyone had a chance to review these? Are there any questions?

I'll make a motion to approve the expenditures as presented. We have a motion. I'll second and a second. All in favor? I I and the revenues and expenditures report is approved. Item number five, discuss and approve both ABC groups let freedom ring and St. John's Lutheran Schools donkey basketball events involving animals in the park. Uh first up, we will hear from the ABC group. if you could state your name. And

uh I'm Sue Tran. I'm with the ABC group, Achieving a Better Community. I live at 412 Elm Street in Berwin. Thank you.

And we would like to have uh the uh Cattail Critters again for our July 3rd event celebrating uh the 4th of July. We've had them for the last couple years. They do a real good job of clean up and they've got they're fully insured and they have a lot of laws and and they follow them and we were just wondering if it would be all right if we could have them again this year. Does anyone have any questions? All right. If not, I will entertain a motion to approve the ABC groups let freedom ring request for uh Cattail Critters in the Park.

I'll make the motion. I'll second. All in favor? I All right, you're approved. Thank you very much. You second heart. Um St. John Lutheran School's donkey basketball event. If you could just state your name for the record, please. Jennifer Billington. All right. Thank you. It looks like you want donkey basket or baseball. Okay. Returning for a second year just like you had it last year. Okay. And how did it go last year? Good. Good.

Uh what about cleanup? Were there any issues with that, Scott? any damage. We had people cleaning up immediately after them and it seems to go smooth. Okay. Is there any questions from the commission? I'll make a motion that we approve. There's a motion and a second. All in favor? Donkey baseball is approved. Thank you.

All right. Item number six, discuss rental or discuss facility rental fee for nonprofit organizations. Is someone speaking on this? Or Sue, are you speaking on this a little bit? Yeah, just some background. Yeah, I

sure was requested that we look at what um our result should be for nonprofit groups and groups that try to fit our community need. Um just a you know suggested to look at that. Um so what we compiled for you is what was brought in couple of years uh from those types of activities either nonprofits or community groups as um as well as the um agreement that we have with um the farmers and artists market. So, I do think it's a good idea to look at our our policy and everything. Um, at this point, if we were to um change the fees for those types of those types of events, we're looking at um a revenue loss depending on the year, of course, and how busy things are. between $18 and $2,500 um is about what we took in um between 2023 to 2025.

Yes. Does staff have a recommendation or a plan um say we do change the fees at all? Is there any sort of I know um Sue did some comparisons to other communities as well. I did.

Um to be honest, I think her recommendation at this time would be to um leave leave things as they are. I think that willing to listen to the groups to see if there are other support and and them with their events. Um I know for instance with Latino ring we work together and for the fireworks. So the city helps contribute um for the cost of fireworks. Um BAM as you can see we have an agreement so that they bring in entertainment and we help defy the electric cost and that thing. So we do have some like that or if your community all of community involved events that that we are supportive of in other ways and I do think that um staff as well um especially the parks and street departments are very amicable when it comes to um supporting and and trying to make sure that people have what they need when they need it kind of thing. So it's really understandably effective. include from other communities.

Yes. If you look at the last page in the packet, you'll see um I did reach out the Wisconsin Parks and Recreation Connect. Um I just asked a simple question what they are currently doing for nonprofit groups. And as you can see, I did receive several responses. um any of which are acceptable. However you want to move forward with it all across the board. Every every community is a little different.

A little different discount, not necessarily like a a free a wave fee or anything like that. Um I guess that would be something that I would want to kind of look at on a case on a case to case basis. Um, like you said, for some of those ones that the entire community or like are bringing people into the community, I could see some form of discount or like you were saying a contribution of some sort to their um to the organization, whether it be paying part of the fireworks or um taking some of the electrical fees or whatever you were saying. So, um I would be opposed to that. I don't know that requires some more discussion on that as well. I mean as to what that would be, but I would say it definitely depends on what the group is and what they're benefiting for the community.

But how do we police that? I mean all of these all of these organizations listed give back to the community in different ways, right? like a public event versus like a just for their organization people event, you know, like I see some of them are for like their specific picnic, their specific um banquet of sorts, you know. So, um but if it's something where the entire community is invited to it, I could see it being something where it could be looked at, right?

