Board of Park Commissioners - Regular Meeting

Good evening. I'd like to call to order this meeting of the board of park commissioners here on Thursday, 03/19/2026. It's 05:31. Commissioner Littlejohn is excused, but all of the other commissioners are here in the chambers. Our first item of business is approval of the minutes.

Do I and then just to remember, we verbalize our we asked to speak, verbalize the motion, and then make that. Do I have a motion? Council member Weston? I move to approve. Motion to approve by council member Weston, second by commissioner Wilson. Any discussion on the minutes? Okay. Seeing none. Alright. Then let's please vote on those.

Do you wanna raise your yeah. Okay. So there's an eye from commissioner Cleary, and those passed unanimously. Our second item on the agenda is notices and discussions. Are there any notices and discussions from staff or commission members?

Alright. Council member Weston.

I just wanna give a shout out for the new Park and Rep app. I had to delete videos from my phone, but I put it on there, and it's a fantastic tool. And so I just want to thank the Park and Rec staff who worked on it. I think it's gonna be very helpful. Appreciate it.

Okay. Our next item, 26Dash0259, request to approve second Saturday downtown art market in Civic Center Park, contingent on the required approvals and issuance of all other city and county permits, including the special event permit through the clerk's office. Yeah. Kate Cole. Yes.

This is an annual event that just comes forward to get the proper approvals, and they will follow-up with any other additional permits that are needed. Standard, nothing has changed with what their setup is. Any questions from commissioners?

Alright. Seeing none, then let's please vote. Oh, sorry. Do I have a count council member Weston?

I move to approve contingent upon all the other approvals.

Okay. Motion to approve by council member Weston, seconded by commissioner Kirsch. Any discussion? Alright. Then let's please vote.

That motion passes unanimously. 26Dash0273, request to approve EMS week five k run walk fundraiser in Riverside Park And Trails on 05/17/2026, contingent on the required approvals and issuance of permits from all other city and county agencies.

Yes. Have you speak on this one? This one is a new event. I've been helping them through the process of what they need to do with the special event permit and everything else. Their route looks great. They've got it reserved, so we're just, doing some other finalization.

Commissioner Olson.

Motion to approve.

Motion to approve by commissioner Olson, seconded by council member Weston. Is there any other discussion? Alright. Then let's please vote. That motion passes unanimously.

Item 26Dash0285, request to approve breakthrough t one d walk fundraiser in Riverside Park on 09/20/2026, contingent on the required approvals and issuance of all other city and county permits, including the special event permit through the clerk's office. Any let's see. Do yeah. Go ahead.

Yep. I just wanna clarify if anyone's not familiar with what, t one d is, it's type one diabetes. So this is separate from the other, breakthrough event that happens in August. That one's a bike ride. This one is a walk. So separate but for the same good cause.

And we do have in the audience Morgan Grabinski Grabenowski and Jill Colstead who are in favor of the legislation but only here to answer questions. Any questions? Alright. Do we have, commissioner Kirsch? Move to approve.

Motion to approve by Commissioner Kirsch, second by Commissioner Olson. Is there any discussion? Alright. Then let's please vote. And that motion passes unanimously.

Item twenty six dash zero two six six, request to approve Aura Trails Fest at Upper Hickson Trails And Pavilion, May 2026, presented by Trek Bicycle Corporation, contingent on the required approvals and issuance of all other city and county permits, including the special event permit through the clerk's office.

Thank you. Just wanna give a refresher for this event because there have been some very minor changes. It is an annual event. Occurs every year. I believe this is my third time bringing it in front of this board. The small changes are that the organizer of this event now has shifted from Aura themselves to Trek Bicycles and a simple date change. Otherwise, everything about this event is standard from past years. Yeah.

Any questions? Yes. Commissioner Kirsch.

Thank you. Can you just clarify how so it's not Aura anymore, but they're still gonna be, like, manning it and stuff. Right? It's just the main funding sponsor is now Trek.

From what I have understood with communications with both Aura and Trek, they are both involved in this event still. Trek and their representative are simply doing the administrative work of getting it approved by these bodies, any other special event permits, and such. So Aura is still very much involved and a beneficiary of this event as well.

Any other questions? Okay. Alright. Thank you. Alright. Do I have a motion? Commissioner Kirsch?

Thanks. I think Robbie I didn't take my name off. So Robbie's probably the one to make the motion.

Commissioner Young?

Thank you. I'll make a motion to approve.

Motion to approve by Commissioner Young, second by Commissioner Kirsch. Any discussion? Alright. Seeing none, then let's please vote. And that motion passes unanimously.

Item 26Dash0269, request to approve alcohol at Black River Beach Neighborhood Center on 06/06/2026 for a wedding. Does that we're not I'm not reading out anything about extra permits.

No. This one's different. Black River Beach is a building that in order to have alcohol, they do need to have the whole building reserved, and they need park board approval. So no extra permits. They're just offering it to the guests for the wedding and for family reunion for the next one, I believe. So, it's just a formality, and

both have done what they need to. Okay. Any questions or discussion? Alright. Commissioner Olson?

Motion to approve.

Motion to approve by commissioner Olson. Second by commissioner Wilson. Any discussion? Alright. Then we'll please vote.

That motion passes unanimously. 26Dash0270, request to approve alcohol at Black River Beach Neighborhood Center on 08/01/2026 for a family reunion. Commissioner Kirsch?

