Parks and Recreation Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay. Up next is all of our current contract classes that are happening for the month of October. We have one more starting on October 19, which is the first aid and CPR class. So these are all going very well. And then this is also just continuing the contract classes we have currently for our sports and fitness section of our contract classes.

Again, they're all doing well. And then we have our open gym, pickleball, and table tennis over at the community center. And in our senior programming, this is what we have coming up for the month of October. Last week was active aging week, so we were able to bring in more workshops for the seniors to attend, just learn more overall about their health and how to stay healthy. And on September 10, we did have our big hats and tea for our seniors.

So this program is very popular. It's been highly requested. So we are bringing it back December 10. And it includes a tea, desserts, and sandwiches. And, again, it's very successful, and the seniors have a great time.

Also, on September 7, we had a pickleball slam. It was very successful. We had 30 sick 36 teams, and they were able to be split up between beginners, advanced, and intermediate. And everyone had a great time. It was very successful.

Over at, branch library, we also hosted our boots bash. This was on September 20. So we had a DJ, a live band, it's called Outlaw, and we had a face painter, mechanical pool, and food trucks. And, again, very successful. Everyone had a great time, and it was totally free for everyone to attend.

And these are our arts programming that we have. We also include our Discover Fullerton. So this series is one of our coordinators or volunteer will take a group of participants out to any historical sites throughout Fullerton, and they get to learn more about our city.

And I do wanna add, at the Hunt Branch Library, we are having a pop up coffee vendor on Tuesday, the twenty first from ten to two during the arts or sorry, the library reading time to just try to bring some more attraction and foot traffic over to the hunt. So we're we're just starting to kinda brainstorm and and come up with different ideas. But that wraps up our September department update. We're happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, staff. Is there any commissioners that have any questions for staff? Do you have a question? For HuntLive or I guess more of Puptober, do you guys have a estimate of how many people actually how many people came? I'm just curious. It seemed like a ton. I I

There was yeah. It was a it was we kind of there's based on a couple of different factors, there was no parking available in and around the areas. So a lot of people parked in the neighborhood. So there was a really good foot traffic. And there was at least 200 at kind of the beginning because Anaheim Feed, was one of our partners, they give out, like, free goodies for the first 200 attendees.

And they had, like, a doggy bar, and they had, like, a special bag with goodies. So throughout the event, it was very consistent. So I would say around the either about 400, 500 individuals at its peak. But we the grounds allow for, like, spreading out all of the attendees. So there was a lot on the dog park while the dog races, the runway show, and then the vendors had pretty, consistent foot traffic. And then the band was actually pretty good.

I've never experienced them. I I'm not gonna I'm gonna butcher their names, so I'm

not gonna try. But it was a German band, and they played a lot of classic German music.

Give it a shot.

Hammerstein.

Hammerstein? Okay. Thank you. Thank you, staff. Alright. If there are no questions, then right now we'll move to the public comments portion of the meeting. This time is meant for members of the public to address the commission on any item of interest to the public that is within the subject matter jurisdiction of the Parks and Recreation Commission. Other than those listed on the agenda, just a reminder, the the tennis courts are on the agenda. But if there's anyone here who would like to speak, please come forward and state your name and address and address for the record.

If I can actually have people line up if you're going to speak. It'll make things go a lot smoother. Thank you.

And just a reminder that tennis courts and pickleball are on the agenda. So this is not the time for public comment on those subjects.

I was wondering. A lot of people oh, yeah. Do you guys have, do you have any online?

No. I don't.

Nobody yet. Okay. If there are no other comments, then right now we'll move to close public comments. We'll now move to approve the consent calendar for the meeting of 09/20/2025 09/08/2025. Are there any commissioners that wish to pull an item from the consent calendar?

No? If there is nobody, then, secretary, would you please call roll? Motion to Oh, yeah. Apologies. Is there a motion made?

A motion to approve the minutes or approve the consent items.

I'll second.

Alright. Now, madam secretary.

Commissioner Talavera?

Yes. Sorry.

Commissioner Freeman?

Yes.

Vice Chair McHenry?

Yes.

And Chair Mondonado?

Yes.

The motion passes.

Okay. We'll now move to the regular business portion of the meeting. I would like to call for item number six. Is there a staff report?

Good evening, chair. Yes. We have a staff, presentation. This is for the potential pickleball court conversion project at the Fullerton Tennis Center. There's what we're proposing for commission consideration. It's, identified as courts nine and ten. Potential conversion to either eight of the courts, eight pickleball courts. It's four pickleball courts per tennis court. And recreation supervisor Ece Cheverria and Jacob Hodgdon will are available to answer any questions after the presentation.

Alright. Good evening, commissioners and members of the public. My name is Eche. I am the Parks and Recreation supervisor, and I'll be presenting the Fullerton Tennis Center potential pickleball court conversion project. Next slide.

Just to give you some background, pickleball continues to be the fastest growing sport in The US with participation climbing each year. Fullerton Tennis Center hours of operations is Monday through Friday, 7AM to 9PM, Saturday and Sunday, 7AM to 1PM. Currently, the only option to play pickleball in the city is at the Fullerton Community Center gymnasium, and the hours are and the day the hours are Tuesdays from 07:30AM to 12:30PM and Fridays from 07:30AM to 11:30AM. Staff held a community meeting on August 13 to gather feedback on converting two tennis courts into eight pickleball courts at the Fullerton Tennis Center. A community survey was also established to gather feedback from all stakeholders.

Here, you can see a proposed map of the Fullerton Tennis Center, the proposed courts of nine tennis courts and eight pickleball courts. The community meeting feedback at the August 13 meeting opposition was expressed by tennis players who raised concerns about the following, noise, parking, and the lack of alternative tennis facilities. Pickleball players were in support of the conversion as they expressed the following. Fullerton does not have any outdoor pickleball facilities. The community center has limited hours for pickleball and emphasized the growing popularity of the sport.

Staff have carefully reviewed the input received through through the community meeting and survey process to address the key issues, raised. Staff compiled a report from August 21 through September 21 on the parking availability detailing the number of parking spaces available each day on an hourly basis during facility business hours. The morning times indicated that there were more than 10 to 30 parks parking spots available each morning. In the afternoon, our reports indicated that there were fewer than 10 parking spots available. To accommodate the park parking, staff have identified the following.

So just to, on that item, we did after feedback gathered a one month data report. Staff on an hourly basis walked the entire parking lot and identified that. But I do want to highlight, even though, like, for example, going back to our August 13 meeting, we did have a very large crowd in attendance, approximately between 100 to a 125 attendees, and staff didn't get any concerns on parking or finding a parking spot. And that was about 6PM on a Wednesday night. So just to give some kind of perspective to the parking situation.

Alright. The city currently has a joint use agreement with Saint Jude Hospital, which allows for the shared use of of the parking lot, which is colored in green. Oh, I am not I'm not too sure why it's not in it's not showing.

There we go.

Oh, there we go. Sorry. Which has sorry. I apologize. Which has a 143 parking spots for tennis players, trail users, and hospital visitors.

There are no designated parking spaces for visitors to the tennis center or the hospital, specifically. Patrons visiting the tennis center receive a parking pass upon entry and validate it at the front desk. The nursery the Fullerton Nursery, highlighted in orange, located next to the tennis center, is a city owned facility. Overflow parking will be available for tennis and pickleball players after 12PM on weekdays when the nursery is not in operation and all day on weekends. The nursery has about 40 parking spots and is a two minute walk from the tennis center.

Staff conducted daily checks for space availability and a majority of the parking spots were not being used. Staff have also been in communication with the property manager for the use of the Valle Mesa Medical Building parking structure that is highlighted in purple. Potential options that have been discussed include the following, parking validations for Fullerton Tennis Center users, a prorated fee for Fullerton Tennis Center users, And currently, the public, including patrons of the Fullerton Tennis Center, may park at the structure. Their current fee is $5 for four hours of use. From January 2025 through September 2025, tennis court usage was twelve thousand two hundred sixty two hours.

Courts 9 And 10 are the least used in terms of general reservations. Courts 234, And 5 are primarily used for contract classes and private lessons. Courts 9 And 10 are on the far end of the facility away from the tennis courts. During the community meeting, several tennis users expressed facility, expressed difficulty, finding a reservation. After reviewing all groups using, tennis courts, staff have identified that several meetup groups have been receiving priority reservations for the use of multiple court reservations each month, resulting in limit limited availability for other general public to reserve courts.

Meetup groups are gatherings of individuals who come together to play tennis. After analyzing these groups, staff will no longer provide meetup groups with monthly reservations and will instead have to reserve courts within the seven day reservation period similar to general reservations. The noise. The surrounding buildings are the Fullerton Nursery about 230 feet and Saint Jude Hospital about 531 feet. The closest tennis court is approximately 13 feet 30 feet from the proposed pickleball courts.

Pickleball decibel readings was on average of 56 decibels. Tennis is read on average of 45 decibels. Survey results, a total of 654, people completed, the survey, five zero five zero seven being Fullerton residents and 147, nonresidents. One of the questions asked was how supportive are you are you of converting two tennis courts into eight pickleball courts? 72% of residents were in support and 27% of Fullerton residents opposed.

68% of nonresidents opposed and 31% of nonresidents were in support. How supportive are you of converting one tennis court into four pickleball courts? 6068% of residents were in support and 29% of residents opposed. 65% of nonresidents opposed and 32% of nonresidents were in support. If pickleball courts were added to the Fullerton Tennis Center, how would it impact your use of the facility?

70% of residents would visit more often if pickleball were added and 22% of residents would visit less often. 28% of nonresidents would visit more often and 56% of nonresidents would visit less often. Funding source, the proposed project would be funded by the Brea Dam Fund, Fund 42 and would not impact the general fund or park tolling funds. Brea Dam funds are restricted for recreational use within the Braya Dam area which the proposed project qualifies as an eligible expense. The Fullerton Tennis Center has the infrastructure and lights to convert it to existing courts.

