Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee - Regular Meeting

I'd like to call the meeting of the Parks and Rec Committee for the month of May to order. For all of you that are here, this is almost like having a council meeting. I love it. Welcome. Mister Dome? Yes. Welcome to to Parks and Rec.

Thank you very much.

You'll just love it. Claire, can you give us the the attendance, please?

Member Hanaki?

Here.

Member Baltus? Member Lynch?

Here.

Vice Chair Spindler?

Here.

Member Aegis?

Here. Member Kramer?

Here. Chair Siegel?

Here. May we stand for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America

and to the republic for which it

stands, one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

May

I have let's talk about the approval of the agenda for today. Are there any dissents? Nothing. Can I have someone A motion over? Yes.

Second.

Thank you. And how about the minutes for last week, last month? Did we have any corrections?

No, I didn't. I'll make a motion to approve.

And a second. And those in favor?

Aye.

Aye. Okay.

We are moving right along today. And we are beginning with, as our committee knows, on June 15, we will be making our presentation to the counsel. We don't want to tell them everything we are going to say because that would take some of the fun out of it. So you must come to the meeting next month, everybody. I promise you, it's stellar.

Yes. You'll love it. We'll try and make it a little. Yesterday was exciting, but next month, look out. We are going to bring before the council things that we think should be done for the that the Parks and Rec Committee thinks should be done for us.

How do I say this? Parks and Rec goes out and has their hand open to the town of Marco Island. This is one of the few places in the world where there is a written on our TV station, we are asking for donations for the Canine Cove. We're asking for donations for the dog park. We don't have we just Parks and Rec doesn't have a lot of extra funds.

And we're going to ask the council to help Parks and Rec and open I know things are tough on Marco Island. And I know that we now have our budget and we have 5% less, I believe, than we did before. But we're going to ask for we have decided that we will be asking for two I'm going to call it items. Two things that we think will improve, help, make Marco what we think it should be. And one of the things that we're talking about is the playgrounds at Mackle Park.

I don't know if you have spent any time there, but we have. And you can hardly believe what a what the playground looks like. When you get to Mackle Park, from a distance, you smile and you say, this is really special. We got something here. We're proud of it.

And you bring your children or your grandchildren, and you get up close and you say, oh my god. Now, honey, be careful. Because where we've put in the screws well, let's let me show you. I wanna share with you what I saw there. Martin, can we begin and share some of the pictures that I have taken?

This is these are the planks that you walk on. And I'm afraid I haven't done justice to them. Because when you walk, they're bowing down. So you kind of have to list to the left or list to the right. Because if you walk in the center, you kind of tilt anyway.

All of our this playground was built twenty years ago, and we have done practically nothing to give it any kind of upkeep. Mark Martin, next, please. Ah, now, I'm not asking you to go down this slide. I just want you to look at it. It is not just shaded.

This is the paint just peeling off. And if you touch it with your hand, you go, wow, look, I'm wearing the slide. So it's something else that needs improvement. Next slide, Martin. And here is you can't I didn't do it justice. God forbid you fall down if you're three or four or seven. You look at these nails. Each one of them is rusty. There are just almost none that you could touch. And if you fall on a rusty nail, that's not real great.

We all know that. It's one more thing. Yeah. And they're sticking out, and there's little crevices. Yes. It's special. Martin, let's go. How about another one? Ah. Now this is our climbing wall. If your knee touches the space in the middle, you go home wearing the climbing wall. It just it we need help, and it needs help. Okay. How about the next one? I just couldn't let go of the floors.

You're walking, and it's just this is actual mold. I don't know when. I don't know how it got moldy or when it happened, but it's everywhere. Martin, the next one. It just well, you probably understand birds are good here, but we understand birds. But again, it is just not pristine. It needs to be renovated. How about the next one? A few more of my nails. These are these are a hazard for children.

This is not something that you can go in and just hammer them in, and it'll be okay. Don't worry about it. This is not something that, don't worry about it, it'll be okay. I think we've kind of reached the end. How about the next slide? And this is the sliding board. Come on and put your little body down on this thing. Again, it needs help. There's nowhere you can go that doesn't need help in in our playgrounds. Martin, how about the next one?

Here it is again. The this is a bench. How'd you like to sit down on this little puppy? It is just grandma's there, and she's dusting it. I'm there, and I'm watching the ladies cleaning it off. But there is no cleaning it off. There's not a lot of help. Are there any more, Martin? This is our swing set. Now this little thing that's hanging down, that's made to hold your child in on the swing.

But I'll be darned. You can't hold your child, and you have to hold them in yourself because this is hanging down, and it's not connected any longer. So this is one more thing that needs help. And that's my slideshow for this. We need help at Meckle Park.

We have a playground that is for the little toddlers. I'll say six, eight, 10, and those of us who have children that are so special, they're probably walking by the time they're 10 or 11 old. We've got a playground for the toddlers, and that needs help. Our water park, it's spraying and sometimes it sprays and sometimes it's not perfect. But if you're hot, we're not asking you for any money.

You don't have to help us with the spray park. But then you walk into the you look at our our playground. This is it for our town. We have one major I don't need I don't need light. It doesn't matter. We have one playground. And you know what? We've got a great town, And we need help for that playground.

Could I just add a couple of things to that, if you don't mind? A couple of things are, first of all, our facilities team works really hard in keeping the playground up. The playground was, I think, put up in 2004. It's actually been twenty two years since we did it. We cannot just simply replace things.

We have to go through the company that we originally got the parts from. So it's really difficult for them to just simply replace parts as they come. A lot of things that didn't show up, and thank you Dolores, it's really hard, I tried myself getting pictures to really show. But a lot of the flooring pieces will just completely go through. And then Facilities has to try to find something and patch it up.

So we have a lot of patchwork that is happening there. Also, the things that you can't see is we have a real issue with drainage at the playground. So today is like today, most likely we're going to end up having to close down the playground for a bit because it's a complete mess there and it takes a while for the water to drain. And then in order to keep mulch there. So a lot of times our mulch is much lower than what we need it to be.

But as soon as they put mulch in, we've got maybe a couple of weeks to where we want it to be and then half that mulch is gone. And mainly that is due to the drainage issues and stuff that we have. So there's a lot to the playground that it's not Parks and Recreation and Facilities not maintaining it and taking care of it. It's old, And we're doing the best that we possibly can with what we have. Now

If I could add something, Dolores, I'll

cut you off. But coming from, I guess, a younger parent perspective, Marco Island provides a very unique community to raise kids. And it gives us an opportunity to raise kids similar to the way we grew up, where we lived in a small town where we had a park that our parents allowed us to run to, ride our bikes all day long, and play at these parks without them worrying that something was gonna go wrong. And Marco Island provides that for us and our younger families, and we wanna make sure that those facilities are safe for our kids so that we can continue to raise them in a similar experience that we were raised.

DAVID Darren?