I move to approve.

Move to approve by commissioner Kirsch, second by commissioner Olson. Any discussion? Alright. Then we'll please vote. And that motion passes unanimously.

26 Dash zero two seven one, request to approve a Sunday market, which will have the sale of goods at Cameron Park from May through October presented by Downtown Main Street, Inc, contingent on the required approvals and issuance of all other city and county permits, including those through the office. Deputy director Cusoni?

Yeah. I can give a brief overview here. DMI approached us about the idea of running a Sunday farmers market in Cameron Park. We had kind of run through some of the details with them, and they provided us with a roles and responsibility sheet that we have reviewed and approved. And right now, they're gonna be reserving the space and running this market on Sundays as presented, and this is something that the Park Department can support. And we feel we can meet the requests on the sheet provided to you all as well under

reservation.

I'm sure DMI has more information on on what the actual market is, but that's a background from the parks department.

Any other questions for commissioner Wilson?

So does this replace the Friday market? This is or Saturday?

It it does not. There will still be a market, in the works. I should say that it's not, complete yet. But on Friday, that is is moved, per the Board of Public Works, to Pearl Street. This would be a new market coming in on Sundays.

Any other questions for staff? Commissioner Olson?

My question is not for staff. It's actually for mister mister Honeycutt if

if

we could when he comes up.

Yep. Any other questions for staff? Okay. Do we need to do a public hearing or not if they're the applicant? No? Okay. Alright. Okay. Chad Honeycutt is here to speak in favor representing DMI. You can go ahead and come up and introduce yourself, please.

Hello, everyone. I'm Chad Honeycutt. I am the executive director for Downtown Main Street, TMI.

Thank you, chair. Mister Honeycutt, I'm I'm 100% in favor of this, but you know what's been going on and what has happened in the past at two of these downtown parks. I was looking through this. I see that the police department will do a walk through of the park and the parking ramp. What about during the event itself?

Before you answer that, what I want to make sure we do is that we establish to anyone that has thoughts of going back to the way things were, that we squash them right away. So is there a plan in place for security or police or anything during the event itself to protect the vendors and the and the residents?

Sure. Yeah. I've gotten quite a bit of feedback about Cameron Park and Burns Park as well. I've also seen it firsthand. One of the macro themes that DMI is working on is restoring balance and beauty to downtown. That's especially in our green spaces. We find them to be pretty sacred. We also want this to be an all access park, meaning certain people don't feel safe or comfortable right now, and we'll we are working on restoring the quality of behavior in downtown as a whole, but the parks especially. We met with the police. We've met with the parks department.

We met with the mayor. We all are working towards what a macro security plan would be. But on-site, we will have safety and security volunteers. They'll also be there to assist the vendors. With that being said, obviously, if anything ever got out of control, we would use the proper procedures with the police or but, we also are cantilevering behaviors we don't wanna see with positive programming. So we're not a traditional farmer's market. We'll be sort of a new concept. We'll be doing group exercise throughout the day in the park at different hours. It'll be calendared. We'll have live music, guitar.

We'll have students from UWL and Polytech. And so we'll be doing what we we wanna lead by example. So what we've realized in the past, a lot of the deterrents we've used, the signage, whatever hasn't really worked. And so it's also about sort of reclamation and restoring our own behavior. I think maybe COVID got us all really used to the depression and sort of what we're gonna accept for ourselves, and DMI is at the forefront trying to establish a better standard of behavior downtown.

Thank you.

Any other questions? I have a question. It says on the sheet that there will be premarket closure of King Street from 5th to 6th.

That's just for the the one side of King Street where the awnings are, where the vendors pull in.

You mean between 4th and 5th?

Yes. Excuse me.

Okay.

And do you have commitments from farmers?

Yeah. We have a short list right now of about 10 people. As soon as we go through tonight, we have our vendor applications, sort of our brand and different things online. Also, part of this is weaving in local businesses. So we'll have a few stalls for local businesses if they're doing a big sale or with the season. We're going to be formulating this market as a rotating sort of organic responding to the season and, like I said, the programming earlier. Along with that, we're stationing the co op as a breadbasket downtown. We're doing a lot of intra economy. We'll do like our bulks and things like that, and we'll be making sure that we're steering people from the market to the different businesses. Obviously, the new Panacocon will be an anchor, and we have about 600 people coming out of mass on Sundays.

So we have a crowd that hopefully they can point them to their fresh food and then get them in the co op and then the children's museum, and Bob's your uncle. So

Any other questions? Okay. And what what do you see the relationship between this Farmers Market and the Friday evening one?

So any type of program in downtown is DMI. We'll any program in downtown, we will support and we'll promote. We originally did do a walk through with the Pearl Street Market with two organizations and two bandwidths. It just wasn't economically feasible. I also personally I used to throw up festivals in Chicago. I didn't want us to sign off on it. I found too high liabilities in certain areas, and a lot of businesses would have to adjust. This seemed like a natural fit for us, and that's why we sort of went this direction. Obviously, we'll support anyone that's putting on markets, whether it's Sunday or Friday downtown.

Okay. So DMI is not behind the Friday '1?

No. So but like I said, we will support anything downtown and do our best to help, but we just can't provide bandwidth. We're a two person staff.

So Okay. Alright. Thank you. Any other questions? Alright.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you.