Other locations in the Bray Dam or throughout the city do not have the current infrastructure or lighting to create pickleball courts. The construction of pickleball courts at other locations would be significantly more expensive, take longer to construct, and would impact park dwelling funds or the general fund if built outside of the Bradenton. In summary, survey results demonstrated strong support from Fullerton residents who are expected to increase their use of the Fullerton Tennis Center should additional pickleball courts be provided. Concerns raised regarding tennis courts availability, parking, and noise have been carefully evaluated. The project is financially feasible through the restricted Brea Dam Fund and requires no general fund or park dwelling resources.

Based on these findings, the commission is being asked to determine whether the proposed conversion should move forward with the consideration given to both resident demand and the broad broader recreational needs of the community. Staff is looking for is looking for a commission to approve one of the following options. The conversion of two tennis courts to eight pickleball courts, the conversion of one tennis court to four pickleball courts, continue to look at alternative locations, or other options presented by the commission. And with that, that concludes my presentation. Staff and I are here available for any questions.

All right.

Do the I have a few questions just a bit off the gate. Or I guess, can you pull up a map of the are you able to pull up the map of the tennis center? Yes.

We'll we'll get the map on the screen.

The one that was in the presentation?

Yeah. Or that just kinda shows all the courts in general. Four six. Yeah. Three is good. Okay. Thank you. So it's my understanding is the one on to the left of the tenant center, is that that's Court 1? Yeah. Right? Yeah. Towards the top. Towards the, like Yeah.

So the facility, if we're looking at the map currently, the Mhmm. The tennis court to the left next to the green Mhmm. That is Court 1, and it kinda snakes through snakes through. So the top two courts would be 23, and then 45, and then work your way down. It it would actually be the the second to our left. Okay. And then it would keep going down.

The proposed changes are to eight and nine, I believe. Nine and ten.

Nine nine and ten.

Oh, it's at very bottom.

It's at at the very bottom.

Alright. I have more comments, but I don't know if I should wait until after. Does anyone have any questions right now? Guess. Let's see. Let's start

with that. Just a clarifying question. The survey and available parking spots included all shaded areas or just the green area?

The survey only included, the green area. The current use that we have, right now.

Correct. Okay. The orange and the purple are proposed future sites for parking.

Correct?

Yes. Okay. Thank you.

Currently, the Fullerton Community Nursery School parking, the orange, is only utilized from about eight to 12:30 because they only do half day programming there. So the rest of the time, that parking is vacant currently, and it is owned by the city.

I'm sorry. And just to add to that, the Val Mesa parking, which was, I believe, at our last meeting, we talked about additional parking locations. We've, since then, we have been in contact with the property manager. And, the options that staff presented, are feasible. So if it's a a, either prorated or full validation of the parking, or they're open to that.

And then, I guess the last question on the parking component is, it used to be, and I haven't been there in quite some time, but that YMCA area was restricted by a gate. Is that nursery parking restricted by gate?

No, there is no gate for the nursery.

A couple of questions. First, in the proposal, if it moved forward to do two to convert the two tennis courts, would they would they be completely dedicated to pickleball? The tennis tennis nets would come down and you'd have permanent pickleball nets, or would it be kind of a hybrid still?

Yeah. So in our research and speaking with other agencies, the recommendation is to do a full conversion, no hybrid model, Because in their experience, there's been more challenges than successes. So it would be a full conversion of the two tennis courts to eight pickleball courts, permanent.

Okay. And then other question is how if it's converted to pickleball, how does the reservation system work for that? And is is there one? What's the structure of that?

Yeah. So we, we would follow the same reservation system that we have for the tennis court use. Our recreational software has the capability, and we're implementing it now with tennis. So we would create a seven day window. Right now, if you go on our website or on, yeah, the website leads you to the reservation link. It's seven days advance notice, and then you can reserve up to two hours per day. So technically, all seven days from that point. Similar to tenant or similar to pickleball, we create them as facilities, court one, two, three, etcetera. And they would go online, reserve it, and and kinda show up, and we check them in through the through our office.

And how many reservations is one person allowed to have?

Two hours max per day.

Per day. So they can do it every day like you said?

Yeah.

Okay. So there's not a a max per week or anything that's Correct.

Okay. Depending on that's currently our structure, and it's also the capabilities of the system.

Got it.

So two hours max per account.

Got it. Thank you. That's all for me.

Sound was a was a issue that was brought up. And the decimal readings that you guys kinda took from pickleball, which was the 50 ish compared to tennis, which was the 45 or something like that.

Mhmm.

What's the big difference between between the two? Is it is there still concerns that that are coming from like, the sound is just, like, not being able to to, like, listen to instruction? Or

I don't know if there was I think, in general, the noise of the cause it's a different equipment being used, so the ball versus the tennis ball. It echoes a little bit more. I think it's just as you're playing the preference of hearing the ding versus not hearing the ding. Noise as a whole though for like neighboring community, since it's a lot of office buildings and very few if any residents through the canyon or through the trail system, it We just did a kind of our due diligence for that general decibel reading. Okay.

But we're actually in a kind of a in a good position essentially where there aren't any homes which would then become you you read about sound barriers and other other approaches that some of these agencies have to implement because of the sound. But for us, that's not a concern Okay. At least for residential.

Okay. I I I thought it was maybe coming from the people that attended the community meeting as far as, like, just the sound.

The feedback, like I said, it's it's more of a preference of hearing that sound while the others are playing. But I don't know if there was a specific issue with the noise per se.

Question you might not have the answer to, revenue generated through the tennis center currently.

I'll let, Jacob knows those numbers. I'll let him respond to that.

Okay. And then so two part. And then what's the potential, revenue generated with the additional eight pickleball courts?

Yeah. So, currently, our, revenue for the fiscal year 2425, the Fullerton Tennis Center generated $600,000 in revenue and that was between general reservations, private lessons, concessions, and stringing. Obviously, with the addition of eight more courts, we would see an uptick in revenue. Conversations In that we've had with other cities, other agencies, they have seen such an increase in revenue from their from their pickleball that their recommendation was like, you're gonna want more. It's kinda what they kinda pushed on us.

Yeah. And and we're talking about the still still the same time frame as far as two hour windows?

Yes. And kind of in general with those eight courts, we'd multiply that revenue by ultimately, two courts by four each. So kind of on a monthly, they average about $2,000 in revenue, if I'm not mistaken. So multiply that by four, probably about 8,000. If the same consistency for each court. If this if it's same consistency patterns of reservations, which we most likely expect.

And then the experience that we've had renting out the we have two currently at the community center. How many courts at the community center?

We utilize the gymnasium, and it's kind of a on a drop in. So we create, if I'm not mistaken, eight, four and four on each side. So four on, like Four. Gym A Yeah. Gym B. So eight courts. So four

and four, eight courts. Yeah. Currently, what we're doing there now Six.

Six. Three and three.

Three and three. Sorry. Okay. So three and three, and that that's that gets filled up on a on two hour time frames as

well too. No. There's no reservation system there. It's a drop in system. Okay. So they pay their It's a little different. It's a nominal fee, to just drop in and play. The experience and the feedback that we're getting from the users there is that

They want us.

We'll want more, but also it gets so busy that the wait times start getting a little bit higher and higher, and it's kind of on a rotational. And there's different skills on different courts, so they kind of rotate in. It's like a paddle system. Like, who's Pick

up pick up basketball. You gotta find

Similar for yeah. Kind of who's at your level and Okay. Every does the attendee know who to play against versus who may be more of a novice than not?

Will that will that continue even if those pickleball courts move forward?

Yeah. At the community center? Yes. Okay.

I think I know the answer to this, but where in the city is there the option to play pickleball in the evening hours?

As of right now, facilities that were none. Private facilities that I'm unaware of of any. I know that the neighboring cities Anaheim and La Habra have private public facilities, I Pickle. And then Anaheim Tennis Center converted courts as well.

Okay. And then last question for me is what is the estimated cost to convert the courts?

Approximately $50,000. 50 to $55,000.

And then it's fine if you don't know this right now. If it moves forward, would you be doing contract classes on these courts as well? Is that the plan?

Yes. So we would continue the same approach providing recreation opportunities for the community.

Alright. So it'd be pretty much similar setup as tennis just with the pickleball at the same facility?

Yes. And then as as per the presentation, as you noticed, our hours are relatively limited on Saturdays and Sundays. That's just been consistent throughout. But if there's interest to extend for tennis and pickleball, staff is ready to explore those options as well.

Okay. What are the hours on the weekends?

Seven to 1PM. Except on the tournament, we have staff available to you know, for that tournament. Yeah. However, it's an added fee to that tournament fee, if that makes sense, like staffing.

Got it. Thank you.

So is the tennis center being utilized after 01:00 on the weekend, Saturday and Sunday? Is or is that, like, kind of private?

Currently, we do have a team tennis that does utilize our courts currently on Saturdays from about one to 5PM. We do have tournaments. Tournaments happen probably by monthly. Those tournaments sometimes or most of the time will actually go from about 1PM to about 8PM both Saturdays and Sundays. But that is not as often as as our team tennis.

Okay. And and that's and that's scheduled on like, on purpose to allow for that to to take place? Yes. Okay. Yeah. Just making sure. Trying to share the love with everyone, I'm sure. K.

Okay. So at this time, if there are no other questions, I would like to invite those members of the public who would wish to address the commission on this item to come forward. Yes. This would be the time.

Now is the time we can line up. Susie, do you wanna

Start. I mean, just as a reminder that it is limited to three minutes each person. Perfect.

Good evening. My name is Christine Ojaviros. I spoke last month. I'm a current, Friends of Fullerton Club president that uses a tent in the center weekly. I'm also a proud Cal State Fullerton Titan graduate, a tennis player, and a pickleball player.

I'm responding to your agenda report summary and your presentation you just did. Survey results, unfortunately, most of your information is can be shown in a different light. 654 respondents, 322 don't use the facility. That's 49.24% have no idea what the impact to the center is regarding your questions. Within the survey data, there's no mention of other pickleball courts facilities coming online in the near future future, which include Union Pacific and Independence Park.

This should be seen as crucial data because it could have easily swayed responses if respondents knew that they had options without impacting existing facility users. Also, regarding the change in use of the conversion took place in an extremely biased and leading question. Of course, people who don't use a facility at all today would find that they visit much more often, but these responses are already expected from folks who support this conversion, and therefore, I have no idea what additional value this data offers. Conclusion. Why is this data in the survey not separated out between those who currently use a facility frequently, the ones paying for it, and those who may use it in the future?