Yeah. I definitely don't think we should wave nonprofit fees at all. That's a huge chunk of revenue that we don't get and we have small revenue anyway. This is the only revenue, right, that parks, right? Does anyone else have any other thoughts? I kind of think if it's not rope, don't fix it. It's been working fine for now. my recommendation to stay the same and then have the chance to discuss it further later. We can table discussion for a future meeting to kind of take a look at it more and think on it. And

just for clarification, don't table because if you table something, it dies unless it's brought back at the same meeting. So you want to postpone discussion. Postpone discussion. Yeah. Sorry, it's very technical. Okay. Could we ask staff to maybe come up with a proposed discount system kind of?

Yeah. Based off what regulations or some kind of stipulations put in there as to what counts as something that would qualify for a discount and what wouldn't. Um, I think that would be a good starting point going.

So, um, we certainly can take a a shot at that for you, but if you could provide a little bit of guidance so that what we bring you isn't completely off the wall, but I mean, you talked about being open communitywide. Are there any other aspects of an event that you would want to see or you feel should be considered for such a thing? I would say I mean they get something out of it because

some communities look at it depended on the day that they want to use it as well what was it weekends and maybe holidays or something were we're not discounted, but the pays were. I don't know if that is something you don't have to go there. I'm just saying what I've read already. Um, but but I'm hearing you want to look for communitywide availability and then make sure that they're some sort of nonprofit with a philanthropic kind of thing. Not

Well, I guess my concern is if it is a nonprofit, what kind of stipulations are you going to put onto that? any anybody can create a nonprofit organization and then ask for a park um shelter house to be created. So what what would you like to see?

I think there's a lot to think about and

and we've been getting feedback that people think they're paying too much the way it is. Um Sue, you want to speak? May I invite Sue to speak? Well, what we do is we need July 2nd and then we have to build CH uh stages. We're doing new stages this year where they're in um being built uh to be a a little more uh to be a lot more safe and easier to put together because it takes a long time to put all those pieces together. We have three bands and um the first one is the Del Rays and then we have the fork in the road. know they just need a smaller stage. But then we we've got um Johnny Watt again this year. They bring in a lot of people. They got a real uh strong following and um so we we need to get uh there's a time between the stages which band is going to be there and we have to make sure that we can get the flow going. Uh and then we the day of of course we go early in the morning and up the next morning from the park. So we uh and this is all all of our events are free community events. We don't ever charge admission. We have our dollars, you know, so that every family can afford to eat there. We've got uh ABC rocks that they can find and we hide them and then the kids can go and get a free um bag of popcorn and a free hot dog for that. So, I mean it's not a lot but it all adds up and we give

everything back to the community. So, and I know there's um that don't have to pay for the shelter houses. So, I was just wondering if we could get into that category. Uh and then the next day on July 4th, uh we just go early morning and finish up anything we see needs to be done. We have to leave our commander uh uh a van there because we have um they have um a hot grease and stuff that they have to let cool down. They got us safe and we all stay together until about 11 o'clock on July 4th. So, we do take up two and a half days, but like I said, it's and and now that it's getting to it's going to be on the weekends, we're going to h pay a higher and we have a lot of expenses and we want to keep them as low as we can to give back and to make Berlin a better community

because we do have a big crowd that comes there and we're proud of that. on the use agreement form completed by Sue for the event free and rank if I added this correctly and I believe I did for them to use the north and south shelter house on the Thursday, Friday and Saturday it would cost them $650. $50. Now, if you would wave that, how would you compare that to maybe the farmers and arts market? You know, what is the cost difference or how much is the city waving um for them?

Yeah, I know. And that would be something to consider because Yeah. They provide entertainment. Yeah, they provide the entertainment. And did you say that they covered the electrical, too? We cover electrical.

Yeah, we have to look at that. Compare that to the fireworks, which I know it's not just for the event, but it's at the event. That's $10,000. I don't know how much it is offset for the farmers merchant. We But we have to we'd have to um do a little math. We have to figure that out for you. But we can we can try to put together a proposal. the proposal being leave it as it is and then another option of somehow what I'm hearing is if it's a communitywide event um some sort of of reduction for that and you can direct us further from there or tell us to stop or whatever how big of a can do you want to open that's just it

right

any little tweaks could blow up to be much bigger than That's the thing is every circumstance is a little different. I mean, this is an amazing event. I would never argue otherwise. It's a wonderful community event, but we have no idea what's going to come in in the future. And you have to be careful when you say you're going to do something for a nonprofit or or for profit group and things because those are viewed differently by different people. And there are groups that have missions that maybe don't align with the cities and would we feel comfortable offering them the same thing or not. You know, those are all things I hope we never that bridge never has to be crossed, but things that we've got to think about when when we're considering writing a policy that you guys, you know, you guys have to think about and go, "Yeah, that's okay." Or, "No, we never want to."