So have two other oh, Commissioner Kirsch, did you have a question? Oh, okay. Well, we have two other people here who wish to speak in favor of the legislation. Councilmember Kahlo.

Just introduce yourself, please. Thank you, Madam President. I'm Chris Kahlo, La Crosse District 6 councilmember. So, this park is in my district, and as you know, we had a fabulous farmers market there, and COVID, among other things, really put a crimp in it. The Friday market, those folks do not want to go back to Cameron.

So they are making their alternative plans, which is amazing to have events downtown markets two nights. Currently, on Sundays, for myself personally, the only market I know of is in Onalaska in the Ashley parking lot. And it's not somewhere I like to go. So this is easy for folks to get on their bikes, come down the King Street Greenway, for my neighborhood to walk down and get some fresh food, maybe do some tai chi. So I hope we can try this out, and hopefully we can kind of activate that park on a Sunday also and bring more business downtown. Thank you.

Grant Mathew. Just say your name and where you're where you live.

See where you

Sounds good. Grant Mathew, 1 River Place Drive, Apartment 217 in the city of La Crosse. And I'm just here, and I'll be here and give real brief remarks because I got a county board meeting in about ten minutes I got to go to. But in serving on the county board and in serving as the chairperson of the Downtown Neighborhood Association, I've got to engage with a lot of downtown residents. And I think it's pretty overwhelmingly clear that people want the parts to be used for that positive type of programming that the DMI director discussed.

And I think that this Sunday morning option right from May to October for this type of Sunday market would just be a really good and beneficial thing for the community. All of the feedback I've heard on it has been positive, and just wanted to encourage you all to support it. Thank you.

Anyone else here to speak on that? Okay. Alright. Okay. Do we have a motion? Commissioner Kirsch?

Yes. I would like to move to approve.

Move to approve by commissioner Kirsch, second by commissioner Olson. Any other discussion? Alright. Then let's please vote. And that motion passes unanimously.

Good luck. Item twenty six dash zero two seven four, update on pool collaboration with the school district. Does mister Flick have anything that he no?

Just quick. So, really, what the members of the, school board and the parks board have been meeting for the last couple months every week to kind of come through and come together with this, this needs case. And with summer registration starting next week and the weather nice, we we thought it would be prudent to kind of provide kind of a status update of what we've been communicating with. So that's kind of where we're at right now, and, otherwise, I'll kind of direct it to doctor Engel to kind of kick it off.

Can the members who serve on that pool collaboration committee please raise their hands so folks can see who those are? Okay. And then is Scott Neumeister also on it?

Yes.

Okay. And so those are the four okay. And are there other people on that pool collaboration collaboration committee? Committee? That one?

Yep. So it'd be those four and also Jay Odegaard, myself, and doctor Engel. So

Okay. Alright. Just to be clear to everybody who's on that committee. Alright. Doctor Engel?

Again, just say your name and where you live, what city you live in.

I'm Erin Engel. I live in the town Trumpelo and superintendent for the School District of La Crosse. It's been exciting to work collaboratively between the school district and the parks board to explore the possibility of collaboration around an indoor pool on the North Side. That needs case kinda outlines all of the challenges we see with our current situation and really feel like there's an opportunity to explore with the community at large. Is there interest in trying to rectify some of those challenges?

The city pool, you know, is closed for this summer and has some pending, you know, maintenance issues that have been a little bit concerning for the future. And the school district's pool is really insufficient in many ways. It's not the right depth for competition. It's not the right length for competition. It's aging and has some mechanical issues that are pending.

And so as we think about the future of that pool, it would be wiser probably to invest in something new to send more good money after bad. And so interested in furthering the the collaboration and seeing what the community's interest is in something. Pools are not cheap, and it requires some sort of funding mechanism to build something new. And it would be a levy one way or another, you know, at the end of the day, unless there's a a donor out there with really deep pockets. And so we'd wanna send out a survey at some point early late this spring, early this summer to really ask the community.

Like, here's our situation. This is the challenges we're facing. We've heard that there's an interest in more pool space and particularly indoor pool space. We have a need as a school district. Would you support something? You know? So that's really the the next step. And so, you know, happy to turn it over to the other members of that committee to kinda describe the experience and where we're at. And I have a draft, very draft version of a survey to share with you today if you're interested in looking at it.

Can you say how many times this pool collaboration committee has met?

I without pulling up my calendar, maybe five times. We've been meeting about every other week.

Okay. Four or five times? Yep. Any questions from commissioners to doctor Engel? Commissioner Wilson?

In the document that we got, it talks about cooperation with the YMCA, and I wondered how YMCA fits into this.

Yeah. It's a great question. You know, as a as a city and as a school district, we've both found it hard to hire lifeguards and to operate a pool. And what we've noticed is there's a expert in our community that is great at operating pools and has also been seeking additional pool space, especially indoor pool space for the programming that they provide. As a school district, our primary use is, you know, a few swim lessons during the year and then competitive swim and practice after school.

So there's lots of times where it could be used by other entities, you know, for the city. You know, historically, that space has been used in the summers, you know, for recreational swim. And there's certainly opportunities during the day for all sorts of users, you know, if it's available as an indoor pool year round. But we've seen lots of successful models of city government, of school districts collaborating with YMCAs across the country and thought that might be a neat way to kind of solve some of our challenges with staffing and pool operation expertise while benefiting the community even further than we would otherwise.