To consider the responses from those folks who might use the facility in the future as equal to those folks who are actually using it currently and have been using it for some time now is ludicrous at best. Therefore, in my opinion, a large percentage of the data included in this agenda report is flawed and should not be used as a foundation for making any recommendations or decisions regarding this issue. Lastly, I must repeat, not furnishing information to the survey respondents regarding other pickleball court options in the area is frankly irresponsible and misleading. Another claim, the noise of pickleball registers at 70 to 85 decibels while tennis registers at 55 to 75 decibels. Was this noise measured while having eight players on what is now a single tennis court at the same time?

I think not as the noise factor is far greater than what's mentioned in the report. Once again, data is included in the report that is not depicting what will really be happening if this conversion is done. I must ask you to please consider other options. Thank you.

Good evening, commissioners. My name is, Marty Schwartzman. I'm a forty seven year resident of Fullerton. Every tennis player I have talked to agrees that pickleballers deserve outdoor courts to satisfy growing demand. And many tennis players also play pickleball.

We applaud the city for taking action to build new pickleball courts already budgeted at Union Pacific and Independence Parks. But tennis is a growing and thriving sport too with an average annual growth rate in Southern California of 10.5%. If Fullerton had planned ahead like Anaheim and La Habra and Yorba Linda and Brea, we wouldn't be talking about the pressure to take over Courts 9 And 10 at the tennis center. But to tamper with the profitable tennis center and incur the outrage of tennis enthusiasts would be unnecessarily foolish in my opinion, very unnecessary. The tennis center is a community resource which is fully utilized especially during peak times when all 11 courts are occupied.

And that's quite often but not when you took the survey or not when you walked around the the tennis center. That was in the late summer and early fall. The the leagues probably hadn't started up then. Anyway, probably every day and most evenings there are clinics and lessons and women's leagues and school team practices and matches. Seniors play doubles four mornings a week as part of a 125 member friends of Fullerton Tennis.

And perhaps most relevant to the future health of this community are the opportunities for children to learn or excel at tennis at the tennis center. Aces tennis, our weekly lessons for three to 17 year olds, summer programs for children are as you know exceedingly popular. And come by to see Saturday tennis for kids with autism. And let there be no doubt, we know that converting two courts for pickleball will eventually lead to four, then six, and we've even heard it tonight. They want more.

It's pressure to have more tennis, more pickleball. Sure. We've seen that in La Habra and Anaheim and if that occurs, where then can we tennis players go since the tennis center is the only public facility in Fullerton that can accommodate us. Moreover, there are no private tennis clubs in our city anymore. Our kids, our seniors, league players, school teams, and casual player players all hope you commissioners see the folly of eliminating tennis courts when pickleball could thrive in so many other Fullerton parks, so many other pieces of real estate in Fullerton and recreation areas.

Why plant it on our courts nine and ten? It's unnecessary. And as we were told at our meeting, this is not revenue driven. So I'd like to know why you had to choose those important, courts. Thank you.

Hi. My name is David Gillick. I'm a resident of Diamond Bar. I've been playing at the Fullerton Tennis Center for over twelve years now. Over the years, I also played at La Habra.

I stopped playing there because they put in pickleball courts. And the thing you don't realize, I I and I play pickleball also, but the two sports are not compatible. And I stopped playing at La Habra because the sound of the pickleball makes it so that as a tennis player, you can't hear the ball coming off your opponent's racket, which is really critical when you're playing a match to hear how your opponent has hit the ball, whether they've sliced it, whether they've mishit it. And so the two you wouldn't put a rifle range next to an equestrian center or a football stadium next to a golf course. Right?

They're just not compatible, and that's the real problem. I used to play at Anaheim Tennis Center. I stopped playing there when they put in pickleball courts, and I can almost guarantee you that I would stop sadly playing at Fullerton Tennis Center if you put in pickleball courts there because it makes it extremely difficult to play tennis effectively when there's a lot of noise, which eight pickleball courts in a concentrated space is gonna create a lot of noise for those courts eleven, six, seven, and eight that are adjacent, even courts one, two, and three. At the Anaheim Tennis Center, I was on the farthest court from the pickleball courts. Still, all I could hear was the sound of pickleball, And it's part of the way the human ear works and, receives sound.

Higher pitches, we naturally hear as louder. So even though the decibel levels may seem comparable, from an auditory standpoint, the human brain hears them as louder sounds and they're more disruptive. So I just wanted to say that. I hope you'll consider my thoughts. Thank you.

Mayor and council members, thank you very much for your time and service to the community. And what I wanna do is express my concern that affects many of us who play tennis at Fullerton Tennis Center, especially during the evening hours. I've been playing tennis, twice a week there for many, many, many years and always appreciate the facility. It's been a great place to have fun. However, with the addition of pickleball courts and the resulting increase in player traffic, the parking situation will become significantly more problematic and potentially unsafe.

The tennis center's parking now is routinely overwhelmed, particularly in the evenings. With an estimated 30 or 40 additional pickleball players. The demand for parking will far exceed what's currently available. Players now are forced to park off prem. We've heard the city has considered off-site parking options and in this case we respectfully ask.

I know where the parking centers are now because you showed them earlier, so thank you for that. And we know how far they'll be from the tennis center. My question is, would you feel comfortable having your family or loved ones walk this distance after dark, after a night of play? While the increased usage of facility is gonna generate additional funds, we urge the city not to prioritize revenue over public safety. The city of Fullerton has a responsibility to ensure that its recreational facilities are not only accessible, but safe too.

This includes providing secure and reasonable parking to all players. So this is not another inconvenience. It's a potential liability that we hope you will not overlook. I thank you for your time.

Hello. My name is Tess James. I'm a proud Fullerton resident and a long time player at the Fullerton Tennis Center. I'm here tonight not to speak against pickleball. It's a wonderful sport. I play too. But to speak for fairness and thoughtful planning. The recent city survey, I don't understand. There's a 90% of residents want new pickleballs built in other locations, right? But I don't think you mentioned that.

That is a clear message from the community, one that reflects a desire for balance and inclusive recreation, not competition between sports. The Fullerton Tennis Center is already one of the few public tennis facilities in the region that offers a high quality experience for players of all ages and levels. To take away even a portion of this court is to further erode opportunities for the tennis community to thrive, especially at a time when tennis is experiencing a nationwide resurgence particularly among the youth and the women. FTC is a truly rare gem, a city run offering high quality tennis. And the tennis center already been said, operates at full capacity from early mornings to late evenings, serving youth programs, adult programs, leagues and residents who rely on this space for health, recreation and connection.

So converting two courts would not simply reduce availability. It would displace long standing community that's grown around this facility for decades. Another major concern, of course, we already know is parking. The Fulton Tennis Center shares a single gated entrance, small parking lot with St. Jude Hospital and you counted it. But you have to realize a lot of staff parking there too. And I even wrote, I remember I I there was a lady in Fullerton bus. She said something. She was circling around a parking lot and it took her fifteen, twenty minutes and they're on their way to NICU. You know what a NICU is?

It's neonatal intensive care unit. So we are going to be affecting the hospital. I believe the current plan lacks a foresight and risk creating overpopulated situation that could lead to confusion and outright chaos in the facility. Our goal should be to enhance recreational opportunities, not to overcrowd an already busy complex and compromise the quality of experience for everyone. Fullerton deserves both thriving tennis and thriving pickleball communities.

The solution is not to take away space from one sport to satisfy another, but to expand recreational access equitably by developing new pickleball courts in other suitable areas across the city. The residents have spoken according to your survey. And common sense supports this view. Build more courts, don't take away what's already working. Thank you.

Hi. Okay. Hi. My name is Jennifer Barron. I really appreciate being here. Thank you so much for all the commissioners here. And Christian and Jacob, and I'm sorry, the middle name and Anyway, I, the first one, have really loved tennis. I grew up with tennis in Fullerton, born 1960, and, played for Fullerton High. It was all league and then college too. I'm the first one who loves tennis.

I went back to tennis, playing with Brian, the pro there, and basically had tennis elbow injury. So I moved over to pickleball. I've spent over a hundred and seventy nine hours going to pickleball courts that are completely filled up at the Fullerton Community Center. We have a handful of people here from Fullerton Community Center, and they are just constantly filled. We have line to get in.

I've listened to everybody carefully. I'll continue to listen to everybody at the Fullerton Tennis Center here with all due respect to them. But one of the things that happens, I think, just psychologically is that we automatically go into a mode of what's good for me instead of a utilitarian point of view. It's a great thing to think utilitarian, what's the best for the greatest amount of people in the community. We have over a 142,000 people and pickleball is really the fastest growing sport for sure.

I wanted to just give you a visual of something. Okay? And that is, when one of the slides said basically, one of the slides here said that there was a limited, there was a limited amount of hours that Fullerton Community Center has for pickleball players. I'm gonna just put a little word in there, extremely limited. You see here every hash mark here is one hour.

Okay? One hour of Fullerton Tennis Center that they have on the tennis court. That's 7AM to 9PM Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, fourteen hours a day. Then 7AM to 1PM on Saturday and Sunday. Every hash mark that's red, you see here is a total of ten hours.

So there's ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty, sixty, seventy, eighty, eighty two hours Fullerton Tennis Center has in a week to play. It's quite it's unbelievable when you think about it, but we don't even have one hash mark, one red hash mark here at all. It's not even ten hours. So you see there's literally over there's eight for every, you know, ten hours. One eight So there's not even ten hours.

There's nine hours. We have Tuesday and Thursday, 07:30AM to 12:30PM on Tuesday, and then on Friday, it's 07:30AM to 11:30AM on Friday. So it's it's really hard because it's all filled up. You come on even at 07:30, there's a line already out the door. The courts and, I I think all my pick up all the people here, they all can attest that and really truth factually is that they are never ever empty. Never. I've been to Florida Tennis Center 15 times. Okay. Anyway, thank you very much.

Okay.