DAVID Yeah, Delores, I think it's also, as we present to counsel, I think it's very important that we remind them that there's a few members that have consistently said, well, the demographic here is not we've got 2% of the kids. Well, that's not true. We've got a lot of grandparents who have their grandkids who come here and want them to have a great place to play. And you can go over there and you can see families that come here throughout the entire season. In fact, my banker from Wisconsin, he's got a home about a half mile from Mackle.

His family walks over with a cart and they go over to the park on a very frequent basis to play in our parks. And they're one of thousands of families like that. And I think it's very important that we remind everyone that this isn't about just the kids who live here, but the parents and grandparents who have their family come here and visit too and want to go to a great park. And right now, we don't have a great park. It's in desperate need of some assistance.

And I think the playground is one piece of that puzzle, right? The fields, which we're going to talk about next, is another piece of that puzzle. And then we still have lots of shade issues, whether that's trees or structures or things in the dog park. So Mackle Park as a whole has a lot of elements that need to be addressed. But starting with this playground and that section as the starting point, I think is essential. And I think then when we talk about the fields, because I imagine if we go over there right now, it's a swimming pool right now. Underwater.

Yeah. So what we and you do have I don't know that we'll have pictures of it on the fifteenth. But the Parks and Rec staff has got has found replacement playgrounds that can be that we have done the lay they have done the legwork, and we are ready if the word count if we would have funding to do something with this playground. It is as Samantha said, we are to the point that it just can't be we can't keep trying to fix it. It's beyond repair.

And we are asking for funds to to repair this. I No.

Replace

it. Replace it. Excuse me. We are ask no repair. We're we're to replace these days. And I am not sure we had talked about funding. I don't want you to, you know, clutch your seat or anything. But in the neighborhood of $2,000,000 that's about what it would cost to do this. We are no we we're no longer doing the $29 playground that we did when our children were little. Those days are over.

This is something that we want to last for another twenty to twenty five years. And we do have things to present to show the counsel if they say yes to us. We are ready to go. We have a second thing that we're most interested in, and that is our fields at Mackle Park. We have soccer fields that are they used to be pristine.

They are now it's over for the soccer fields. And today would be a prime day for you to come and see what our soccer fields look like. Bring your galoshes because that's what you need. And I am not going to talk at this meeting. You're very lucky that we have a little honey at the end, Matt.

And Matt knows more about our soccer fields than probably anybody else in town. Not only is he a member of the Parks and Rec Committee, he's coach Matt at the Charter Middle School. So it's like we're with someone who they want his autograph. He is that special. The rest of us, nobody knows. Coach Matt, they know. And I think that Coach Matt is the person to tell you about our fields and what needs to be done and how it should be done. You want to tell us? You want to talk about it, Matt?

Sure. I'll come up there. There's a couple of pictures. I don't have it on a So I'm gonna try and share a couple of pictures. I apologize. I shouldn't I'll have this on a slideshow for June 15. But just a couple of pictures from just last week after OCMI had finished up their flag football. The soccer field basically looks the same all year round, but I'll share some pictures. Hopefully, they are somewhat clear.

Might have went off with the power outage.

Martin is still here?

I believe so. Can we get the overhead turned on?

I thought he walked out.

That's not good.

Okay. Alright. So I'll have pictures for June 15. I guess I can go back to my seat and

All right.

So the pictures that I'll share, I mean, it's very self explanatory. We've got potholes throughout the middle of the field that are basically just temporary filled with soil that washes away with any good rain or any decent play. We've got patches of weeds that have now become a part of the field and basically act like road, road bumps or, speed bumps when you're playing soccer or even just running on the field. Then there's the divots, that are that are filled with sand, basically. That those are my biggest concerns, especially for the athletes.

I firsthand saw, one of our athletes in a five v five tournament a few years back. She was a middle schooler. Now she's a high school standout soccer player, Tore her ACL, at 10, 11, 12 years old, playing on our field. The field was wet, and she went to plant. Legs slid out, and she tore her ACL.

She's now recovered and obviously playing, at a high level now. But it was because of the conditions of our fields, and I was standing right there when it happened. But besides the divots, the unevenness of the field, right, we're not able to line the field properly. We get close. But from a standpoint of what a soccer field should be, dimensions wise, we have a lift and rise in the field that basically creates two separate fields.

So you have to stop where that rise comes up. The drainage is an issue. It's been an issue for a while now, especially with this season. And it just never seems to dry out, especially in the winter seasons it's not raining. But the safety concerns are the biggest thing, and I think they need to be addressed. And I just don't understand how we've got field spaces around the county, and even outside the county. I was just at a soccer tournament in Fort Myers this past weekend, and I took my shoes off. That's how nice the grass was. I wanted to feel it on my bare feet. It was a carpet. And this field was four times the size of Mackle Park, and it was as green and plush as you can imagine. That's the middle I'm sorry?

Is that Collier County?

No. This was Kelly Road Soccer Complex in Fort Myers. And it is in the middle of a development community that does not compare to Marco Island, by any standard, standard whatsoever. Whatsoever. And that the field was a thousand times better than what we provide. And we're talking about one small football sized field, whereas they had acres. How many kids do you

think play soccer, ballpark? OCMI,

they provide to 200 families, for flag football, soccer. Those are their two main sports on that field. For me, I provide we practice cross country. We practice track and field. Unfortunately, we don't have a track on the island. But that's where I have to practice track and field. And then we practice soccer there. We practice flag football on our field at our school, just to make it easier on the kids. But we had to reschedule our championship games for both the boys and girls earned the one seed to represent Marquan in the championship game for middle school soccer. And we had to go play it at North Collier Field because the fields were unplayable.

You cannot play a quality game of soccer on that field. Not to mention our goals are too small. They're 9v9 goals, not 11v11 goals.

So this issue was brought to my attention last year by Matt. So I had the opportunity to go over there last year. I think this was November when you and I chatted about it originally. And I went over there. And that was not during the rain. Might even been December, not the rainy season. And like it was still pretty darn wet over there. And I can't imagine what it must be like today. Certainly, know that the facilities team tries to do their best with what's there. But you know, it's not designed to be what it's being used for really today.

And I think, again, we've got a lot of kids who use it, families who live on the island. But you go over there, I went over there during spring break. And I mean, early in the day, there are a lot of families out there. There's kids out there playing with their grandma and grandpa playing baseball. There were kids out there playing soccer. There were people working out. And there was a whole variety of age groups using it. And it's a beautiful thing to see. And imagine if we get this to the point where we actually have real grass, real grading, drainage, in that we don't have potholes and sinkholes and muck holes throughout it. It can be used more frequently.

And so I think we've got we know what needs to be done. Now we have to find the funding to make this happen. Because certainly that park does not represent what we should have here on the island. And I mean, it's a low barrier where it's at currently to improve it. But I think you get that raised up, you get the right type of grass on it, you get the right drainage on it. And it'll be beautiful, and it'll be great, and it'll be used even more than it is today. And certainly, it would be nice if we could get it to the point where we could get a track around it, but it just there's not enough real estate around it anywhere. We've looked at it in a variety of ways, and it just doesn't we need a couple more feet.