Commissioner Olson?

Thank you. Doctor. Engel, you may not have gotten this far yet in your meetings, but is this going to be collaboration continuously with the city and the school district in the Y, or is at some point the city going to not be a part of this and it's just gonna be the school district in the Y? Is is that something that's been addressed yet? Not, If I understand you can just say so.

At my anticipation, it would be an ongoing partnership between all three entities. We know that if the pool is closed on the North Side, there's a lack of opportunities for youth to get swimming instruction in the summer for safe recreational opportunities, and so we would wanna continue to maintain that presence for the city. And then an indoor pool provides an opportunity for residents to have year round access as a city amenity. And so I feel that that, you know, shared responsibility for whatever we develop would be ongoing in perpetuity. Yeah.

Council member Weston?

You kind of you did already mention this, doctor Angle, but I do wanna emphasize what has been most exciting to me about this is that although this is establishing a new version of a partnership inclusive of the YMCA potentially, There it's helpful to know that there are models like this across the nation and that we're not necessarily starting this from scratch. We can beg, borrow, and steal from what has worked in other municipalities, and that's an encouraging framework for us to use as well.

Yeah. There's MOUs that we have examples of that describe other arrangements between cities, YMCAs, school districts, and so we feel confident that there's models out there. And one of the things I'm excited about is by working together, we can be more efficient with the few funds we have. Know, school districts are are facing economic challenges just like the city is. And so maybe we can preserve what we have and maybe even something better by working together and being more efficient in the process.

I'm gonna ask another question. You started to talk about this survey and whether or not we would go to referendum as a conversation. That referendum would be from the school district. What do you wanna share about that potential, not that that's in the works for sure.

Yeah. You know, levying this like, acquiring the kind of money you would need to build an indoor pool, you know, probably a little in excess of $30,000,000. It's not a small number. You know, you would need to to find that money somehow. Taking the time to fundraise for that, you know, it would be very, very difficult.

If the community supported it, there would be an opportunity to go to referendum and love you the money that way. Since it's the school district and the city partnering on it and the sit the school district has a slightly larger geographic area than the city, there's a it makes sense logically for the school district to kinda, you know, promote the referendum from the school district side of things as opposed to the city because it would capture a slightly larger audience, and it would benefit that audience too. And then in terms of just cost sharing, we'd have to figure out what that looks like exactly in the in the process. So if there was support on a a refer on a survey, I think it would bode well then for going to referendum and asking the community if they supported this opportunity. You know, we heard a lot, you know, in the community when the North Side Pool was being discussed for closure.

There's a lot of interest in trying to maintain access to to recreational and swimming instruction opportunities in our city. And So if that support continues to be there in a survey, then we would consider going to referendum. Of course, it would need the cities and the school district support from the folks that are elected to make these decisions first.

Commissioner Kirsch?

Yes, thank you. Two things. Do you want to address any financial contribution from the school that we had talked about, school district, like some sort of funding mechanism? And do you wanna bring up where we're thinking of actually placing the pool?

Yeah. Absolutely. So there's two logical sites for a pool. I'll start there first. We have a pool at Logan High School, you know, and so there would be a potential opportunity to locate it there. And then the Northside Community Pool's at Logan Middle School. So that's another natural site to consider putting up. As we evaluated all the factors and and other things going on, it really seemed like the existing Northside Community pool site at Logan Middle is really the best site for an indoor pool like this. It has more access to the neighborhood. There's already a site that's, you know, you know, closed, you know, so it'd be easy to to do that there.

The high school has lots of events all all year long, and so parking, you know, could be a challenge there with everything that's going on at the high school. And when we think about daily use and access kind of during the school day, you know, during the school year, it would be easier to kinda segregate access at the the Logan Middle School site so that the community could readily access that pool. And so that's why the Logan Middle School site seems to be a better location based on our assessment. And then as far as funding mechanisms, referendum, the greatest form of democracy we have in our community, ask the people what they want in order to fund it. And then we already have a budget for a pool built into our just general operating budget, So some of those funds would be used to to operate it.

And then we have numerous partnerships with the city already where the city uses our gymnasiums and grounds for free because appreciate the partnership so greatly. And the costs, often minimal, but we are able to charge those through a special levy called Fund 80. And so, potentially, there would be an opportunity to to charge some of those additional costs through Fund 80 as well. But the the partnership is what's exciting and and being able to to leverage something together for the benefit of our city.

Commission commissioner Olson.

Thank you. Doctor Engel, are there any plans for any public meetings, about this topic before or after the, survey?

Timing's all. We're trying to get something done before summer and everybody leaves and nobody fills out surveys anymore, you know, is busy recreating and whatnot. But ideally, we would have some public meetings before the survey went out so that people would have an opportunity to get questions answered, their concerns addressed, could really understand what's going on with the survey. And if the survey came back and it showed strong support for this idea, we would have to have many, many community opportunities for input so that people really understood the challenges, you know, why this is being pursued, and what

the impact would be on them. So if if you wanna have a survey out before the end of this before summer starts, I'm guessing that would be, like, May. Mhmm. We're already in March. Are there any plans set up yet for public hearings?

