Porter County Parks & Recreation Board - Regular Meeting

on the way. Yeah. Okay. Yes, dear. Yes. Talk to Tyler. We'll get more Yeah. Hello. guilty to a third trial. Well, trying to we there was a guy that did the trial about two weeks ago and he was found guilty. But what the jury doesn't doesn't get to hear is how he tried. You know, he plead guilty three times and judge rejected the plea and they're like, "We think you probably did it, but you know, beyond a reasonable doubt, which is what I have to prove." It's like it says right in there probably is not enough and and because it's has to be a standard that's more than probably. So it's like tough one to lose like somebody died. Cool. Um, I caus so if I have to get up and my wife's paper, so I'm here because we haven't had anything yet. So if you go running, we'll just slam that down next month. Throwing cigars into the crowd. None of this is as important as that.

Nothing. We'll slam that guy. That is a fact. So, you have I I was always like a Hummer and my car was parked over there in the FJ Cruiser. Yeah. I I I always wanted a Hummer and then like years ago my dad's like, "Well, what about that car? That kind of looks like a Hummer." And I was like, "Yeah." And I'm like I'm like, "Oh, it's a Toyota. It's like a Toyota version of a Jeep." And I found Toyota. Yeah. Green one. I was like, "And it's a Toyota forever." Because I don't follow it. So, how did we what did we find out? That's okay. Still in process. That's still jumbo. By the time they get to a point as usual with maintenance. Yeah. No, we're we're still in the who knows stage. Yeah. Yeah. I wish I would have had like I was like just so um I was like really looking for I wish I would had like a mechanic look at it because they probably like if anything could have probably saved me a few thousand like it's like

Yeah. So, somebody had like done some like work of their own under the hood and it probably could have just saved me a couple thousand you feel better about it. There hasn't been any major issues, but like Yeah, but it's like it's a 2014. It's got I bought it at 6,000 miles. So it's like I've had it almost like Yeah. So I don't put actually at one point I was probably only putting 8,000 miles. Yeah. But then it's like could throw in some long longer trips in there. Well, but the only thing is that back seat. It's like that it's a comfortable car for like two adults and then like getting one in there. Well, that car that you know that might I might just be like maybe I should I can get like a nice fat, you know, back row like that's exciting for any minute literally today. Yeah. But I don't, you know, I don't know. I think I might be off. No, like that's

that's what I've heard too. Um, but then it's like everybody's got a different story. Like some woman told me a while ago, my first one came six weeks early. Yeah. [Music] Did you get that email from Brian? Yeah, but I'm gonna I'm gonna wait a couple more minutes. Then we can do the regular joke when he walks in. We all stand up. Actually, I have a question for him. My wife had question. Just the guy. Oh, it's going. I heard you got some. I already heard that. I don't even know a couple grand on it or something. You got to know, right? When's the next full moon? I don't know those things. Know those things. Surprise with all the rain that's supposed to be kicking it in. Yeah. Like that. Yeah. We lost power over two days. You You were one of the wind. A good idea. Yeah, we got it Tuesday when they brought the I'm like, you know what? Yeah. So, like, but that

was I would that be on one of the Oh, like in our house could be on one that we pull with the tractor. It would make we had to meet the animals wagon ride. Great idea. Like, how does it get attached to the wagon? Down below is one in Lake County. My uh how many wagons you look? So we own two seconds. I was upset that it just one, right? Now I have to not beat the time put the time back in and then you Well, you never know though, too, because if you if you Yeah. And they're like, "Well, we can our kid can actually get on this ride. Let's do it." probably a custom window. Yeah, maybe a big deal. It is a big Yeah, because like power I think is that like I'm right by kind of difficult to get up. Yeah, you don't have to be that pretty hard and like so I was looking out my front window when like the worst part of the storm hit and I'm just on like I think that particular like a house is right across and it's not close to the I couldn't even see the house across the street because of the one I don't know what it was like rain They have loud or like you're going to do it. It almost looked but it was like it could have been very sturdy something like that but it's like you couldn't even see 100 ft away and all. What's our timing for our white set? Okay. And the lights went off instantly

followed up with this week. Our next door neighbor had it as I know that was I imagine by the end of the month there were some big we had like preassm if Yeah. If that I don't even know better. What about the llamas? When are we going to get the llamas? Contacting us. The exhibit's ready. Animal the alpaca enclosures ready. That's really strange because we're going to buy it, right? Yeah. We were going to tour the farm and get some alpacas and Yeah. I don't I don't know if there's something. Yeah. Further alpacas, not llamas. Yeah. Llamas are mean up. Yeah, I guess it was like it didn't hit as bad. Llamas are nice. So, what's plan B? Do we have another alpaca dealer? I'm going to go shop around. Shouldn't be hard to find somebody willing to sell you a couple alpacas. Yeah, anybody that breeds them breeds them to sell and we may have to look in like Illinois. Were you there? Do we have more for that meeting this summer than last year? It wasn't in that five. Call it the pin. That really sounds like it makes sense. That's great. That's the perfect time for it. It is. Yeah,