So,

I don't think any fees should necessarily be waved alto together. I just I don't think that's realistic. Um, now going back to the farmers market, granted this is an agreement. Would it be worth opening discussion with them to maybe revise the set agreement? So they are contributing a little bit um with with a reduction in rental fee or whatever they want to donating or not donating I shouldn't say but for their rental for the usage to kind of align with everybody else. I mean, yes, this is an agreement, but this was also how many years ago

um when all of this was first starting. And this isn't me trying to open another can of worms. Absolutely not. I think the farmers market is a great asset to this community, but um looking at the numbers that were provided, it's all about perception, right? It kind of looks like favorites even though it's not. It's a written agreement. Um or is there some form of agreement that some of these other groups can come up with to do a similar co-sponsorship type agreement, right? But that's still waving the fee then.

Not necessarily that agreement. It should be. So like these larger events would have a separate contract for the use of the city park and reccks, right? that would be separate from the normal building of the the policy that we have like but then who would decide is big enough to qualify for that right or would it be on the like the EC group if they wanted to do something like that to approach it with the city and and because essentially that's what the farmers market did So interesting to know the value.

I would like to see the comparison as far as the numbers go. Um I don't know but I don't think it's close to the fireworks considering that the fireworks are also part of the community general other places in the event but it's also part of the event. So yeah I mean it's a good question. I don't know the answer to that. How deep do you want to get into? I mean, if you're gonna if you're looking at bigger events, you've got the ABC group, you've got the Bugal Bass, you've got the Street Cruisers. Um, any one of these organizations can say that they're giving back to their community. Absolutely.

Right. So, let's just say like that we don't mess with the bees. Like, let's pull that out of your brain for a second. But what if these individual groups, if they were to approach you and say, "I have this agreement and I want I want the city to do this with me instead and here's the numbers I ran and here's the numbers that it'll help you." Would that be something where that's what we're looking at? These all stay the same. But if a group comes to you and says, "Can we make a deal?" Would that be on a separate case by case basis, right?

Because essentially that's what market did. Correct. And I Yeah. And I think a lot of that had to do I think there was an entertainment license. There is that was what it was from is that they needed to use the entertainment license that the city provides. That's very unique there. I don't know how many agreements we want to right after. Yeah. You don't want to have a million of them and have everybody have, but I mean thankful that we have a small community. If not, I don't feel as though everyone on this list is going to come knocking down the door and asking for something like that.

But also, these groups can get creative. I mean, I work in nonprofit and say the ABC group could get a sponsorship from a local business to cover the park rental fee. Uh the baseball club could get a sponsorship to cover what they do, right? Exactly. So, I mean, that's also something that these groups can consider. look for sponsorships to offset their costs. Yeah, absolutely. Um maybe the farmers market sponsors the ABC group.

Well, maybe we should maybe postpone discussion. Okay. to um do we still want staff to provide a proposal or should we just keep this in the back of our mind maybe? Yeah. Could we still have you kind of go through some numbers though and have you bring it back because I would really like to see that. Sure. You're specifically talking about the contract with um with farmers market. Yeah.

Okay. Are there any other numbers just so that we bring you what you need and then like that group. I don't know other than I in our DPW or for all the events if if they ask for special provisions that's on our application. Okay. Um I mean costwise it doesn't really amount us. Okay. The clean up after obviously for parks.

Sure. Sure. hours that that would be considered probably. Yeah, it's mostly just those two just because of the bigger events happening and like obviously the farmers market is all summer long. Those are at the forefront right now. Yeah. And those are the two that would probably have the biggest impact. So, are you looking for the cost of the gazebo and the park for 17 two plus what it would cost for electric or at least the rental fee? Yeah. Yeah, rental for sure. That's easy. Yeah.

I do think if you want to question your agreement, get a lot of fight. No. And it's not muching yet. It's it's but it's good to compare it to something else so that you know if you should be doing this for more than one group. So okay then we will put the numbers together for your discussion for next time. Sounds good. Awesome. Thank you. All right. Moving on to item number seven, new business. Does anyone have any any old business? If not, I will entertain a motion to adjurnn. I will make a motion to adjurnn.

I'll second. All in favor? Meeting is ajourned. What's up?