Good evening, commissioners. My name is Jay Williams, and I've been a resident for twenty five years. I played tennis for twenty plus years, and I've been playing pickleball for eight years in neighboring cities, like La Habra, Brea, Tustin, Placentia, and Yorba Linda because our own still has no other outdoor pickleball courts. Just to repeat, pickleball is America's fastest growing sport for the third straight year with participation up over 150% since 2020. It's now played in more than 13,000,000 by more than 13,000,000 Americans across every age group.

Cities all around us have adapted, and yet, we still have zero. Meanwhile, at the tennis center, the city data shows that many of the 11 courts sit vacant for large portions of the day, particularly at midday and some on weekends, and that's a valuable community space that's not reaching its potential. I fully support the plan to take just two of the 11 courts and restripe and fully to restripe and resurface into eight dedicated pickleball courts. That's less than 20% of the total space. Cities that have added pickleball courts have seen facility use double, new program revenue, and increased intergenerational engagement, families, seniors, young adults all playing together.

It's a low cost, high impact recreation that creates community connection. So Fullerton still has a chance to lead and not lag behind by converting just two courts and making a better use of city space and meeting resident demand and gather and creating a gathering space that reflects, the Fullerton spirit. Thank you for considering.

Good evening, commissioners. My name is Ketan Swanson. I've born and raised in Fullerton for thirty years. I know someone mentioned forty seven, so I'm a little under. But I am more so, yes, in support and not in support of pickleball being built there. I have nothing against pickleball. I understand it is a growing sport. I totally respect that, understand that. But as previously mentioned with all the other points, I wanna reiterate and just beat a dead horse. But the especially the mention of parking as a female, there's a lot of men here.

No offense. Walking that distance, especially at night because a lot of work, so the only time we can play is in the evening. As a woman walking that far late at night, not really an ideal situation. I know there's been talks about that, you know, Fullerton maybe doesn't have enough pickleball courts currently, but they are being built. There are at the community center, but it's just like every city can't offer everything. Fullerton doesn't have an ice skating rink. Yorba Linda does. Anaheim does. Are we gonna build an ice skating rink if someone wants it? Then we don't have Disneyland. Is Fullerton gonna build Disneyland? I've I'm used to traveling to Brea, to Yorba Linda, Anaheim, all across parts of Placentia to go find tennis. I've tried that. I found tennis at Fullerton Tennis Center. I know it's it's not ideal, but people can travel to find it just because it doesn't offer everything.

I know they want more. We would like more, but sometimes there isn't more and that's not always available. And I don't know if the government has thought you have 50 to $55,000 potentially to build these new courts. Eminent domain, there's a Stein Mart and Placentia in your Belinda that if you want to make money, you have to spend money. That can be indoor pickleball courts year round by a community, by a college that would bring in revenue, by local businesses, get sponsorships. That can be a constant revenue making thing if you want to make revenue versus just taking away something that has been built by a tennis community that they spent all their money has been run funded by tennis. Again, I have nothing against pickleball. I know they talk about the the noise. I think it's not about the surrounding areas. It's more so the noise that pickleball can create compared to tennis.

Tennis is a sometimes quieter sport. Unless you get angry, then maybe it's a little bit loud. But pickleball and also as well, tennis usually just two players on a court, maybe doubles, but you don't have people waiting to swatch, like, switch, swap in like pickleball does. You have people chattering on the side so that increases the volume as well as them playing as well. So that will carry on as what was said. That's just going carry through the rest of the courts as well. I feel like there are other options when someone said you don't need to take away from one sport to give to another. When you can if you have 50,000 to $55,000 maybe build that somewhere else so they know there are other places that are being built. I know it's an old saying. I know I'm young, but I still have a belief in it that if it's not broke, don't fix it. So thank you for your time and consideration. Thank you.

Hi, fellow sports enthusiasts and hello commissioners. I am here this evening to express strong support for the proposed conversion of two tennis courts into dedicated pickleball courts. This action is not only timely, but essential to meet evolving recreational needs of our community. Let me begin by acknowledging the deep roots tennis has in our community. It is a sport that has shaped generations and deserves continued support.

However, the rise of pickleball is not a threat to tennis. It's a reflection of how our community is diversifying its interests. The idea that pickleball is infringing on tennis space overlooks a broader truth. Public facilities exist to serve the changing needs of all residents, not to preserve exclusivity for one group. Pickleball is the fastest growing sport in The United States with participation increasing over 150 in just the last few years.

Our community has seen a surge in demand often with players improvising on tennis courts or waiting long hours for limited access. Unlike tennis, pickleball is more approachable for older adults, beginners, and families. It fosters inclusivity and community engagement in ways that complement, not compete with tennis. The courts proposed for conversion are in a remote area and the least used courts at the center. Repurposing these would not disrupt core tennis activity and would maximize utility of a city owned facility.

This isn't about taking something away. It's about sharing space wisely. Tennis plays still retain the majority of courts, and the center remains committed to maintaining high quality tennis facilities. But denying pickleball its own space sends the wrong message, that tradition outweighs progress, and that one sport's legacy matters more than another's future. We urge decision makers to consider the broader picture. Change is a natural order in life. It honors the spirit of public recreation, adaptable, inclusive, and forward looking. Thank you for your consideration.

Hi, commissioners. My name is Vinay Chaturvedi. I'm a resident of Fullerton. I don't have anything prepared. I just wanna speak from my heart. As a father of five kids, and I'm sure you guys are also I have family. My kids, and I play tennis three times a week at the Fullerton Tennis Center. My kids at school, I have two at high school and three in elementary school. All of them wanna play tennis. They don't wanna play pickleball. Maybe later in life, they might get into pickleball. But right now, all of them wanna play tennis because it gets scholarships and college. You must understand. So what I'm I look at it. I saw the data.

Honestly, the data seems skewed towards one conclusion. And it seems like the parking that if one of you would just go there one evening between six to nine, you'll know how it is. It's full. There's no parking at all. And there's a hospital there. When you see that whole green, tennis has just probably half. Most of it is hospital, so you don't even get that. And with my kids there, usually, I'm I go to work, so the classes are in the evening. They take coaching classes. I wouldn't be comfortable walking them all the way.

It's pretty dark and dangerous by that route. If you have ever been there, you would know. And I've I've heard all of the people saying pickleball is a growing sport. We should bring it in. Nobody is disputing that. I'm agreeing with that. It is a growing sport because it's a new sport relative to tennis. Right? Tennis probably grew when it started, and now it's been years and years. And we should have pickleball courts, just not at the tennis center because those two sports don't mix together.

And, I'm fully supportive of looking at other options, and one of the recommendations was to look at other options. Look at other options. And if it's not because of the dam budget that we are doing this and it's not because of the revenue we're generating, then maybe we should do a report on building a tennis I mean, pickleball center, what would be the return on investment, how much would it cost, and maybe that's a better idea to give them because two courts won't be enough. I'm telling you it's not going to be enough. So maybe build somewhere where they can maybe we can generate more revenue, make more courts, have everybody happy, breakeven in two years.

That's probably a better plan for the city. You know? So I really think we should relook that other option and say what is better. All I wanna say is, I know the pickle pickleball, if it's your left hand, it's broken. Don't break your right hand to get a plaster, not even a plaster, just a bandage for the left hand. You know? It's not gonna fix your left hand because two course is just a bandage. You're breaking your right hand to put a bandage on your left hand. So please consider my request, and I thank you for the time.

You ready? Good evening, commissioners. My name is Robin. Thank you for listening to me. I'm so confused by the survey results because I play tennis three to five times a week at the tennis center, and the single most issue is parking. Parking, parking, and parking. And I think my colleagues have already mentioned it. From eight to ten in the morning, from ten to twelve, the afternoons are Biola University, and in the evenings. And from the survey, and I love pickleball, I play pickleball too, many of us do, but not at the Fullerton Tennis Center. It's just not a good mix.

The single most common concern and comment made in the text responses accompanying the survey center around parking concerns. The report uses terms like potential options have been discussed and overflow parking will be available but only at certain times. Neither of these really address the true parking issue because one is potential and the other is only available at certain times. Why weren't the 217 respondents who are most frequent users of the facility, for example those classified as several times a week or those classified as about once a week separately called called upon with regards to their comments on parking currently. This data is not included in the report but would seem crucial to the decision making process.

The city staff and this commission really recommend negatively impacting these community members, thriving medical facility, hospital, doctors, and other businesses with all kinds of additional parking demand and car traffic simply to accommodate an athletic desire when other options exist. We implore you to look at other options in the city. Thank you.

First, thanks for the opportunity to, speak to you tonight. And also, thank you for the wonderful research that's already been done on this issue. My name is Greg Tedimer, and I've been a Fullerton resident for almost thirty years. My wife and I were privileged to raise our kids here, I've always appreciated the many recreational activities and facilities. I was an avid tennis player for most of my adult life.

And for perhaps the first twenty years or so in Fullerton, I played at the tennis center once or twice a week. Then some age related injuries caught up with me and I had to quit. After recovering from having both hips replaced about seven years ago, I tried to play tennis again a few times, but due to several years layoff and reduced agility, I found I couldn't low longer play at the level I found enjoyable. Then I heard about pickleball. I found it quick and easy to learn and began having fun almost immediately.

In fact, that's one of its biggest draws. The sport's so easy to learn that one can enjoy playing very soon after learning the rules. And like tennis, it's easy to find others to play with who are for who are at a similar skill level. I now play two or three times a week primarily at the YMCA and at the community center. While tennis is a social sport, the smaller court and more intimate nature of pickleball fosters developing friendships with fellow players, which I have done with several of the people that you've already heard from.

Pickleball is perfect for people like me. And I'm sure, as you know, we've we've heard about the Tuesday and Friday morning pickleball sessions at the community center that are very popular but fill up rapidly. I'm confident that pickleball courts at the tennis center will become as popular if and when the conversion is complete. So please add my vote to the residents who would like to see the two tennis courts converted to eight pickleball courts. Please understand that we're not trying to subtract from the facility, but add to it and increase its usage and popularity. I'm eagerly looking forward to playing pickleball there. Thank you.