after that they had that they're already in the calendar beer fest and I I was like I don't want to stay and then they convinced me to stay. Yeah, usually the one in June. I don't even Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. What about our sound installation ideas? We We're still trying to figure out what we're doing today. It's I don't know how most of the companies they did last year. They did it like three or four times. So, we're trying to figure out do it that much. I see you have art and craft people make us quilts. Yeah. I ordered it might not be a bad idea. I take I don't like that. I don't know. She didn't like hers. We switched. I was like this is like this is what I want. Like that's what I was thinking. There are clubs out there who quilt. Oh yeah. Collaboration for some sort of effort together. Yeah. Have you been? But that would because that would dent it for sure. Yeah. And you maybe you put one, skip one, put one, skip one. Yeah. Yeah. I say part of the big thing too. You'd have to be able to get them down to I did find a company that makes sheets hang like isolate a corner and see how it does in a spot. Yeah. And then go from there because we can get those colored and stuff like that and then we can do decorative stuff either lower or higher

like the commercial grade stuff. Yeah. It's really just a matter of figuring out how to work with a dome. It's like living in a frame. Yeah. Really cool until you want to hang something on the good. I don't know. I did. The babies are crying. Yeah. Most importantly, is the restroom signed up now? We're waiting on the ground to get out to not really. We have the sign. Waiting on the ground to get because we got to the I I don't know. I It's not going above the door. No, it's soense. It's a go do something like so if anybody but then I don't know I might I might hate it. We we made it big enough you know I wanted the sign but I got the idea Brookdale. Yeah. So did you get all your restrooms delivered? It should get delivered tomorrow. Yeah. Well then the other thing Yeah. They they tried to do that forgiveness thing. Sunset today. Oh, did they really? How wet was that? And it's like that wouldn't hold they call like you're like comfortable. You're almost water that 10 years like just finish that out and then it's not we get the so I think it's something we're going to work on next week. back, don't we? Yeah. Yeah, we got something. The skid steer should be able to get it, too. So, we got to get the skid steer fixed. I think people try to make work, but I think it's overworked it. So it's like you know why they they like I think one of the problems is like the

replace the alternate no one's double checking your uh what you're actually well what I'm saying is like that you still got the track vendor because it's part time and you say oh I made I got the 45,000 from the public vendor got 110 or more thousand from my private. Don't forget that civil engineering class. I don't know what kind of equipment if the departmentation own people knew that you said that they would be like you don't qualify program but they Kevin people aren't like you have all right we go ahead and get started pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right, thanks for coming everybody. Um, just reminder for our scribes and notetakers if when addressing the board to come up front table so we can get a good click audio recording. I'd certainly appreciate it. So, uh, Jake, who's here? All right. Brian Weisen, I'm here. Carl English, I too. I'm here. Bob Durant here. Har Peterson here. Brian Cuba here. I won't bore you with the president's message because every month I say we've set a new record and I think we've done it again this month. But uh just we'll let the the reports rectify that. Uh we have minutes from February and March that were submitted. Do we have any additions or corrections on either one of those from anybody? I did not see any. I didn't see any. I motion that we uh accept both February and

March minutes. We have a motion. We have a second. I'll second. We have a second. Any discussion? There being none, Jake. Brian Weisen, yes. Carl English, yes. Bob Durant, yes. J Peterson, yes. Ryan Cubell, yes. All right. And that brings us to our legal mind. Well, Dave makes sure to time being able to read bids to everybody. I think that's what he does every single every single year. And so, and so that you can get all the glory of of count the bids to everybody. So, uh he did that last month for me. Uh but, uh I'm gonna talk him into letting me do some of some of the some of the stuff we have coming up. Uh but but uh the only legal news that I the only legal update that we have for this month I think that we need to talk about is the Presbyterian church is we had a meeting scheduled um they really can't work with anybody over there who's not an attorney um because there's other in other circumstances we know that they're represented by council. So, uh, it's not the the board who meets and discusses things can't necessarily communicate directly with the attorney without their attorney being involved in that conversation. So, we're trying to hunt that down so we can go forward. interested in in in running that down, but um we were unable to do that since the since FIS last month in March to get it a specific person on the phone and some of that might be the presidential church would prefer not to get the attorney. Um but we would need confirmation from that or we need to turn it over to people who aren't attorneys to be able to, you know, have the discussion with Presbyterian uh