Not at this time. The first step was to bring it back to the parks board in order to to get your input and to see if we're gonna continue to move forward. The second step is to bring it to the city council and the school board. You know, if if we're gonna put out a survey that, you know, could potentially commit our municipalities, our governmental organizations to a direction. We wanna make sure that those entities support it. And if we get to that point, we would have some community information sessions before the survey went out. Absolutely.

Any other questions from commissioners? Are there comments from pool collaboration committee members?

No? Yeah.

I can I can speak more of just my opinion, but I the the thing I'm more excited about is, you know, the continued collaboration with the city? When When I first got on the school board, I was kind of like, why why don't you guys talk to the city about things when we're when we're talking about big projects? So I'm I'm really excited about where this relationship can go on the in the future. There's a lot of needs on both sides of it, so it'll be exciting to see what we explore.

Any other comments from staff?

Yeah. One more comment. With the y and the school district and the park parks, it seems like this pool is going to be really busy scheduling. It'd be interesting to see what we do with scheduling to get the various users to have their time in the pool.

Well, I can describe a little bit about the design so that would help alleviate some of those concerns. So to really meet both the city's and the school district's needs, it would really have to have two different kind of wells. One would be a competitive pool, you know, eight lanes, appropriate depth for diving on one end, spectator seating. So we really want it to be a competitive venue, a lap swimming venue, for those that enjoy that portion of swimming and recreation. And then that would be one side of the facility, and on the other side of the facility would be a zero entry depth, you know, swimming or a slide, you know, some of those features for recreation, so really the community aspect of it.

And so to manage, right, the great demands, you'd be able to run lap swimming and just kinda kid open swim at the same time. You'd be able to have an evening swim meet and a birthday party, potentially, if you wanted to open it up and drive some revenue on the other side. And so there would be an opportunity to meet those collective needs concurrently and really maximize the time in that space. There's examples of these that have been built across the state and other communities, either as partnerships with school districts or cities and YMCAs. And so I think it's a neat design that really allows us to meet the city's need for recreational and swimming instruction and the and the the school district's need for athletic endeavors, swimming instruction, and competition, and then adding in the YMCA with all of their users and the ways that they use pools.

And then we're already imagining any number of other partnerships after the fact if we get that far. You know, health systems have need for recreational therapy, you know, rehabilitation. The STAR Center has a need for adaptive swim and other things. There's lots of groups we could reach out to, you know, to really maximize the use at that point.

And one other comment. Right now, the park department just has two and a half months of pool use during the year, and this would extend the park department pool season, I would think, which is a good thing.

Absolutely. We'd go from eighty days of real viable swim time to three hundred and sixty five days of viable swim time, and that would definitely expand access. And, also, as we compared our our relative pool you know, on the operational side, just, you know, chemicals, daily maintenance, and some of those things, it costs about the same to run an outdoor pool for 80 days than it does to run an indoor pool for three hundred and sixty five days. And so just the indoor nature of it makes it so much more resilient to the elements and viable mechanically, and so the costs, you know, over that period of time aren't as much as you would think relative to even an outdoor pool.

And it's my understanding that just sort of roughing out the dimensions that there's a surprising amount of space there where the North Side pool is, and so we can actually accommodate these two different sets of water facilities in that in that block.

Yes. Absolutely. Like, within the the boundaries of the current city pool on the North Side, you can fit in the facility that we're imagining. We have preliminary sketches from our architect that we work with on all of our projects, and so easily fits into that space. We had initially thought, you know, there's no way, you know, because it's an indoor pool. But it turns out once you account for deck space and awnings and all these other things and the different ways an indoor pool is used compared to an outdoor pool, it turns out the space is sufficient for what we're looking for. So it's kind of a neat kinda just kinda neat that it works out that way.

Anything else from staff, commissioners? Nope. Alright. Thank you very much for being here.

Yeah. My pleasure. Happy to answer anything else you have now or later.

Okay. Alright. 260267, request to approve the concept of River Point Park design. Deputy director Trusoni.

Thank you very much. So I know there's a lot to unpack here. I'll start with a brief overview of the space. You kinda in your packet, there were some different maps and pictures of the space we're talking about within within the River Point development back in or last year, this property was transferred from the RDA to the purview of the Park Department. And at that time, we were tasked to assist the planning department with developing the park space for on this property.

So we, at that point, signed with an architect. We kind of gave them our thoughts, ideas. I'll read off some of the goals that we provided the architect. The first one was connectivity. We had asked for low maintenance sustainability.

We wanted to complement the development and development of the existing park system and to ultimately enhance and highlight the natural beauty of the site. So with that, the architect came back, and we've went back and forth now for quite some time on this design. And what they're what you're seeing in front of you tonight is the first concept that we are bringing to you to get the ball rolling, get things started, have being a starting point for further conversation and development of this space. I want to be very clear that this tonight is very conceptual. By giving conceptual approval tonight, that doesn't mean that this piece is ready to go.

I'll kind of explain that process now. This is obviously a large space, large request, a lot going on here. So with the amount of money that would be needed to be associated with this, we feel the best approach along with the planning department is to kind of phase this project out. And before we put any kind of shovels in the ground this project, it would have to come back in front of this board for approval. So example, Phase one, for example, on Phase one, we're looking I think the request right now is for $2,000,000 in 2027.

So we need to come back from this complete design or conceptual design here, bring back to this board at some point later this year or early twenty twenty seven what Phase one might look like. And our thoughts on that would be kind of the connectivity piece of the trail connecting the north and south end of this park space, some earthwork, landscape, low maintenance type design at that point. And that's that does two things for us. It gets again, gets the ball rolling. And it also gives developers and potential new developers some progress in the overall development.