Good evening. I got three minutes, so I'm gonna do my best here. I got no agenda either, but I wanna say no offense to tennis. My name is Glenn Mitchell. I'm a fifty year resident of Fullerton. I went to Fullerton High School, Fullerton Junior College, Cal State Fullerton. I did my student teaching at Nicholas Junior High. I was a busboy at the Sunny Hills Racquet Club. Just saying. So I go way back. I'm wearing this tennis outfit tonight because it's, for Andre Agassi. Somebody was asking. He used to have hair, and he used to play pickleball. No. He plays pickleball now.

He used to play tennis. So anyway, where am I going with all this? So I was a PE teacher at Santa Ana High School for thirty four years. Okay? I retired two years ago. Absolutely love pickleball. I went to the YMCA for a couple times, one court, and it was not that good. One person. Anyway, so I went to the Fullerton Community Center. About half a dozen people from the class of 1979 are still playing there with me, and I absolutely love it. Okay? There's a beginning court, intermediate court, and advanced court. And if there's four paddles in, the winners don't stay. You got to sit out. Tomorrow, it's going to be raining.

It's going to be crazy, crazy crowded. Okay? So back to Santa Ana High School. I got a minute and a half here. You probably heard about Diane Keaton passed away, a graduate of Santa Ana High School, the oldest high school in Orange County, 1889 if anybody cares. Again, I went to Fullerton. So I went to the football game Friday night. Santa Ana played against Troy. I spoke with the athletic director again, Lilly. He says, Mitch, I got bad news. We had to cancel the tennis program. We just could not get enough kids out for tennis. But the former principal again, Lewis Pratcher, is converting three of the 12 courts to pickleball. It's unbelievable. Everybody comes out to play pickleball.

I still play senior softball. I used to play baseball. Can't do this anymore, but I could sure hit a slow pitch softball. Okay? Same with tennis. Doing this motion takes a lot of wear and tear on you. I serve it like this and everybody just has fun. We all get along. It's a blast. It really is. And as far as the parking concerns, there is the YMCA. I will ride my bicycle there because I live really close. So I shouldn't be a problem with the parking. Okay? Alright. Not to humor too much. I was trying not to listen to guys behind me because they're trying to tell me the Dodgers score and, you know, I'm recording it. So I don't want to go there. Anyway, I'm very hyper as you could probably tell, but I'm so passionate. I absolutely love love playing pickleball and all the people that play it.

I'll see you tomorrow at 07:30 everybody. Have a good night.

Wow. That's a tough act to follow.

No. No. It was great. It was great. Couple of people have come up here and spoke. Hi. My name is Steve Colgrove, and, I spoke at last meeting as well. Thanks for having me again. Appreciate your attention to this matter, commissioners. Couple of people spoke about, sacrificing and not sacrificing and thinking about utilitarian and that whole mix and everything, and a lot of people have talked about pickleball growth. You've heard several people talk about that, but I haven't heard anybody talk about tennis growth, so I'm gonna do that. But before I do that, I'm gonna say something I think is really relevant. Have any of you sat in a stadium of 20,000 people to watch a tennis match? 20 rows up, you can hear the server bouncing the ball on the court. It's silent.

We are players who have learned to play the sport that way. Pickleball, 180 degrees opposite of that, and I love that sport. It's a lot of fun. It's a blast. It's exuberance. It's fun. It's not compatible with tennis. It's different. I don't think the decibel levels that were that were, outlined in the in the report here actually put 16 pickleball players on the court at once and measure the decibel noise of that particular mix of players compared to what comes off of four players on a tennis court. Can't believe that because I know the noise is bigger.

I'm a member at Anaheim Tennis Center, and I know what that's like to try and play with pickleball going on at the same time. Okay. Enough of that. Wanted to give you a little history of tennis because we're talking about pickleball growth, but I'm not talking about tennis growth. For those of you who don't know, the United States Tennis Association celebrated its 140 birthday recently. Started in 1881, same year that the US Open, what's now known as US Open, was first played. The first Davis Cup match was played in 1900 between USA and Great Britain. That sport this sport, that's a hundred and twenty five years ago. This is a sport rich in tradition. The Southern California section of the USTA grew from 1,500,000 members to 2,500,000 members from 2019 to 2024 and added 300,000 members just in 2024 alone.

The Southern California section of the USTA estimates that 11.4% of every Southern California resident identifies themselves as a tennis player. That's one in nine people. I don't hear any comments anywhere about how you're gonna accommodate the growth of tennis players coming year after year after year and needing facilities to play tennis when hundreds of thousands of them are growing in numbers along with the growth of pickleball. Don't rob Peter to pay Paul. Make room for both. Thank you.

Good evening, commissioners, and thank you very much for allowing me to speak. My name is John Shipman. I'm a resident here in Fullerton. And, first of all, I wanna start off by saying what you heard from Glenn a few minutes ago is not an act. He plays pickleball just like he speaks. Okay? I've played against him many times, and I'll probably play him against play against you tomorrow. Alright? And I may lose, but I'll have a good time doing it. So I think for me and why I wanted to speak is forget about the noise. No pun intended. That's a moot point. If the noise affects you when you're playing either tennis or pickleball, you're not concentrating on what you're doing. Okay? I'll tell you right now.

Yeah. That's true. And you know it.

Hold on.

Because when I play pickleball Yeah. I don't hear I don't hear the other pickleball players. I concentrate on what I'm doing. Okay. And I do mean that sincerely. And I would invite you to come tomorrow at 07:30 and see what happens at the community center. Right? Doesn't matter if it's raining or if it's sunny. It is full. Right? And really what this is about, it's not about noise. It's not about parking. It's not about exclusivity. It's about community. Right?

And that's what we're talking about. I think just what's most important is everyone in the community needs to be served, and I think that's what you're doing when you're considering turning these two pickleball turning these two tennis courts into pickleball courts. And so what I I would encourage you and I would applaud you for doing just that. So staff, thank you very much for doing a good job and coming up with the numbers. And commissioners, I really would appreciate you giving this full consideration because not only is it important, but it's needed. So with that, that's all I have to say. It's it's about community.

Thank you.

Hi. Good evening. My name is Margaret Goodall, and I'm here to support the two courts being changed into pickleball courts. I think in a community of a 145,000 people, asking for two of 11 courts is not unreasonable considering there's no courts in pickleball pickleball courts in Fullerton at all. I wanna play with my husband. He works. I wanna play with my friends. They work. There's no courts. None. We've looked all over Fullerton. But I did do a survey looking for tennis courts. There's three tennis courts, two to three tennis courts over by Fistler that are public courts. There's 40 plus tennis courts with the high schools, just three high schools, Fullerton, Sunny Hills, Troy. Can I finish? Can I can I

Let's be respectful?

And and Fullerton College and Cal State Fullerton. Ali plays at Cal State Fullerton. A men's, tennis league plays at Fullerton High School. My understanding is you have to submit a form to the Park and Rec, and you can get a league play there. No problem with parking. You can park right next to the courts. There's no issues. 40 plus tennis courts. No pickleball courts. So where do I play? I don't want to go to Anaheim. I don't want to go to La I do. I have been there. And you have to walk to park. It's not always right next to the facility.

You have to walk. Sometimes on the street, sometimes across the street. And if you want to talk about safety, La Habra versus the hospital in Fullerton, I think that you're going to find that the hospital at Fullerton that's fully lit is more safe than walking in La Habra. So I just think it's a fair thing, a 145,000 people with no pickleball courts. And I agree it's community and it's sharing. I played at the Fullerton Tennis Center when I played tennis. We had community people in the in the facility around all the courts talking, having fun, doing food, and and having, parties there. So there's noise there. It's not like it's completely quiet. So I just think that, again, it's community.

I think what Glenn said and what John said is true. There should be court pickleball courts for people in Fullerton that pay taxes and enjoy pickleball. Thank you.

Hello my name is Susanna Fan, I'm a resident of Fullerton for over twenty five years. I have two kids that were born and raised here and I have one in college and one in high school still here in Fullerton. I was not prepared to speak today but listening to everybody else's comment prompted me to come up. I do not have a prepared speech. I just wanted to make a few comments that I heard from other people.

So I am a, I strongly support the pickleball conversion. I had two boys like I said that took tennis lessons at the tennis center by the way. So I used to go there. They took it for a couple years and honestly it was always empty. I mean that's what I'm saying.

I go to, I am a member of the YMCA, I drive by there every day. It doesn't look that full to me. On the comment regarding the noise from pickleball players versus tennis players, I have driven out to other cities like Tuffy Park and Placentia, La Mirada Community Center. They have both of these facilities have both tickle ball courts and tennis courts right next to each other. It's never been a problem. So hey, And also as Jennifer, so you know what? Please be respectful. I was respectful when you were talking.

Yeah. Apologies. Yeah. Let's just remember to be respectful to the speaker and lower your comment until after they're done.

Apologies, please continue. As mentioned previously, Fullerton Community Center has only two mornings and it's always packed like they said there's a line to get in all the time and you have to wait a long time. Again we're not trying, I mean we're not trying to say pickleball over tennis or whatever. There is obviously room for both. Share the love, I think somebody else said that.

Thank you for all the work you guys have done on this survey. Pickleball is for all ages. Everybody has commented on all the statistics about the growing. I don't have any of that because I wasn't prepared but I am prepared to say that at the Fullerton Community Center and other places that I play, there are, you know, high school, college, I mean, there's such a wide range of players and I know at the college my son goes to, at UCLA, it is a growing sport. It is really popular over there too.

So and regarding someone's comment about, well, we don't have a skating rink at Fullerton and we don't have Disneyland. Obviously, the city can't accommodate everything, but converting two converting one two courts. Anyways, thank you. Hi,

my name is Theresa Lim, fifty years plus resident of Fullerton. I used to play league tennis, women's league. My kids started playing tennis at Fullerton and they went on to play college tennis. And now my grandchild is starting to play tennis at Fullerton. So it's third generation and that's because we love to sport.

A couple of things I want to address is not pickleball versus tennis because I play both. It's the location of Courts 9 And 10. It is just not conducive for pickleball. The narrow stairway, you cannot see because pickleball players are, you know, you want to see people play so you can know which players you wanna connect with to start, you know, a group or which level you wanna play at. If you go to Anaheim Tennis Center, which I was a member of when they first began pickleball, you know, it's right there.