And I gotta tell you, our park is probably one of the better layouts for a cross country meet in the in the county. I run a lot of cross country meets at Manatee Middle School because they have the space. But when MIA runs their yearly meet there, and I've run a couple of middle school meets there for cross country, it is one of the best parks to run a cross country meet just because of the scenery. Right? We don't have a whole lot of elevation change and stuff like that.

But the scenery alone, people enjoy coming to our park to race. And these are schools all over the county and outside of the county that will come and participate in these. And I don't want to forget it, but is it Bill, the facilities? Bill does a phenomenal job and shows that he truly cares about the kids when it comes to lining the fields and preparing the field for us and OCMI. Top notch. I don't want to forget giving him some props there. But he's top notch.

Brian, did you go?

I just wanted to mention, the reason we picked these two items was mostly because of the safety issues that they cause, not because of what it looks like and stuff. That's just added bonus to it. But I just want to make sure this is the reason why we picked these two, because they are valid safety issues there.

And when we talk about parks, we're going to add the Mackle Park, we would like some funding for Winterberry Park. Now, these aren't the little guys. These are the senior softball guys. There's two fifty of them. And they're out there, and they love it, and they are this is their life.

And the senior softball, they do they donate to keep Winterberry Park up. And they go out and they water the plants and they plant flowers. And Home Depot came, and thanks to Samantha, they did some work at Winterberry Park. But that too can be used in the field funding. So not only are we talking about school age boys, we're talking about, I guess, they the boys of whatever, summer, winter.

These are the men who were there, and they love it. And I think that's one more thing that makes Marco Island special when it comes to sports and what we're offering. And I would like to think that besides maintenance, which is major for everything that has to be done at Veterans Park and Mackle Park, these are things that need funds now. And it is it goes to show you that Parks and Rec is more than pickleball. We've got a lot of things going.

This is the tip of the iceberg. But I think at the June 15 meeting, we would like to present these two items to get funding. And for the council to, when they do their budget, we would like these items to be in the budget. Fred?

If I could, though, probably going back for at least fifteen years, I coached soccer on the island. And with that, the level playing field is so all important. And yeah, right now, play senior softball as well, okay? But when you see the people that are injured and some seriously because the ground is not level, if you ever put your foot down to try to turn and there's a well, I experienced something where I tore an ACL playing soccer up in Amokli. And I was trying to turn, and the ground dipped about two or three inches below.

And you can hear my knee step midfield. But getting back, though, it's so important for the safety factor. And that, in my view, has got to be primary, okay? Improving the fuels is one thing, but it can't be that difficult, and it's really necessary to make it safe for the kids and for the adults as well.

So did you have anything, Samantha, that you wanted to add to this?

I think you're all doing a great job.

But I don't know if you want to open it up for if anybody has any Yes.

I wasn't sure. Claire, did anybody have Anne, you didn't have to John, did you want jump right in?

Just wanted to add, all this looks great, great ideas and everything. Let's just make sure that we include some maintenance budgeting for our facilities to be able to manage these and keep them nice once we replace them. Okay. You know, both the fields and the playgrounds. We want to make sure that they're able to maintain them.

Okay. And would our audience, did anybody wish You didn't even have to sign up. You could just come forward if you've got something you'd like to add. Nothing. We've stymied them all. What can I say?

We would From staff, is there anything else on your side that should be included in what we're going to bring forth here?

One of the things I think you want to reference is the master plan we did three years ago. The number one thing that the citizens wanted of Marco Island. And it was pretty much 20 different surveys. One of them is scientific. And the city of Markaline residents were willing to fund parks and recreation as long as they were willing to maintain what we have. That was the number one priority. And what happens, as I've seen this before, is when you don't maintain what you have, then you quit providing the service. Because it becomes a safety issue. So you make a choice. You maintain what you have, or you just don't provide that service anymore. Those the two choices.

Yeah. And just on the safety issue, as we move forward here, Dolores, when you guys present, you know, I mean, Naples just face the same thing. Right? Their their their main park had to be shut down. And I believe they're in the midst of replacing their entire playground, and it was shut down mid season this year because of safety issues. And same issue, you know, twenty plus years old, hadn't been touched, and now it's it was in tough shape. So and I think when you guys put your presentation together, I think what Dan just said is is important to to reference that master plan. Because there definitely was surveys done both in person. There was, I think, emails done. There was mail surveys done in a variety of places on the island.

So I think as we present that on the fifteenth to use that as a point of talk to start and then, you know, the playground issue, what we want there and then the fields and what we need there. And then shoot, aim for the moon.

Girls and boys, brave.

We did get one registered speaker for this one. Oh,

won't you? Please come forward. Tell us your name.

JANE Hi. My name is Jane Hansen, and I'm a resident on Marco Island. First of all, I'd like to always encourage you that you constantly go back to your master plan. You spent $90,000 of taxpayer money to develop a long term plan about what the priorities were or are for recreation on Marco Island. I did participate in that and I thought it was a really excellent process.

And so you can always go back to that and say, this is what we need to spend our money on. These are our priorities. And then as we have additional funds, what can we then start to tackle on the list? And as I do recall, the maintenance was really, really high on your list. Supporting and continued maintenance on your existing facilities.

And I think you did make progress with the aeronautics and that was one. But I wholeheartedly agree with the park. And speaking, I am that grandma that is at the park. And I am the grandma that, at the time, would have my granddaughter come and visit. And, unfortunately, I would have to call up and say, is the splash pad working? Oh, okay. Is the splash pad working? Okay. So I'm glad to hear that that has been resolved. But now and I am fortunate that my daughter and family are in the area.

And she attends my granddaughter's at Tommy Barfield now. But I was really saddened when I heard that some of the parents aren't bringing their children to Mackle Park because of the condition of the playground. And this may gross you out, but I'm going to say it. I said, so well, exactly what it is besides it looks dated and it looks like it could be splintery and it's flooded and you're not sure you're going to be able to get your child out of that booster swing. It was actually rodents and things that they really felt were unsafe.

And so that's the word on the street with some of the parents in this community. And that is really sad. On a positive note, and I probably should have started with that, is whenever you look at Facebook and people are saying, what to do? I have grandchildren coming in town. Or I am visiting. I am telling you, Mackle Park is way, way up there with responses. Take them to Mackle Park. There's so much. It's great. And so eventually, as I believe what you were alluding to, eventually that's going to catch up with you.

Because if you're not maintaining it, then you're going to start to see that, well, no, don't take them to Mackle Park. So I wholeheartedly support the upgrades to our Parks and Recreation plan, especially for the children. Thank you.

I'm sorry, if I could.

Yes, go ahead.

I apologize to the speaker. Sorry? Ms. Hansen, I'm sorry. Jane.