They've kind of been asking us for that. They've been asking the city for that. So we're doing our part to move that piece forward. Let's see. Yeah, I know that there's probably a lot of questions with this. Again, very conceptual design. I know we've met with different user groups, potential user groups, other stakeholders. We've had a student, UW student, complete a capstone project designing a portion of this. UWL has had a recreational group do some public outreach. We've met with them twice in prior years to discuss ideas for this design.

We've kind of what we've done is give all of that information and accumulated it into one design at this point. And again, this is very fluid at this point. Much of this will be changed and adapt as we go throughout many years and whatnot. But what's in front you tonight, again, is a starting point. And with that, I can try and answer any questions that you might have at this point.

Commissioner Kirsch?

Yes, thank you. A couple of things I just want to make sure are included. Number one, if there's a good native tree that's there, leave it. And number two, using for the trails, trying to use permeable surfaces. And what about flooding?

So flooding, I'll I'll start with that part. Flooding is taken into consideration. They have the flood maps. And anything that would be any structure would have to be built outside of the flood zone. Anything within the flood zone would have to be, you know, acceptable type development in that space. So, yeah, when we're right, we're crossing those bridges as well at this point. And then so your permeable surface you'd ask for? Yeah. Yeah. Maybe just an overview of of this.

We are, again, with with this conceptual, before we go into phase one, the trail, we would have to go into more of an in-depth design on that, and we'll be bringing that back to you at some point too, like I said. But that is still to be determined. Obviously, we'll take all the input that we get and try and reflect that in the Phase one design when that time comes. But yes, this is very high level at this point. So thank you for those comments.

I agree with you. Commissioner Wilson?

Yeah. I guess my my reaction to the plan when I look at it is that this park is overstuffed with with things and, like, more more walkways than you need for that amount of area and a lot of activity where I'd like to talk about saving native trees. I'd like to save some more of the natural area that's there on the riverbank. And then some of it is, as you say, fairly expensive, like the boardwalk across the marsh. It's another thing that's gonna be high maintenance and expensive to build, and, it's a fairly small water area.

People can see across it from what we have now. And a fishing pier on that, I don't I'm not a fisherman. I don't know how much there is in the way of fish that anyone would want to catch in there. But just it just seems like too much.

If I may comment on that, you're exactly right. And I agree with those thoughts. And that was intentional at this point. We asked the architect to develop this to a high level so we can then peel back instead of trying to add it at a later date. Just it's an easier way to do this process so we can give people and groups and stakeholders a visual of what it could be. And then from there, we can develop what we feel is reasonable, what isn't reasonable. We can associate costs with it, that kind of stuff too. So yes. And I wouldn't recommend fishing in that space. Currently, no.

Commissioner Olson, are are you done? Okay. Commissioner Olson?

Thank you. Dan, a couple of things. One, is there going to be a wall built to retain the ground

end

of

And And with of then, to And that kind of stuff is all potential development down the road. Nothing in here right now in respect to a levee type system.

Okay. And then on the the one page, there's then the then

we'll we'll next And

question.

Commissioner Young?

Thank you. Thank you, Dan. I'm not going to nitpick much because I know, like, it's big picture stuff, and we love that. My guidance, personally, would be and you can call it crazy, but I don't think you could spend too much money on this project. I think I if you went back to a blank slate and showed somebody Husqa Park and Riverside and said, how much do you wanna spend to make this look great?

They'd say, I don't know, a trillion dollars. So I appreciate that you're, like, considering every possible thing you can. And given the amount of development opportunities that this city has, River Point being, like, the only big development our city is ever going to have in my lifetime, I think it's important to really show people what a top tier city presents with its riverfront. So thank you. And when it's time to nitpick little things, I'll be back for those.

Commissioner Kirsch?

Yes. Thank you again. So part of the reason we don't have well, I'm just kind of concerned about water safety because it is going to be next to very big developments. It's not Pettibone. It's not Riverside Park, which is all rip wrapped off anyway.

I mean, I know we love having our parks, I do like the idea of having something really special there. But it's gonna be near where a lot of people are. It'll be great to have a pool to teach them all how to swim, But what are the water safety concerns with that big I mean, that's a long stretch of water to be watching out for people, for people to do whatever they feel like doing. Luckily, it's a little bit farther away from any bars that are currently available. Just wanted your thoughts on that.

Yeah. Thank you. And obviously, safety is going to be the ultimate concern as we develop continue to develop this space. I will say that we do have experience in that world with all the waterfront properties that we currently manage and have. So we'll look to previous successes and we'll look to other ideas, too, that the public may have or that law enforcement may have or whatever it may be to improve the space.

Councilmember Weston?

Thank you, Madam Chair. Love the, I think, the tree canopy walk. I I love something that will get kids in there with nature. My kids find Riverside Park boring as much as I love it. Right?

And so I love that component component there as well. So thanks for that, and we'll see what comes to fruition. I also wonder how we will mitigate the mosquitoes because that's just you come up with that, we'll have all the money we need to build a park. The other only other comment I have is I think all of these elements and having options for elements, to me, also creates opportunities for more of those folks in the community who do have a fair amount of money that would like to say, I wanna make this the Lee Soe Weston tree canopy. Right? And so I think that's an opportunity if it's already drawn up to say, sure. Give us a million dollars, and we can so I appreciate that.