It's a social sport, and you've got all these people lined up to watch you play. Right? And then you swap in and out. So there's a lot of noise, people talking. And if there's players playing tennis in courts six and seven, that noise level is not from the pickleball, it's from the people talking. And that's called a distraction in tennis, and that's illegal from the player's point tennis player's point of view, because we will get penalized for a point for distraction. So, you know, it's right there. I mean, how are we going to keep those noise down from those people chatting? Right? You can't, because it's right along that fence area, and those are the only benches you can sit on.

And then you got this narrow stairways where you can't see anything because it's I love watching pickleball players play. You know, that's part of the fun of seeing who's good, who isn't. Right? And then you could decide which level you wanna join. So that's one area. And because I was there when the pickleball started in Anaheim, I know how they generate their revenue. And And it's not just because you have courts, and you're going to be able to generate revenue. They have two teaching pros that comes in, clinics. And they run the clinics. And those clinics are so successful that it's why people come from far away to join, because it's so competitive.

And I was part of that group. And it's so much fun. But then you're going to need the space, that social space, where the pros can teach, the people can gather. And that narrow stairway is just not the right area for it. If you're gonna put it, it has to be somewhere else where there's more room. I mean, that's the way it is. So you guys if you're gonna pick pick two other courts, I don't care. But 9 And 10 is not it, because of the narrowness of that location. So I suggest you look at other places.

My name is Jack Austin. I live in Brea, California. I have for forty two years. I played tennis off and on at Fullerton Tennis Center for about thirty eight years. I've got a lot of friends in Fullerton who play there.

Now, I I appreciate everybody's comments tonight coming and giving their input and information so the council can consider that. I would like to offer couple of things. I didn't think about speaking, but after everybody talked, I just I got a few ideas. Now, parking down a paved, it's kind of an asphalt paved road where you say the nursery is. I've walked down there when the YMCA had Crab Fest.

There are cars going up and down. They're pulling out from the little, you know, businesses or centers, community centers, buildings along that road. And I think the liability for the city of Fullerton is gonna be quite great if they put pickleball courts in. And if you have somebody from tennis or pickleball that parks down at at that nursery because they can't get parking in front of the tennis center, one child or one adult getting run over is gonna cost Fullerton a whole lot more than $8,000 revenue a month. Now, putting in two courts, just something to consider, A lot of people play doubles pickleball.

I've watched it. I've played it once or twice. I prefer tennis. Just my opinion. But with 16 people on a court and pickleball on one court, 16 on another, that's quite a few people.

If two of them came in a car, that's still a lot more cars coming in. So the city of Fullerton here, I guess, the past, I don't know, year or so, they've taken away groups of people that have played it at Fullerton Tennis for many years and reserve courts ahead of time. And maybe some, you know, people that are 50 come out in the mornings when it's cool, and that's been taken away. You can't reserve those on a monthly basis anymore. And the reason I heard tonight was because people complained we can't get a tennis court.

If they can't get a tennis court and there's already people playing, why would you wanna take courts away? Now, I I think one last one last thing I would request the city council get with the city attorney and look at the original grant deed that the person gave this property to the city of Fullerton, and it could have been for tennis specifically. I'm not sure on that, but I would like the city attorney to check that out before any decision is made about the pickleball courts. Thank you.

Hi. Thanks for the time. My name is Bob DePiro, also a Fullerton resident of forty years. I don't want to be too redundant. Just want to hit on a couple of key points.

The survey on parking, I know we talked about a lot, unfortunately captured a period of sort of low usage. I think you really want to look at a facility's ability, want to look at near peak or top peak usage. I would suggest reaching out to I know a lot of ladies playing leagues, maybe reach out to the captains of other teams from other facilities, ask them what the parking is lot when they try and arrive for league play. I think you'll get a pretty clear answer of what the problem is with parking. As far as capacity, to build on what you said, you talked about changing the meetup group as far as they're getting reservations because there's a capacity issue.

And now we're going to add to that by adding or taking two courts away. It's only going to exacerbate an existing problem. I play pickleball also. I think very clear from what we're hearing here. Your survey, We know it's a growing sport. We need to add pickleball courts. Doesn't mean we have to take away tennis courts to do it. I know it's costly, but we should be looking or at least do some type of research, some type of feasibility study on building certainly more than two quarts. Two quarts is not gonna satisfy a growing need. We need to find some we can build maybe four or six quarts, indoor, outdoor, whatever we have.

Lot of land in Fullerton, lot of parks. I gotta believe there's alternative solutions that we should at least be considering instead of just trying to pigeonhole one's immediate solution in an existing facility. That's a thriving community. That's all I got. Thank you.

Hi. I'm Mark Volk. I live in Covina, pretty far away from here, but I wasn't planning on talking. But the one thing I didn't realize that the proposed situation regarding the parking, that is really a bad idea. I've had to walk ladies myself when we got done oh, first of let me tell you. I only play Thursday nights, so I can only speak to mostly what's happening on Thursday nights. And we play between the hours of seven and nine. And it's dark when we get done when we get finished. I've personally been asked a few times to walk ladies down that path. I mean, you would not wanna do it.

I mean, what I've I've had my my phone stolen from the homeless people that used to be there. Maybe they're still there. I don't know. Maybe they found new homes. I don't but I know I had well, fortunately, it was sold back to me for $300, but that's one place you do not wanna be. So regardless of the situation with, pickleball versus tennis, going down there at all is a real bad idea. Try taking your wives sorry about that. Just try that sometime. Try to take your wives or girlfriends and ask them to walk that path one or two, three or two or three times. You would never would wanna do that.

The suggestion that you have for parking down there at the, what do you call it, the nursery, it's ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. I don't even like walking it. So and I know you're gonna be doing it. 20 because you're gonna be adding basically 24 more, cars. Because right now, you have eight Thirty two. Yeah. 32 minus eight. So I'm saying just 24. Right? So, I mean, the yeah. 32. But it's minus eight because they're gonna take away some of the tennis, players. So that's a lot of people. I mean, that's potential. 24 more cars? 24 I mean, does anybody, something's gonna happen. I guarantee you something's gonna happen. It's not a good area to be. Fullerton is a nice town, but that's not a good area right there. That's it. Thanks. Alright.

If there's nobody else in chamber, is there any else? Yeah. Sorry. Apologies. But the the session's over for that for your sessions specifically. But is there anybody else online?

No one. No? Okay.

Alright. So with that we're gonna bring this back to the commissioners. I do wanna talk about one thing before we open this up a little bit. So I did have the opportunity to get a tour done by Pam Austin by the Friends of Fullerton Group Friends of Fullerton Tennis Club and our friend Jacob here who were gracious enough to give me a tour of the the tennis center. It was thank you again for that tour very informative.

It didn't give me a lot of context to what, was spoken about today especially for, the noise concern. First is that I do agree and that when I was observing the games while while they were going on the prime thing the prime objective I would say is like the silence in the area and that not only is it like naturalistic with all, the trees and natural sound barriers around but also just because of the location and the positioning of the parks that it's such a wide open space that it is quiet but if someone were to speak you kinda can hear them from the other court around. So in my concern, I I do understand the concerns for Courts 9 And 10, being as problematic because, if you do have, I don't know, four four, so eight courts with how many people that come along with that traveling up and down from the entrance of the Fullerton Tennis Center going down to Courts 9 And 10, you know, back and forth back and forth. It is going to pick up in in noise like not just from people talking but just feet shuffling to begin with.

I I think my the one of the concerns that I've heard I guess for for the noise but one of the options that I was thinking of was for Tennis Court Number 1. If it were to be converted to just a single or just a singlet of of the of pickleball conversions but putting up, I don't know, noise reduction kind of any kind of noise reduction kind of billings so that it is blocked by the building. It is a little more secular next to a parking lot and a hospital. So those court so the theoretically the the the noise shouldn't add consistently as if you were adding so many people down to the lower courts. Parking and and maybe I understand your concerns.

In in my experience, it wasn't super difficult to get parking, but I understand where people are coming from and that, traveling such a larger, longer distance, and I have not seen the lighting at night. And hopefully, the city staff can comment on the lighting or at least some of the, you know, the concerns of public safety in terms of that way. I didn't see too much of the issue but that that was a concern that was relayed by other people who were at the tennis center while I was taking the the tour. I would just say that, there is a community spot on the lower portion of the tennis center where it is like tables and places where you can have lunch. So if it another place of noise generation, if there were pickleball in number one, I feel like somehow that would that would kinda be eaten up by that.

But I I've I've I'm opening to whatever kinda what other commissioners have to comment or ask.

Just out of curiosity, how do we arrive at nine and ten?

Arrive as in?

As as in those are the two proposed courts to convert.

So taking into account, some of the items like noise and the ones that were most isolated that weren't going to impact the day to day, those are the furthest down, or the furthest south of the the facility, which are isolated in that sense. In reference to the other courts and staff, has much more knowledge on them, but those are primary courts. And when I say primary, they're utilized by our universities, the high schools, and the teaching and for classes. So they're less used because they require a further walk down there, two, nine, and 10. But in reference to, like, Court 1, those isolated court courts, they're what we call stadium courts because they have stadium seating where more matches take place.

So it becomes a little bit they're kinda more of the premier use courts.

Okay. And then is there an option to incorporate some sort of sound barriers if we were to move this direction?

Yes. We can explore some sound barriers. Think some, agencies have done, like, sound curtains that they hang on the fencing. I don't yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Most cities do, about sound curtains. I believe City Of Mission Viejo has that that, in their tennis centers.

Yeah. Obviously,

there's themes with the concerns that were raised from the tennis players. One of those that resonates with me is certainly the parking concern where potentially, either staff of the hospital or patients or family of patients may be parking there. Is this supposed to be a restricted space for Tennis Center users only?

No. It's a shared parking lot, in our agreement with the hospital. And then the hospital does have that lot. They have some employee parking, if I'm not mistaken, already, within their structure. And then on on Harbor, they have an additional lot. Okay.