Jane. Mhmm.

I'd like to invite you to make another comment at the June 15 meeting if you can attend.

Yes. We didn't even pay her. This was Oh, please. We'd love for you to come on the fifteenth and be a guest speaker. Yes. Do sign up. Because you are truly you're the person that we're talking about.

Right. I am that grammar. Yeah. Thank you.

Thank you.

Maya? So I just have a question. So when the Cove was put in and the playing field was done back years ago, I'm just wondering what happened to the maintenance plan on those. When did it stop being maintenance to the point where it is now because you couldn't maintenance it? I'm just what's going you said in the master plan a lot of people were worried about how are we going to keep it maintenance. What's the plan to make sure if we do get this money and people do donate for these master plan items, what's going to keep the city maintaining those items so the residents don't have to question that anymore or see it? Just wondering.

Not all of us are looking at

each other.

No problem. It comes down

to budget. Work the best that all departments in the city do the best that we can with the budget that we are given. But when we're asked to reduce our budget, it makes things really tough. So tough decisions. So that's if it's in the budget, we're going to do the very best we can. And honestly, the Facilities Department does above and beyond with the budget that they have.

And just if I can add, because I wasn't part of the quote that Joe had put together. There's a couple of things you do. One is you look at your maintenance team. Who's gonna maintain it? I did playgrounds in Chicago and Detroit. A lot of times, we didn't have the maintenance team. So what you had to do is you had to spend on more of the elite structures that a tank could actually drive into it, wouldn't touch. Okay. You can't do wood anymore. Right.

I I'll be honest with you. I haven't seen a wood structure until I got here. Most of them are made of especially stainless steel, aluminum, metal coated painted rust, especially in the weather that's down here. And then what what we what you'd end up doing is you're gonna look at the size of the structure. Maybe based on the size of the structure, we don't have a maintenance crew that can maintain that size. So we scale back what we have right now. There's a lot of things you can do, but a lot of those things you're gonna do is like, that's where was talking about the master plan. You you decide ahead of time what you're willing to do. You don't go and spend the money now

Right.

And say, oh, wow. What am I gonna do now? No. You gotta think of those things ahead of time. And the leadership has to make those decisions ahead of time on what they plan on doing. And again, that's what I was talking about. Either you're willing to maintain these facilities, these programs, or you just get rid of them. You have to be able to fund and maintain those.

And I take it it's a year by year basis when the budget's redone? Absolutely. So I I get that. But if you put $2,000,000 into a park, all of a sudden you take away the budget for it, how you going to keep it up? So that's my concern and worry that we have to keep it going versus letting it go.

For

instance, right now we have mulch as the falling. Most people are going to port in place and some of those rubberized carpetings or things of that nature that will last longer. You don't have to spend a lot of maintenance. But there's a there's a lot of upfront cost ahead of time. So those are the determinations we have to make when we decide what we're gonna spec. And it's gonna be based on what we're hearing from from you and and the support with city council.

Well, and and, you know, I think we have to look at this as a twenty five year investment or twenty year investment. And like what Dan just talked about, one of the questions I was gonna ask is about, you know, what can you put on the ground? So a rubber mat or a rubber flooring versus bark that blows away and, you know, washes away, you know, is that applicable here? And, you know, those things then lead to less maintenance time for Joe and his staff or whoever goes out and has to put bark down. So I just think that as we do this, I think this is a crown jewel of our island.

This is a gathering place for many families, young and old. And people walk the park, people play the park, people play in the playground. And we need to make this the best we can because this is a once every twenty or twenty five year replacement item. And we can't go and do this half. We've to do this the right way.

So I think that as we go to counsel with early estimates, we then work on drawings and we work on what needs to be done. But I think we can't be afraid here to go after what needs to be done and done the right way. And actually, I listened to enough council meetings that even the folks who are a little more conservative in nature have heard over and over again that the kids should have a great place to play in. You know, there's a soft place in people's hearts for for these kids. And but I I I think Mackle Park is just such a key part of our island that we need to do this right the first time. This is once in a twenty year opportunity. So here we are to do it right. So

One quick question.

Yes.

Are there restrictions to, like, the personnel that we can use for maintenance? Like, I'm just thinking we get so many people to help with beach cleanups and things like that, whether it's the Kiwanis Club, the Key Club, Rotary, all these clubs. Is it something where the community, once or twice a month, we have a get together? And I'm not saying running mowers or something like that. But if the playground needs to be power washed or we need bags of mulch laid out or something like that, is that something where we can source the material through the city and then have those groups show up to do those types of things?

Because it doesn't seem like we have an issue with 100 people showing up for beach cleanup once a month when we're doing it, or once every two months. Maybe we can look to the community as well for maintenance help.

Well, don't Samantha's better at the volunteers on Marco Island than I am.

Okay.

So

I was just gonna say, we used to have groups like the Qantas, the Rotarians, the JCs. And what would happen is they would do a lot of work in the parks, especially in the Chicago We would let them know, and they're always looking for a project of some kind. And they were willing to help. And they're and like I said, is that's how we did a lot of the stuff in the Chicago area. Okay. We worked with those those groups. Here, I'm I'm not sure exactly how the volunteers work here, but I know Samantha uses a lot of them for some of her programs as they are. But as far as maintenance, that may be something a little bit different. Used to be you could do that. The liability involved with that is probably a lot different than it was thirty years ago.

Okay. So I think we're probably we look forward to seeing you on the June 15. And now is Tim waiting to we have a presentation about pickleball from Tim Annette. And I think it's gonna be a happy time. So

Can you guys hear me?

We can hear you. We can't see you, but we can hear Oh, there you are. Okay.

Welcome to the frozen tundra up here. It's only 55 today. Just insane. In Des Moines, Iowa. So, yeah, Martin, are you there?

He's I think he's here.

Okay. Or Samantha, what I'd like to do is just make a motion and run through the Dale and York noise study that was completed about six weeks ago and just run the committee through what was determined and what was found. Think just some really good news and I just wanted to share it with the committee today. And then I think, Zach, you have a few things you want to hit on. So we'll just go through that if it works for the committee.

Yes. Let's

Perfect. So if we go to page 16, and I can't see where yeah, I think it's behind you or in front of you. So this is page

This is this is We've got 17 on our screen. Here's 16.

Doctor. There we go.

Okay. We're ready.

Doctor. Okay. So what this is, Doctor. The more red, the darker the red, the louder the noise is. So, you know we've heard from the Cadwells and John Ages and many people in the neighborhood and this is the current configuration the way it exists today.

So you can see why the neighbors are not happy, right? A lot of red really throughout the whole neighborhood and a couple things had shifted for me as I went through just learning the noise study with PSM with Dale and York and that is that trees and shrubs don't do anything to curtail noise. And the other thing is is those our courts run north and south and the people who live at the South End regardless of the distance, they they really bore the brunt of the noise more than anybody. So the overhead slams in pickleball when they're going south. So the bottom line is I just wanted to demonstrate how red everything is.