Commissioner Kirsch? Yeah. Thanks

again. So I had a thought, and then you bringing up the mosquitoes kind of went with that thought because I work in floodplain forests. My initial thought was to try to highlight I mean, bring a floodplain forest close, because nobody really gets out well, not nobody, but very few people know what a real floodplain forest looks looks like. And yeah, this is a small area to support something that looks like a floodplain forest. And then you brought up mosquitoes, I'm like, well, you probably don't want a lot of wood nettle, nettle, which is a floodplain forest.

But it could be another arboretum sort of thing. And to control mosquitoes, you just don't want I mean, you have to have a park. You have to have it park like. It can't be like Petty Bone where you've got the wild areas. So there is it's kind of I like the wild areas. We have them in Petty Bone, but this might just need to be more like just an idea of an arboretum and not like Petty Bone where you've got the wilder areas, which are really cool, and that's why they have a lot of birds and stuff to eat there. But if you don't want mosquitoes, don't make it that way.

Any more from commissioners? We do have a member in the audience who wishes to speak. Chuck Lee, can you come up and introduce yourself? And they have said they want to speak both in favor and in opposition. And you need to can you push the the button to activate your thank you.

Okay. Thank you. I'm Chuck Lee. I'm president of Friends of the Marsh.

And the city where you live?

I live at 412 South 20th Street

Okay.

Here in La Crosse. First time this year, I think I spoke to the Park Board, but I've been here many times before. I'll be here next month, by the way, for our new MOU with the Parks Department, which we approved at about 03:30 today with our board meeting. At that board meeting, we had an opportunity to talk about this master plan for the first time. So it was a a brief discussion. And I don't mean to be coy or about registering

to speak both

in favor and and against. But there are, as some of you have mentioned, many, many things in this plan. I would say too many things. I would agree with Pat Wilson on that. We were calling it a kitchen sink plan, and let's go with that.

And so there are some things in the kitchen sink that we support. We support that trail to the north end of the development zone from the south along the river. We support a loop trail along the river leaving the As For Trail just over the bridge and then reconnecting to the As For Trail later on to the north there. We think that would be a good access trail. We think the whole project needs a theme, an idea.

What's it about? What are we doing? What are the goals here? Not just to build stuff, but what are the goals? Friends of the Marsh has been involved with this project now for several years. We have a goal. We are an environmental organization, and we are interested in a natural landscape in this area. You talk about a tree canopy. There there is a flood plain forest here, and it needs to be supported with new trees so that that forest will be perpetual as much as we can make it over time. There are other locations on this 20 acre site.

If you stand on the Ashford Trail, for example, you can look to the west, and you will see that floodplain forest. Let me emphasize floodplain. It floodplain floods practically every year. The only question is how badly and how long will it stay. But you see that floodplain forest, and it is the most accessible one we have in the city.

There's a much better one in the marsh, but there's no way other than to stand on a trail and look at it. So you see the flood plain forest. And then if if you walk towards the east, that is if you're on the Asforth Trail, walk towards where you are, you have a section of what we'll call Savannah. And this is mixed trees and grass area. And you keep going east, and you find prairie, sandy soils, very light soils, and fit for prairie grass and forbs, meaning flowers in that area.

Continue to the east on the other side of the Asphora Trail, and you have a perched wetland, which is is a wet wet wet area. A perched wetland. This will be the only one in the city. It is a remnant of the many wetlands in our city. A perched wetland is a wetland that has no artificial water sources.

That wetland fills up because of rain and because of flooding. So when it floods, the difference between that wetland and the river is nothing. There is no solid ground. It is one water body. When those floods go down, some of that water drains back out. Once the water is left in that wetland then, once the water from flooding has drained out, it will also lower in in in-depth through evaporation. But that is it. There are no storm sewers that enter in here. There's no springs that fill this wetland. It's a perched wetland.

That is it is entirely natural. And for a city, it's practically impossible. I don't know of another one, frankly. So it is unique, which means that it moves with seasons. So if we have a dry fall, as we often do, the water is less, the muddy edges are wider.

It's natural. That's the way it works. So standing on the Asfloor Trail just a little ways over the the footbridge from Riverside Park, you can see four natural landscapes standing in one spot. Remarkable diversity. Those landscapes exist in a 1,200 acre marsh in the rest of our marsh, but not standing in one place watching or looking at it.

So this is something to celebrate. So our focus, we we do have a theme. It's a natural area. We did participate with Parks Department in bringing Neil DeBoe, founder and president of Prairie Nursery, to town a couple years ago to do a vegetation and soil survey of the area and develop a vegetation plan for how to maintain this wet this this flood plain forest, how to wet how to maintain plant and maintain the grasslands, how to maintain the riparian edges of this wetland. And we shared the cost with parks for that process, something we've been involved in.

So that's one of the inputs into this plan. And that's where it came from. It was we we arranged for the survey and the and the plan and we helped pay for it. So it's not we come to this with short discussion, but not with short consideration. I'll leave it at that for now and take any questions you may have.

Any questions for Mr. Lee? Any comments back from staff? I'm guessing none of this is new to you.

No. And as Mr. Lee mentioned, the DIBEL study does have an impact, and we'll be going back to Friends of the Marsh as we continue to develop in this space in the entire area.