I'm also a proponent for safety in all the things we do within the Parks and Recs department. Right? So any park we consider, any addition or modification we consider, safety is paramount. Is there an option to look at lighted pathways from the proposed parking additions to to the tennis courts?

Yes. We can definitely explore that. The nursery law, while the comments were being made, we did, staff has gone out there and there are, lights within the parking lot area. I'd also wanna share that as you if you're walking down towards the nursery, that first building is a city building. That's where our homeless liaison officers are housed.

So there's additional staff there, which then leads you to the nursery and at the, at the bottom is the YMCA. So it is a, kind of a go to destination, the YMCA in the evenings as some, public has shared it. They do utilize it because they have activities going on. We can definitely explore the walkways, but I do know that the lot has in ground about eight foot, I would say, lights.

Yeah. Think I'd appreciate if we got to this place that we'd explore the walkway lighting so as to enhance the feeling of safety for any patrons that might be going there. You know that's it for my questions but for comments, you know for the Fullerton residents in the room and everyone else thank you for coming and offering your opinions and insights and you know I think part of us probably wish we had this much attendance every meeting. That being said, know Fullerton is committed to its residents and creating opportunities for people to have access to sport. And while I am not speaking for my company, the company that I work for is really about access to sport and I had the recent opportunity to listen to Maria Sharapova talk about her tennis career and she was asked a question about pickleball and her immediate reaction was to scoff and to say pickle what?

But then immediately countered that with what's beautiful about pickleball is the access it provides so many people. And for that, I'll say also that land is at a premium in the city of Fullerton. Our parks are beautiful and and while we have we enjoy a lot of different parks across the city. We had lighted parks are few and far between. And I know that we are looking to add pickleball courts to an existing park that's being renovated currently. But I for one am in favor of access to sport and I think what adding pickleball, converting pickleball courts at the tennis center creates more access. So that's where my head is.

Couple questions for me. Have we looked into, I don't know. For for the people on the on the list who maybe not visiting the tennis center at the moment. But if we went forward with pickleball center, is there signage that's gonna be saying, hey. There's more additional parking this way, you know, for those people who don't know, you know, where to go or, you know, the option for the validation, like, anything like that? Have we explored any of those potentials?

We we I don't think we've have gone too deep into, the signage. And but we will include that in our website on our website as they're making reservations and then making sure that everyone's informed.

Okay. I would say I I have a lot of the same concerns, that people have shared here. I'm also in favor of access to to sports. I grew up playing tennis. I also, play pickleball, so I'm right there with you guys being divided, in the sense of being pulled in kinda two different directions.

You know, safety is always a a big concern, so I'm glad that that it was already brought up. And I do think lighting needs to be addressed, especially if we move forward with that. Lighting, whether it prevents any crime or not, it definitely gives the feeling of it, and people feel safer. And it's something that that will, I think, help feel people have people feel more comfortable as they're doing it or walking down the the street. I did just wanna comment.

I know there's a lot of comments out there that they said, you guys said that that build somewhere else, find another place to build it, and I get that. I think I think everybody in this room wants to do that. There are a couple other pickleball courts that are being built. Christian, if you can remind me, how many are going in the current currently at the

So there's a plan for Union Pacific Park for two.

For two. And then are they lit? They are not lit. Okay. So that's two. That's that's good. It's obviously not, gonna gonna meet the needs of of a city this size, especially with no with no pickleball courts. But I I work for another city. I work for the city of Garden Grove, I am currently in the middle of of a pickleball project just similar to this, except it's not a conversion. It's a complete build.

And it is approximately 150,000 to $200,000 per court to build it. So if you want eight courts, that's one point two to one point six million dollars to build new pickleball courts and the the restrictions of location. Like we've addressed tonight, pickleball is loud. It can be the decibels are louder than than tennis, and it cannot be close to residents' homes. And so that limits a lot of places.

At minimum, in our experience and in my research, it has to be at minimum of 500 feet away from, from a residence, or else if you look at these other cities that jumped on it really fast and installed pickleball courts next to houses, they're all being sued. And it's because of the noise ordinance and having to do all kinds of different things. And this is somewhat of a perfect storm when it comes to a location. I get the the the access to the to tennis and and the long standing club that's been there. But, I think I'm in agreeance with at least one of my fellow commissioners of access and that this is important to have it there.

And I but I do think we need to take steps, and I would direct staff to do that, to take steps to mitigate as many of the issues that have been brought up tonight, like the lighting, the safety, the sound, if we can do, more sound barriers to to try to prevent that to educate the new public that's going to be coming, if it moves forward, on on being, courteous to their fellow tennis players, and to not have it be the the, quote, unquote, party, that that that's been mentioned. But, yeah, that's that's my comments, and you've answered my question. So thank you.

Thank you. Question on surrounding cities that have done conversions. Have they done conversions at and in conjunction and in collaboration with tennis courts as well too.

Yeah. Pretty pretty much every agency that we reached out to, they were a preexisting tennis facility that was only for tennis. I don't believe any of the, any of the agencies that we reached out to started from the ground up.

Okay. Perfect. So that's pretty much my only question that I had. And then, definitely want to make sure that, staff does, if council does kind of move forward with this, address safety concerns. Huge advocate for safety, in public spaces.

So definitely, well lit, ambient lighting, you know, just making sure that there's, enough budget doing a maybe a septed evaluation with PD, working with PD, making sure that any shrubbery, isn't, you know, some of the landscape components that people can hide behind things, things like that. So, yeah, just making sure CPTED, an assessment is done with PD, in that area. And then, again, thank you all for coming. Again, wish we can have this this much attendance, at some of our other meetings as well too, but, I'm super excited to hear that a lot of tennis players do also play, pickleball. And I think that that's that's really important to kinda see, and making sure that there is access for, evolving ways to to maybe bite the bug or drink the Kool Aid, right, to potentially play tennis.

And I do I do wanna make sure that the public does know that you could reach out to your local school district board members and ask them to invest and and get access to tennis facilities at their schools. They are public, and they should be have access to the public in that as well too. So, I know there was kind of some moans and groans, but, you should be able to be able to do that if you, talk to your local school districts. They are public spaces, and they should be accessed by the public as well too. So not just, for students as well too.

And unfortunately, it would be after hours, but, just wanted to share some of that information as a former, board member, school board member. So I know LaDer Vista has some has some courts. Parks did have, and I believe, they're using them either using them for pickleball at the school site. So, you know, just be advocates a huge advocate for the sport. It started to happen a little bit with baseball fields.

You started seeing backstops being taken down, not utilized, maybe just because they weren't being, you know, utilized to their potential. So, access to sports and physical activity and being outdoors, I think, is a very important thing. And I think, as a commissioner, that's one of my key elements, is to really promote, you know, health and wellness and and, you know, being outdoors. So kids follow our leads. Grandkids follow our leads.

So just continue doing all the amazing things, that you all kind of came to share here today. And I think with that, I'm gonna, motion, to go ahead and have the, we'll move to a motion to move, a, six a, convert the two tennis courts into eight pickleball courts.

Okay.

I'm sorry. Chair Maldonado, just to clarify to commissioner Tolivera's point. Yeah. Whatever is decided today, it's it's a commission decision. This item won't go to council. Just for clarification.

Oh, it's not?

Correct. Okay. So, yeah, the recommendations are at commission level, and they won't go to council.

Okay. Is there a countermotion? Yeah.

No no countermotion, but I'll second.

Okay. Oh, sorry. I'd like to counter it a little bit. Yeah. Just I still like like the the main motion of of the eight courts, but with a caveat of of the sound barriers and the safety concerns being addressed with the lighting and having that be if it's not possible, then roll it right into this, to, to have it be, like, a a phase two with it. Are we actually, follow-up question. With the funding available, I know it's it's specific to the dam area. Correct? And so, like, we I know we can't use it in the rest of the city. That's only a specific tenant to this area.

Is there is that walkway or the the street, would that be able to be used for lighting in that area? Is that funding source allowed to be used there?

I believe because it is in the Bray Dam. I think we could, but I would have to confirm.

Okay. And I would I would imagine the the sound barriers and all that stuff would could be incorporated into it because that's part of the upgrades anyways.

Correct. Yeah. So, just to clarify, what do you want, commissioner Talavera to amend his motion to include those items, or is that a

I'll I'll amend it to include those items.

Okay. And if you can just repeat the final motion, please. Thank you.

So I moved to, convert the two tennis courts into eight pickleball courts, with the caveat of including sound barriers and safety and signage concerns, adjusting signage and, safety concerns with, light and ambient. And maybe ask PD. I know they have one officer that provides the crime prevention through environmental design, evaluation. So, I think I think it'll be important to do that just to have a making sure that PDs knows how to patrol that area as well too.

Okay. Just to for clarification. So it's the recommendation for the conversion of two tennis courts to eight pickleball courts include sound barriers, is this just to courts the nine and ten surrounding the pickleball?

I would say nine and ten maybe the south of the the south part of the courts right above. I don't know the numbers of them, but the ones right above those. So it's mitigating both sides of it for all the for if people are crowding below, the sound isn't going up as well. Yeah.

Okay. And then and then lighting and signage improvements. Now I know you someone mentioned about phasing this. Is that or is it all in one swoop?

I I would say phasing it only if it's not allowed by the funding. If it's allowed in the funding and there is funding, to do it in in one phase. But again, it depends on the

But it's your motion, Commissioner.

No. Yeah. That's Yeah. Sorry.

If you can if you can do

it all in one phase, do it all in one phase.

Okay. We will

and to that, I'll second. Yeah.

Okay. We will include that.

I have one counter one option b. I don't know what it's called. Substitute motion. Yeah. Substitute motion. Thank you. Thank you. So I was just going to, mention the idea for six b, which is converting one tennis court into four courts, but it would be for court number one. Same concept of of public safety and sound reduction. Yeah. It would be the same kind of concept of sign improvements, noise reduction, and public safety. But yeah.

Is is that a motion?

That is a motion. That is a substitute motion.

My concern with that is Yeah. Number one, that court one I believe has as you mentioned stadium seating. Correct? Which I would imagine no.

It does, yes.

It does, yeah.