If we go to the next page. So and we talked about this at City Council as well as Parks and Rec last time. So what we're talking about and this has been approved by the city, but it is taking the current fence that we have and putting the e noise control around the perimeter of the 10 foot fence. And that is already on deck. I believe Joe Pirelli has ordered that or getting ready to.

That e noise will come in and that's what we all saw in the video which had the before and after the noise. And then Joe and his team will get that e noise installed on the current 10 foot fence and that's designated in blue. And kind of what we had talked about at City Council as well as Parks and Rec is it will make a little bit of a benefit for the neighborhood and the community but you can still see that a tremendous amount of red is still going down. To some degree it almost helps the Cadwell Corner, I call it the Cadwell Corner and Aegis Alley. But on the on the West Side where John lives you can still see a lot of red.

So the perception is we're gonna get the e noise up and we're gonna put it on the current fence and it's going to take care of everything. And really tonight today is just to demonstrate it helps, but it doesn't take care of a lot. Does that make sense to the committee?

Yes. Yes.

Okay. So then we drop down to the next one and this was part of the breakthrough that Dale and York came up with. So installing the e noise, so this is putting the e noise discussed at the previous slide and putting around the current 10 foot fence. And what they realized is if we were to put a 10 foot fence in that yellow parallel line between the four courts and the four courts on the south, you can see what a tremendous benefit that has for literally everybody in the current configuration. So saying the same thing, putting the e noise up around the perimeter doesn't do a whole lot, but adding a 10 foot fence and putting e noise on that fence between each section of four courts, and you can just see all the green that starts to materialize when that happens.

So I had visited with a couple of people on city council. I also had a chance to visit with Joe Pirelli. And the last I knew, he was going to try to get a quote worked up on what it would take to on the cost to add that 10 foot fence along with e noise on that on that panel between the four courts. And the thought was maybe to try to get that in front of city council because if the if the city council is willing to spend, I cannot remember the exact numbers, but 88,000 and that extra fence in there were to cost another $20,000, until we move forward with the 16 courts and raising all the money and gathering that gift up, it would be a great way to really give the neighbors the benefit of that one more fence and looking at the increase or the decrease in noise reduction. Does that make sense to everybody?

Yep. Yes.

Okay. And then the last piece is the one that we get the most excited about And this is having 16 courts. This is having a 10 foot fence between each section of four pickleball courts. And you can literally see here how this really becomes life changing. What we would also do is the current 10 foot fence that runs along the whole perimeter, we would increase that up to 12.

The 10 foot would work for the Cadwells and for a majority of the neighbors on the East, But over where John lives to the West, there was still a little bit of red that was soaking through. So I had them run it, you know, just a 12 foot fence along the entire perimeter, putting the 10 foot fences between each section of four. The e noise goes up and the reality is the quality of life for everybody there. It's just it's an amazing output of what months of work have been put forth to try to get to to this this proposal. So, you know, I can't remember whose idea it was to carve it back from 24.

We're looking at the l configuration with 20. But cutting it back to 16 feet, getting a 12 foot fence, putting the 10 foot fences between each section of four pickleball courts along with e noise, and the neighborhood just it just turns it completely over into a I don't want to use the word paradise, but compared to what they're going through now it's day and night difference. So just wanted to get that in front of everybody. I've been working and thank you Dolores once again for Matteo and Carlos with the Ritzman courts and they put all kinds of quotes together that I can certainly share with the committee. But one of the one of the most important things that for for Parks and Rec and if we could pull that back up, Martin, if you don't mind just one of the one of the charts.

You know, so there's been some ideas where, you know, part of the gift that we have been talking about is to take the two tennis courts that are on the West Side, on the John Ages side, and refurb those, put in new clay courts, new systems for watering, the whole enchilada. And then the other concept is with only 16 total courts, there's enough room to the south to where we could bring in we could refurb the two tennis courts that are back there. So part of the discussion today that I I just wanted to have, and once again, for your time today, is would would the committee want us to try to move forward and just keep two tennis courts in on the West Side or would we wanna put, you know, make it four total tennis courts or we could even just go green space behind the 16 pickleball courts and leave that for more of a park area if we wanted. So that was one of the one of the key discussion points I just wanted to get in front of everybody today. I'm agnostic.

It's just a matter of what makes the most sense.

Well, this this puts a smile on our face when we see when we see green. Green's our color, and it looks like maybe we found an answer. And we have Zach standing up. Did you wanna make a presentation or what have you got to tell I

just kinda wanted to frame what the ask was. Zach Lombardo here on behalf of mister Annette. We this went in part to council where we got some feedback, and the majority of the feedback was come back to Parks and Rec and help identify some development parameters. What is it specifically that we would be doing? And so we have done that, and I have on the overhead projector here kind of what I see as the general proposal for the gift that counsel is looking for feedback on.

One of the major items from counsel was to reduce the courts to 16, is what has been updated and what's on the screen now. But I wanted to just kind of capture for the record what all of the component parts of this proposal would be from the gift standpoint so that we can talk it through, see if it's supported, and then it would go back to counsel for the negotiation of a memorandum of understanding so that we could actually put the gift into motion here. There's obviously a lot of granular detail that has to be figured out. There's site planning issues. There's parking spaces.

There's lots of additional pieces, parts to this, but we wanted to understand that Parks and Rec was supportive of this concept. I wanted to just briefly touch on, there was a lot of discussion in the last conversation about maintenance. This entire thing, and Tim today was focusing primarily on noise because that's been the recent direction of the conversation, but Tim and his group has also been focusing making sure that this is a self sustaining facility that can maintain itself, because that's obviously part two. That was something that Samantha did a really good job of articulating to us in the very beginning was it's really not enough to receive a gift of a new facility. It has to be a facility that can take care of itself.

And so a big part of this has been trying to figure out how to correct the pickleball, or I guess I should say the racket center operational deficit to make sure that it can handle its operations going forward so that you don't get two new play tennis courts and then realize that you can't maintain two new play tennis courts. So if we could switch to the overhead, and then I'll hand it off to the the committee or the document camera, maybe not the overhead.

I'm not

sure what

it's called.

I think he said it wasn't working.

Oh, it's not working? Maybe

he thought it would reboot, but it hasn't.

Yeah.

I pushed the button. I think that'll work. I'll read it while the thing's loading, but it was off. So the the first piece is

I think it might my screen just went black, so you may. And it had a little play button in the corner.

We're back to video.

Yeah, I don't think we're going

to That's Okay. I just cover the points. There's eight concepts here. The first one is the number of pickleball courts, which is a set that we're proposing is 16. You currently have eight. And this proposal would be both adding eight and refurbishing the existing eight that you have. So on the other side of the gift, would have essentially 16 new courts as opposed to eight new and eight old. We're currently talking about two tennis courts that will be made to clay. If there's feedback today that it should be for, we're here to receive that feedback. The soundproofing would be included as consistent with the study that you just walked through.