So the Parks Department does have an MOU with Friends of the Marsh. Just one or more than one?

We we have one, which will be coming, I believe, next month, I think, is the plan. Right?

Okay.

We've had that now for several years, and it's been one of the best things we've done over time because it establishes a relationship on a regular basis rather than inventing it every time something comes around.

Thank you. Commissioner oh, I'm sorry. Commissioner Olson?

Thank you. Dan, that MOU with Friends of the Marsh, it's always been for the original Marsh. Has it also been for this area? And if not, is it going to include this area?

I'll pass that to Sammy. She's been the staff representative working on MOU.

The MOU doesn't outline a specific space per se, more the relationship that the city has with the organization Friends of the Marsh. And so when we hear Friends of the Marsh, it kind of expands to all Marsh areas within the city of La Crosse. So though we don't have a map outlining where we currently have all of our partnerships, we do have a map of The Marsh, and included in that is this space as well.

Okay. Thank you. I'm glad to hear that it is not limited.

Commissioner Kirsch?

Thanks again. So what is the use of the space right now? I mean, does it already get a lot of use? And what is the anticipated use when the developments are finished because, I mean, it's a small space. And if we do consider putting it in a more natural state and it it gets a lot of traffic, and it's also if you did go more natural, which, of course, I like, it would also have to be very educational because these are gonna be people who don't know about natural processes. Why is the

why is that marshall dried up?

Why don't you you know, that kind of stuff. So, you know, how how is it being used now, and what's the anticipated traffic looking like?

To clarify with your question, are you asking for the entire space on this design or just the the marsh area?

The entire space. The floodplain forest all along and the marsh area.

So this extends north up to I forget the name of that the street, but passive ground development. Yes. Okay. Well, the current use is limited at this point. There's a few road trails in the trail that we do have coming from Riverside Riverside kind of bends right at the beginning of this space. So that's kind of where then walkers, runners, whatever maybe, are now directed further east at this point. So there's a whole lot going on there, which is prime for development space. Future use is, I would say, what you have in front of you. I mean, this is our starting point, and we're gonna continue to develop it with the input of many others with special consideration to things that Chuck had mentioned, which you have mentioned and future people mentioned as well. I don't know if that answers your question, but

Well, maybe there isn't an answer until we see how much use there is. Is it gonna be so attractive that it's I mean, it's not gonna be a place where we have concerts. That's Riverside. Is, you know, is that one thing, or is it just gonna be, you know, people kinda using it as their recreational backyard because they happen to live close by?

I I believe the possibilities are pretty wide open at this point. As council member Weston said, this may draw attention from, public members that wanna get involved, that wanna donate to see something, you know, specific, and then we'd bring it in front of this board and and get your thoughts on whether it's a good idea to move forward or not. But I think I'd hate to limit at this point because there's so much area and so much opportunity here. But I think we're in a good space to begin.

Okay. Last comment, council member Weston.

I was going to move to approve the concept of the River Point District. Although Mr. Olsen already.

Okay. Motion to approve by council member Weston. You want me to do what's there? Okay. Motion to approve motion to approve by council member Weston, second by, commissioner Kirsch.

Any more discussion? Alright. Then let's please vote. And that passes unanimously. Our last item is twenty twenty six dash zero two six eight. Update on the 2025 waterways season, mister Thurk.

Good evening, commissioners. Thanks for having me. My name is Gary Thurk. My company is under contract with the Park and Rec Department to manage what I call the Park Department's outdoor water recreational facilities, but it includes three mooring facilities, the transient dock on the South Side of Riverside Park in front of the waterfront, five boat landings, 78 boathouses, and a few leases that tie through the Harbor Commission. I believe the attachment had, all the revenue and the expenses for 2025.

I won't go through all of them. The expenses listed had a few items that constitute those totals. At the end of the day, in 2025, we had, some net profit of over $130,000. 2026 will be my tenth season that I've managed the facilities. Couple things I wanna leave with you.

Over the last nine years, not 10¢ has come out of park department operating funds and or out of city taxpayer, the the coffers. These facilities are totally self sustaining. I think that's something that, this board and the park department should be extremely proud of. I think they also should be extremely proud of the facilities that that we have. I think they're the finest in the mid in Western Wisconsin.

We must be doing something right. We have over a 100 boats on our waiting list going into 2026. We have 14 fishing tournaments scheduled at our landings, something should be very proud of. I I certainly am. And last but not least, thank you for for your support over the last nine years. I hope you support me in the next nine if I'm healthy enough and the park department still wants me to con continue on.

Any questions? Commissioner Olson.

Thank you. Gary, are there any, big projects or big plans for 2026?

Oops. Sorry. I won't tell you no, there's not, I won't tell you yes, there is. But you'll be you guys will be the first to know.

Fair enough.

Commissioner Young. Thank you, chair. Gary, how does $130,000 compare to 2423 roughly? Is that a is this a normal successful year, better than average?

I think this would be considered average.

That was my question. Any other any questions? Anything else you wanna say? Alright. Yeah. Thank you. Okay. Are we doing anything with this? We're just accepting it? We're just accepting it as an update. Okay. Alright. That brings us to the end of our agenda, so I will call this meeting adjourned. Thank you to those of you who serve on this in a volunteer capacity. Thank you to the members of the public who have come out and engage