It's one of the more busiest courts and it's preferred with the high schools and the universities because of the stadium seating for spectators. Spectators. Yeah. And then for tournaments.

So Right. Alright.

So there's a substitute motion on the table, but is there a second? Because it's not for me.

That's fine.

You like the ideas, Walter. I don't think you.

No. Not much from

you on that. Love the idea. Yeah.

Well, with that, then, I'm gonna ask Madam Secretary, would you mind calling the vote?

Okay. So we've got Commissioner Talavera. Yes. Commissioner Freeman? Yes. Vice Chair McHenry?

Yes.

And Chair Mondonado?

Yes.

Okay. So the motion passes for for B. With the other Alright.

With that, we're gonna now say, are there any commissioner any matters from commissioners that they would like to address? No commissioner is, commissioners are limited to no more than five minutes per per discussion whatever.

Staff, I know that council approved the turf, for Lansfield, correct? Yes. We have an estimated start date?

Yes. So we're working, we had a kind of a pre con of to the pre con meeting. We're looking we've worked with our user groups and we're looking at the start date of November 17. The installer we've been kinda back and forth. They're looking at a seven week project date for the installation, which pushes the the calendar towards the January, which wasn't something where that's will become challenging.

So they're they're going to propose a they're they're having internal discussions to move that window up towards, like, January, which is where we where we planned. And they've also asked us potentially to start a week earlier, so November 10, if that week. Oh. Okay. But I believe Pop Warner might be finished. So we're working through that, but as of right now, November 17 is our tentative start date.

And did council approve what was recommended by commission?

They approved the, yeah, all the amenities, the synthetic turf with Kaia, no to the shade structure, and they've asked to reallocate some of the funding for scoreboards to other, sports fields, East Fullerton Little League, if we can make upgrades at the Fullerton Sports Complex, and then exploring West Fullerton Little League, if I'm not mistaken. So working with those organizations.

Okay.

Thank you. I just the only thing, other thing is talking to Fullerton Hills softball, talking to Golden Hill, the league, other other groups. There's a lot of concern about access to fields and especially when they have permitted fields and Fullerton Hills was most concerned about it especially when new turf comes on. A couple of concerns. Access, so the public accessing fields when it is permitted what to do about that because their account to me was that when they've asked people to leave and they refuse to leave, Fullerton Police doesn't really engage much with them.

So there's number one. I don't know what to do about that but something to think about. And the other thing is maintenance of the new turf field and what that schedule might look like, who will be responsible for doing it knowing that post 2026 funding may deplete for certain things? So how will we how will we maintain this field so we get the full lifespan of it?

So we're actually, internally looking to so historically, there's always been a staff at Lions who kind of oversees sports usage, our access to the public, permitted use, etcetera, plus maintenance. Because we have the we have the equipment to, like, broom the the field. So we're looking at allocating, I guess, I would say, like, more of a specialist staff to Lyons Field within the upcoming budget cycle too that would be responsible for the maintenance and access to the facility and so forth. Something in regards to permitted use versus, like, the non permitted use, it happens at all of our fields. Something we're trying to educate the user groups is that what space of the field is actually allocated.

Right? Versus I have a permit here. I have the entire park to my availability, which isn't accurate. So the sports users in Fullerton Hills has access to the Fort Softball Fields. And then if they reserve the soccer field or that overlay, then they have access to that. In the design, we did include a fifth, like, six u field on the Northwest Corner, because they wanted to practice. So they do reserve that space. For football, they also reserve all the spaces. But when we run into challenges that we actually can't enforce is when there's only one permit. Let's say Field 1 is permitted and someone's on Field 2 just throwing the ball around playing soccer.

It's technically still an open park because your permit is like there there's a barrier what Field 1 covers. Right? It's not the entire park. So it's a little it's education with the sports users, education with the community. That field, when the stairs were to my you know, the background that I've shared that been shared with me when the stairs were installed, it just crazy amount of people started utilizing the space.

We're actually trying to really hone in on the private use. So when we talk about the commercial use, there's a lot of unpermitted camps and private lessons that take place. We're all for that. However, there's a process to actually have a reservation, pay the commercial use fees and give a and provide the insurance. So we're also educating those individuals because it happens, we go online and then it comes around social media like, Johnny's doing a baseball camp at Lions Field 2 without permits.

Right? We know they don't have permits, but they're still hosting it, especially during the summer. So it's, we're really gonna take a kind of a deep dive approach to the education component once the field's online again and making sure that the signage is appropriate, that we're enforcing all the rules including with the staff. I think once we have a dedicated staff, it's going to help us a lot.

Sounds great. Thank you.

Any other comments?

Have anything?

Just great job on everything. Obviously, that was a lot. You guys had a lot put put together a lot of information, and having somebody, you know, go to the parking lot every hour for a month is a lot. So kudos to you guys for that, and putting together a a good packet. And I'm excited to have that addition come on. And just great job on all the rest of the events too. I mean, it kinda got overshadowed, but with this pickleball stuff tonight, but you guys have done great kinda coming out of summer going into right into the holiday season. So I get it. It's a lot of stuff, but you guys are rocking and and keep up the good work. I know the community really loves it, and I hear a lot of good comments from, a lot of community members and people I I go to church with and stuff like that. They they all attend a lot of the events that you guys put on. So good job.

Yep. Definitely good job on, on providing us updates and seeing all the amazing, foot traffic that we're bringing along to to the hunt, to a lot of our parks, and, to, to the Thursday night market as well too. Just wanted to ask to see if it's possible. I know next year's spring schedule and then because it's twice a year. Right? Twice a year, Eche, that you do for user groups?

Yeah. So I am I'm working on our packet for our user groups. Hopefully, gonna send that out on Wednesday.

And that's that that's, like, gonna happen in November, that meeting? November, December?

The meeting's happening in December.

In December? Yeah. Okay. So just, wanted to kinda just put it out there and see if there's if there's something even, like, feasible when you're looking at that schedule, to do potentially either, some type of annual kinda more regional, like, sports tournament, whether it's soccer, softball, baseball, whatever it is, that kind of draws in, more of a regional, component, to the city. So kind of just join in, you know, residents from from from all over, you know, locally, but bringing them in to generate some some business revenue.

So using some of that. So kind of taking a look at that that yearly count or that six month calendar window to see if there's any opportunities, even for, a weekend that we can reach out to some of our soccer leagues, again, softball leagues to host something. It could be, again, first six six months or the second six months. Just kind of maybe start talking to them about something like that. You know, we're or, again, there there could be a potential, you know, opportunity for, something more regional and, like, large scale, that comes into to the city. So just kind of coordinating, with them on that. Yeah. Just I'm thinking big picture.

Yeah. I know I had a conversation with, Fullerton City Football Club. I think they've been playing games, their select group, at other locations. They wanna bring those games here into Fullerton. So, just kinda working on that, working on scheduling with them.

Okay.

But if that's something that they wanna continue doing, for next fall winter season Yeah. You know, we can definitely work with them.

Awesome. Yeah. Thank you so much. You guys are doing a good job.

I neglected to say it, but good job, guys. You guys do such crazy work all the time. Right? And this is the work that brings the community together, and we appreciate you very much. So

Thank you. And I just on that note, shout out to all the staff, the Tennis Center staff, Fullerton Community Center, our special events, Susie, our our admin. It's just all across the board. I think our department has been wearing multiple hats like anything, and they've been it's very deserving, you know, for them to get the credit. And, you know, we'll see towards the last quarter of the year. It's it's pretty packed. Mhmm. So we're looking forward to, you know, some big projects, CIP projects, and and some special, you know, standalone events that we're we're looking to have. So thank you for the kind words.

I had one or a few things. One, yeah, fantastic job of of everything and help thank you for helping coordinate all of that tennis versus pickleball dilemma that we had. It was quite intense. But I do wanna give a shout out to Sofia Peterson, recreation specialist for the Hunt Library. She did help us out a lot.

We did a whole tour of the Hunt Library as a wedding venue, but also it opened up a mile now that I'm looking know what I'm looking for as like a wedding venue, The only tip I would say is that one thing that I do notice from other cities is that when you look up a perspective venue that is public, they give you a list of vendors off the website. But I I think this is the only one I think Fullerton is the only one that I could see that I I think it's like I had to specifically request it in of can I have a list of vendors that I can have on-site or something like that?

Yeah. The beauty of it is that you can bring your own vendors. Yeah. So we're not we're not tied down to any. We do have a preferred vendors list that's Sofia. Sofia's of the staff that has stepped into the assisting in that coordinator role, we had to make some staffing changes at the FCC with a few departures. So Carla is our coordinator. Sofia is assisting because we are inquiries for FCC rentals and the Hunt rentals, which I think the Hunt's a really nice build your own venue.

Yeah. Has so much so much freedom to do kinda anything you want.

You can throw a party. You can throw a party back there. Yeah. And the only ones that don't know is you and the train and the coyotes. But Yeah. Aside from that, yeah, no, Sofia and and I'd be remiss also, Edgar who was here. We've gone through a lot of our leases negotiations as you've seen in the agendas, updates, golf course, RFP. So all across the board and analyst team in our department, we're in good healthy shape.

Okay. That's awesome. Thank you. And the last thing I wanted to say, I know we kind of already voted on it, which was number four, the community garden rules and regulations. It's already been received and filed. But what I do wanna mention is I did talk to a representative for cool OC patio, and she did give us a give me a lot of, like, insight into what a community garden is. And I know we do have, like, a a PhD on staff, and that's really cool. The only thing I would ask is that if we can look into like group what is it called?

Apologies. I just looked up the word.

Composting. Group composting. If we can have on-site composting for the actual community garden. I don't know if that's a possibility, but I thought that would be a fun idea.

Yeah. We can explore that. Absolutely. And

then as like just for the educational portion of like the community port the community half of the the garden, some of the educational things that we're thinking of inviting nonprofits into the space to give, kind of workshop a workshop based, presentations or, kind of education sessions for either want water conservation or how to grow kind of crops or kind of in that kind of way. I'm sure if we can look into that one as well. Other than that, loved it. Loved everything you guys are doing. Puptober was awesome.

And if there are no more items, then this meeting will be adjourned at 08:45PM.