And one of the major differences between what Tim just showed you and what was shown to counsel is when counsel looked at this, there was a thought that the rear fence, the southernmost fence, needed to be something like fourteen, fifteen, 16 feet tall in order to achieve these kind of results, but adding those interior fences removed that height concern. So this is a lower fence than what was shown to council. Council was shown a much taller fence. The lighting is all going to be replaced throughout the entire facility. The fencing, so there's the soundproof fencing, but then also there's the access control fencing around the entire facility to make sure that you can better manage the users at the facility.

Shade structures are being proposed to be added sort of along the center line here to the left of the pickleball courts, to the west of the pickleball courts, and then additional bicycle racks in the parking lot. That are kind of the items that are currently proposed in the gift for structuring, and what we're trying to our understanding from counsel was we needed to get your feedback on that, make sure this is something you actually want, make sure this is something that has appropriately addressed your concerns, and then we go back to counsel with you saying yes or no.

Okay. John, you had I just had a couple of questions,

I guess initially for the city, I guess. Will the city be employing a third party objective confirmation of the decibel decreases that we're seeing in this plan. Because I do have a confidence issue with mister Dale VanSquoik, as he just recently, in a May 2026 publication, stated within a 100 feet, it's difficult to get the sound level down to a point where it's going to be acceptable to residents. He just said that this month. So I have a confidence issue with him.

In addition to the video that he he did use, present to city council, it neglected to state the fact that some of those spots that were shown were shadow zones, and that there was only an average of 5.5 decibel decrease. So that was, of course, glanced over. So I have a confidence issue with him. And I'm wondering what the city's plans are to validate any of that with an objective review.

We do not have any plans to get another point of view.

Think, Joe, do you know what the date or where where are we at with the ordering slash installation slash funding of? I know that you went they council had asked you to go get pricing, then we got the the different one. And I I don't I don't recall if council has since voted to approve that money for you to order.

They did.

They did?

They did. I'm actually working with the contractor now. They just sent me a template that they did for their their own measurement. I'm I have to verify and the measurements are accurate with all the gates and send it back to them. Once they've verified that, then we'll actually push the PO through and they'll make the order.

And did they give you a timeline on that?

I believe it was about eight weeks.

Okay. So we're talking June, July. So it's gonna be August before this. So personally, because I think for the neighbors to have good confidence in this that we need to have the initial setup be put installed Now, and seeing the extra work that Mr. Annette just did on this project, I think that perhaps we have to find a way to maybe see what it would cost to put that extra fence between the two sections to get that section done, what that might cost, and whether that can be funded through perhaps the increase that we just had in membership.

I don't know where that falls in the budget and where we're at with that

situation. I've actually already reached out to two different contractors to get pricing to remove the five foot fence that's there Yep. And install the 10 foot fence.

Got it.

I'm already working on it.

And would that also then include the the e noise application on it?

They will. It would be separate proposals because they're two different companies.

And would we be able to use some of the remaining funds from that that they just used? Because I thought I don't was there a half $1,000,000 that was in there that we pulled the 100 to knock out the building, and then some of it was used for the e noise?

Yeah. We used 52,000, I think. Now is there money left for us to put that between the the the eight courts? Is there money in your budget there?

There's money still in that project. That is completely we're waiting for counsel direction on that. They'll get that from you.

So it would be my I guess I it would be my recommendation that we go to counsel, and we ask for this 10 foot fence with the e noise between the existing courts. Yeah. And and and before, there's eight more courts or any honestly, if it's good at 16 courts, who knows? Maybe 24 does work and parking works, and it'll all be happy. But I think until these eight are resolved and that we take

Yeah.

Best known information, I I can't, in good faith, move forward No. To to to recommend eight more courts. I I think We think that's fair. Yeah.

This I think this is the answer. It looks like let's now, do we bring this it how soon can we bring this before counsel to say we bring maybe Tim goes before counsel and shows him what he has shown us today. And if Joe has a cost of what it is, we could maybe get it all done. And that's the answer.

Yeah. What In one swipe, right? Instead of you having to go after that eight courts twice, I mean, could we could we go to counsel? I mean, I'd I'd be happy to present what Tim did here. I'm I'm more than comfortable with this this work.

I think Tim could

Tim could do it.

Between Tim and Zach, they could do that. And I would like to think that we we do we say we'd like to have 16 courts. But before we get that far, let's get the sound issue taken care of. That's the first thing.

Yeah. I mean, that's gonna do us by

really quick to page 18, just the page before this one.

Okay.

Because I just wanna point out that this one. This so this adds the 10 foot fence that we're talking about in yellow. Yep. But what this doesn't do is it doesn't increase the height of the perimeter fence to 12. Right.

It loses it 10. Right.

So as as you can see here in the even under this report, which I understand you don't have confidence in, it's still showing that this is not the ideal solution. So while I think that's reasonable, and I think that having actual on the ground testing makes sense, I just want to make sure we're aware, though, that this does not include lifting a fence to

This is not Yeah. You're right. This is not the final answer. But we see a lot more green, and it gives us confidence to think there's hope, and this can happen.

And I think what it can do is we could validate it off of this page. Yes. So that seems fair enough.

So it would seem to me that, let's just say that this happens in August, right? I mean, we all know that the pickleball court is in jam full players in August, even September. So right? You'll have September and October that we can get some people in there playing, right? And it won't be maximum. You're going to get some people playing. You're going to be able to, with one good morning of play, know like, is this working or is this not working? Right? Like, it's gonna be very obvious. Now I personally experienced the difference when I went to the place in Bonita. And what I experienced was vastly different. So I'm I'm pretty confident that the work that Dale did is going to be very good. I'm very confident in that. So I would be happy to make a motion that we go to counsel

I would like to comment first, four motions.

We also have two registered speakers on this topic.

There's minimal public here today. So have you or Tim spoken to the Cadwells or any what is their feedback Tim on has.

I am I'm sorry.

Thank you.

Can you hear me Okay?

Yes. Yes.

Yeah, so I had I visited with Dave and Carla. It's been about a month ago. Went through the whole study with them. And I made Dale and York available to John and Valerie Ages, as well as Dave and Carla so they could have time one on one with PSM and answer any questions that they may have. Went through the final noise study which I just did with you today and they were very very excited about everything that has happened.

They also understand that there's really not a big motive that the courts are gonna move anywhere. So long story short, they're they're very locked in and comfortable with the position. I I rather you hear it from them, but when we did have our get together, they were very excited and very optimistic about where we're going and what we need to do.

Thank you.

Okay. Fred, did you have something you wanted to say?

Excuse me. I'd like to just go and ask staff a question, okay? Because one of the points you raised was two tennis courts are four. It's a little different point, but what's the community interest in tennis courts right now? Is there any demand for tennis to

have four courts if it's too sufficient? Let me answer that. When we did the study, if you remember, man, was it four years ago, five years ago, we did the study. There's still a demand for tennis. What happens is, as you age, your your ability to play tennis decreases. Doesn't mean it's it's not popular or anything, but it's just one of those things where as you age, it's easier to play pickleball than it is to tennis. And And we have the charts and everything else when we had the study done. So there is people that still play tennis here. Tennis was still supposed to be a viable option for Marco Island. And

to add to that, just recently, of our Parks and Recreation staff, we reached out to other facilities to see about their tennis participation. In some areas, their tennis players participation is higher than the pickleball. So and that was local meeting between Marco and Naples. So we definitely think that there is a need and I think if we have a facility where they feel welcomed and we have really nice playable courts, I think we'll get more people.

Thank you. Donors, I have that.

So first off, I think the idea is great with breaking it down into the smaller sections like that and soundproofing it in that manner. I think it's a great compromise and huge step forward to working with the community instead of against it, And and really trying to find that that even ground. With the tennis courts, has anybody said anything about hard courts instead of clay courts?

Yeah. I'll let and then, Tim, unless you disagree with this. So this was our interpretation of feedback we received at, I think, the last time we were before you all. There was a good number of tennis players who showed up, and they were, I think, frustrated at that time because we had proposed converting what they considered to be the best tennis courts because they were clay into pickleball courts. And so we were reacting mainly to that feedback. I think that Tim's and his group's preference is not defined by tennis. So if you told us, don't do it that way, we're

Well, it's called Just recall It's called Hartrew. It's not clay. Yeah. As a tennis player

Not clear.

The old folks, we like that softer rather than the hard court, that softer court. And I think if we could do it correctly and we'd water from underneath, And Carlos, they've got it all. I think four courts is probably the answer. And we could have an incredible facility. But before we before we go anywhere, let's get the sound issue taken care of or addressed.

And Joe, you're up, baby. And what we need is we're going to need do we bring this? Do we wait to bring this before the council until we have a cost of what we need money wise? I think the money is there, but we have to make a presentation, And Tim can do that before the council if we know how much money we need. And if you've got when you're ready, we're ready. Let's put it that way. What do you think? This is up to you. The boss is now telling him.

Yeah. I mean, I I'd be happy to make a motion to to to do this with the funds that are left over in the in this project so that Joe can go. And I think I don't know if we can do with a a number not to exceed so that we can not have to wait another thirty days to do this.

Sorry. What was the what was the number not to exceed for what?

So for this 10 foot fence plus the e noise. I got to have a feeling that we have a ballpark figure what a 10 foot fence plus e noise might be.

So the procurement side of the city does not like the not to exceed number. We don't do that.

Sorry about that.

Well, we got that.

Scratch that. So how long how long do you think it would take for you to get a cost of the of the new fence, the e noise fence? What do you think?

So I should have it any day now because, like I said, I've reached out to two different companies. The e noise panels that will be on there, I can get those afterwards. I just needed a actual layout of the fence. So I should be able to get all that pretty soon. I'll have it by the next PRAC meeting for sure.

Well, let me ask you this. Is it possible for us to make a motion that Joe could present this at the next council meeting that he has with whatever numbers that he gets from these vendors using the funds that are left over in the project?

I I would say at this particular time, we have a lot of things that are being thrown out. I wouldn't wanna give a date certain. I would like to talk to the city manager to go over some of the things we've been talking about. I'd like to rewatch this again. We have a lot of different moving parts on this thing, and I don't wanna have another meeting in front of the city council without having all those answers.

So I think there's only really two moving parts to this. There is a foot, a 10 foot fence in between the existing eight pickleball courts with the Enoise application, and we would use the funds from the existing project to fund it. And I would be happy to make a motion that our recommendation to counsel would be to proceed with that as quickly as possible.

I would say if Joe is comfortable with it, I don't have a problem with it, but I wanna hear it from him because I'm gonna be getting do putting the work together.

I would like to reach out to Enoys and have them do a sound study on the project or proposed fence because there's holes in the fence right now for people to walk through around the courts. So I wanna see what they think the actual, you know, outcome of that will be before we bring it to council.

I think that's a

good point. Yeah.

I mean, it's a valid question that

we should test it and make sure

that at least a small sample size

So we are ready at this point when you're ready, Joe. This the ball is in your court, as we say. And if you'll you'll let us know when it's when you're ready, we can present it, and we'll have Tim can present it to the council and see how we can do.

And just for one little bit of follow-up on that too, we I I am working with the police to do a noise decibel calculation before we put the the new e noise stuff on and afterwards. Okay. And we'll do it from, I guess, direction was 10 foot away, and then we'll do it from 50 feet away just so that we can get some numbers.

That's great. That's what that would be one. Thank you. Zach, does that is that okay with you? Does it sound okay?

No. Yeah. I I think you have to you have to be comfortable with it. We're not dictating terms. I think it makes sense. The concern is legitimate to understand the difference between what engineers put on paper and what happens in the real world. And the city council has made an investment, and we appreciate that.

Before we close this, I just want to clarify one thing. We're going to do this outside perimeter on a 10 foot fence August, roughly speaking. Is that correct? If we, amongst us, wanted to sometime between now and, let's call it the next thirty days, ask or go to counsel with this additional 10 foot fence between these four courts, it would seem to me that it would make sense to do that right away because the decimal numbers, I mean, dropped quite a bit with that extra 10 foot fence. If we're going to give this the best chance to succeed, I don't understand why we're going to go spend another thirty or sixty days doing this when the wheels are in motion.

The money is there in this project. So I'm going make a motion to do this. And maybe there'll be a second for it. But my motion would be that we go to city council with this 10 foot fence with the e noise on it, and we do it as quickly as possible using the funds that are already existing in the project for the pickleball or racket center.

Is this gonna slow his process down?

I I would hope not.

Is it gonna stop it until council now reviews what we're proposing to add?

There's no fence there now, right? Not even like a three

foot There's a five foot fence in the middle with no sound noise on it. They've already approved the perimeter. Right. What this would be doing is saying, let's add the 10 foot with the e noise at the exact same time. And Joe's working with the vendor right now and I can't imagine that the vendor is going be slowed down with, let's call it, I don't know, 2,000 square feet of extra product. I can't see it. So that's my motion. So if somebody wants to second it, great.

Not

You do have public speakers too.

Real quick too, just before we go on that, that fence will shut down the court because we have to remove the fence that's there that's cemented in and record the new poles. So there will be a shutdown time if we do that.

August would seem to be a great time to do that.

And the only other thing that I want to bring up is that Samantha hasn't had time to realize that the panels will become like a little bit of a safety issue because her team won't be able to see that second set of courts beyond that fence.

Is that where you can put in cameras? Just throwing it out there,

if that's a concern. I hate to throw I know that you and I are thinking, let's just do this. But I guess I've been around the town of Marco Island or government. Girls and boys, it just doesn't happen in thirty days. It it we just as much as I'd like to think that Dan can stand up there and and speak in our behalf or Samantha, doing what we wanna do, if you and I were gonna do it, we could be ready by June 15 and bring it up before the council.

That would not be an issue. But I don't think if that's not the real world of government. And am I correct? I mean, we dreaming this group that we could have something up and ready or a proposal by June 15?

Well, I sure wouldn't be that person, but Joe would be the one to be answer that question. You know, I never give a timeline. I learned that a long time ago. Yeah,

I knew that. Okay, Joe.

Just real quick, too, because we only have about thirteen minutes left of the meeting. We do have someone that wanted to speak, so we should allow the public to speak. And then Dolores, you and I wanted to mention something about the next meeting.

So we have Jane Hansen.

Okay.

Hello again. Jane Hansen, Markle Island, long term resident here. Gosh, I don't even know where to begin about the subject of pickleball. I had been following this topic for quite some time when you had the outside consultants that talked initially about expanding the program. And there was the pickleball people against the tennis people. And the tennis people are saying, well, more of us would be here if you maintain the courts, but you're not maintaining the courts. And the pickleball players say, no, tennis is dead. That's why we need more courts. And so there's a lot to watch about. I also live nearby.

And I can hear the pings at the library. So I can't imagine what it's like for the people that live in the Marco Villas or the people that are on Heathwood. And I know that everybody's trying to address that. And I really appreciate the cooperative efforts between the pickleball people and including the neighbors. But there's a lot more to this topic that I haven't heard you guys discuss.

So we can look at, yes, there's a problem. There's a need. There's a wait list, but then you cleared the wait list and there aren't as many people on it. Have you looked at other alternatives to meet the needs? Why do you have 400 people that get prime time for pickleball? Why not alternate? They get even days or odd days. Right there, you double your numbers of people that you're serving. What do you get afternoons or you get mornings? You see this with all of the golf clubs that are in these developments.

You don't get your preference as to when you play golf. You get your first choice, one first choice, one second, and one third choice. So it's not just this private membership. So speaking of private memberships, that's the way a lot of people in the community view pickleball. If you're an exclusive member of this club for really a very nominal fee, hundreds of dollars less than what it cost you to be at the Y, you get the privilege of playing pickleball whenever you want to.

But I, as a resident, A, can't get on that list. And I've been here for quite some time. And B, I can't just come over and play. There's not courts that are designated for taxpaying residents to use it. So I think that would be something I would encourage you to look at is your whole model as to who's a member, who gets to use it, what days do they get to use it, and is it fair? Is it fair for all of us residents? And then great. I am so excited for the foundation, the money you're about ready to receive. And I remember at one point in time that money was going to go for shade at Mackle Park. Yay.

Or for Veterans Park. Yay. But now you've got these people that are going to raise this money. And it begs the question, the donors, the millions of dollars, that begs the question is what are they getting in return for that donation? Is it a lifetime member?

Sorry, but

you're out of your time.

It's probably good. I do just have one last thing to say. I'm sorry, you're probably going to rescind the invitation to speak on the fifteenth, but I can understand that.

Thank you. Thank

you. Thank you. Claire, do we have another speaker?

It was just that one.

Okay.

Had a motion. Do we have a second to Darren's motion? Let's start with that. I'll second. Okay. Darren, you want to repeat what your motion is?

The motion is that we, at the same time they are working on the exterior e noise, we're going to install a recommended installation of the 10 foot fence with the Enoise product between the existing eight quarts. And that way, we can do this simultaneously and get faster feedback to understand if this is going to be the best process forward. And we use existing funds from the project that remains. And we're going to depend upon Joe to get the best bids as quickly as possible. But it seems he's got that wheel already in motion.

And we will attach that with what we make our recommendation as soon as we can get on council's agenda.

With that, in case this extra thing you're adding doesn't go through, the other part's still going

to go It's already gone.

Okay. Perfect.

That's already done.

Okay.

But if this is true, which I believe it to be true from the consultant, it dramatically changes it. So why would we not do this and stop all this pickleball conversation? It's time to end this and say, this is going to either work or not work, and then go to what the next situation is. That's the motion. Okay. And a second.

Claire, you want to ask each as opposed to just yea and nay?

Vice Chair Spindler?

Yes.

Member Hanaki? Member Lynch?

Yes.

Member Aegis?

Yes. Member Kramer?

Yes.

Chair Siegel? Yes. We are now, Joe, the ball is in your court. I'm not sure how soon we can get on the agenda. And let us maybe June 15 is too soon to present this, but we do it as soon as we can. So you'll let Samantha know, and we'll go from there. And in the month of June, I will not be here. And I don't believe Samantha will be here. We're not going away together. We're just going away.

And will you how many of us will we have a quorum then? Do you think you will be here? It's June it's June 16. I will be here for the fifteenth, but then I'm leaving. And I'll be here. You'll be here? Okay.

Will you intention to come for the meeting.

Okay. I'll be here. And, Matt, will you be here?

If not in person,

I can be here via

Well, we've got we would have four, and and I think Beth would be so we would have a quorum. So can we have a meeting to be honest, I'm not sure without Samantha being there.

You could have a meeting without me here. But my question is, do you have anything that is pressing for us to make sure that we have a PROC meeting? Or do we want to cancel the meeting for June? And just anything that we were going to discuss, we can put on the July.

Well, think we took care of our hot button topic here. It's gonna take thirty days to sixty days to move this

Yeah.

Forward. We've got plenty of other work to do, but it's gonna be dependent upon what happens on June 15 at that meeting. And then discussions about fundraising and other things after the fact will come from that, not only for the pickleball project, but Mackle Park. And, you know, these are all issues that are gonna be be necessary to have conversations probably above and beyond what we can get out of city council's pocket.

From my perspective, I would assume there's a lot of people that are gonna be going on vacation. That's usually the vacation time for not only some of the committee members, but staff. Unless you actually have something pressing, I would suggest that you postpone it till the next meeting.

Okay. So we will postpone our actual meeting. But we will do we will have our presentation before the before the council. And let's see if we yes.

I have one last thing. So I just wanna thank Joe. He's been working with Linda Scherzinger. We and Dan. Dan helped out on this too. And to counsel, we got the Tree City USA money, which working together with beautification. We are now able to get a bunch of trees that are gonna go around Mackle Park, around the the lake to replace dead tree stumps, which is gonna be great. So we won't have tree stumps. And then we're gonna have some new trees that are gonna go around the soccer field for a part of that to begin to get some additional shade there. We have plans for more for next year and we're working on some other things with Linda. But we made that happen and we moved that down the field. It took a year, but we got there.

So

thank you.

Thank you.

Because it took three parties.

Yeah. Thank you. And with that, can I have Joe, do we do you need anything else from us? Okay. Okay. Can I hear a motion for adjournment?

I'll make a motion.

In a second. Thank you, and we are so glad you were all here. And, miss Hanson, I want