church. And other than that, um I think that is all that I was specifically told and uh hopefully as summer comes up and maybe have some meetings out there with beer garden. We were just discussing that. I'm going to make sure that I'm here for that. It's become a tradition. Yeah. Here you go. All right. Thank you very much. um committee reports. Um actually I'm going to start with marketing education. I went a few weeks ago I was invited to uh Indian Department of Environmental Management Partners for Clean Air Coalition meeting in a separate role from here. And once I got the meeting, I realized that the parks needed to be involved in that program. By the time I got done, they had they would love to have the Porter County Parks and Recreation as a member of that coalition and would love to have us do a presentation on our programming and projects at one of their meetings. So, I've kind of told Jake presentation and programming. Um, I have some information from them. Give that to marketing and education over the next couple weeks. You guys can come up with some sort of suggestion for the board. And then because there's different levels, obviously with different levels, there's different financial obligations. So, if you guys come up with one that you think would be best for us as the board, then if you give that to me, then we and Brian and budget will go over that and see where works in and how we can do it. What's the organization, Brian? It's the department of Indiana Department of Environmental

Management and it's their partners for Clean Air Coalition. Um they do a lot of scholarships, education and outreach. And some of their members are drive clean Indiana, uh BP, uh Cleveland Cliffs, Florida County Health Department's on it, NIPCO, um let's see, Rails are on it. Nerps is part of it. I think as we're going forward, starting to broaden our footprint in Porter County and in Northwest Indiana, these are some of the organizations we're going to need to work with. Additionally, as we are moving forward with broadening our footprint, as far as parking and trails and things like that, there are potentially some options or availability for grants to help us put in like car charging stations and and things like that. So I think it's something we just need to explore a little bit further and like say I'll give you guys the information that I've got from the recommendation budget see what we can work it in and by next month we can come up with a some strategy and how to move forward. That's our great. All right. Um since we're on market and education, we'll start off with you guys for committee reports. Well um I my told me that the escrow received my tax bill. I haven't received that in the mail yet and I'm looking forward to it for the first time ever. I can see our Porter County Parks and Recreation. Has anybody received their their tax bill, property tax bill in the mail yet? I don't know when those mailed out or if they have yet, but I know we we did everything that they asked us to be included in that. And I haven't received the final number count or

invoice from that company to pass on in terms of the final dollar amount is but I'm looking forward to getting that in the mail knowing that the whole county is going to be so that should be this month I think here in April. Yeah, I think it is finalized Friday. Okay. So everything probably started getting mailed out this last Monday. So over the next two weeks today maybe the man from the assessment office. So yeah that's so that's exciting. Hopefully we get a whole lot guys on our our programs and our website maybe do we have an ability on our website uh to track the number of visitors and what they're clicking on? Any idea? We have a metrics to to track that on the back end of it to see whether like when clicks and stuff like that without question there should be a spike in in the days after that hits the mail as everybody clicks that QR code it would be really would it be in terms of that investment I think it's a reasonable investment for sure but what does the the real outcome look like in terms of numbers so that would be something yeah we certainly Yeah, if we get a base number from, you know, last month, then we'll we'll check it again this month. Okay. I believe so. Once in the spring, it just one time. And if it's something that we felt like traction, then we can do it again. Yeah. Yeah. Well, because you valuations in August for next year's tax bill. So I mean there are other go

that would be the assessor's office sending the valuations out that I have to check. I don't know if them or the treasur out, but either way, I mean, our office, the auditor's office certifies everything and then sentence it out or is ready by August 1 and they send out your tax for year. So, you can hit again in August. Might feel about the tax. If you're mad, go take a walk. Do we have an update on the sunset bill? Uh I don't have one that's any any different than what I had last month. Unfortunately, I know what they're doing now is getting the final design approved for planning development and then at that point we're just waiting on the ground. When I was talking to probably going to look at In the next month or so, construction will start once the ground's not so wet. We're gonna do some but we'll try not to. Yeah. Then Jack has sub the application out to time all that the same time where as construction starts I can tell right to the back end that sign and there's power along that stretch right so it shouldn't be too bad station right there shouldn't be too bad I don't imagine it's going to cost as much as it's going to electric

station shouldn't be near that 65,000. That's a big one for marketing. So, you think by this summer that'll be It should be. Yeah, it should be out by the summer. So, or not. Hopefully that'll be Nipk's timeline. They got their hands full right now. Ideally, we'll have the up in time to where we can start advertising like the gardens and some events and stuff like that on necessarily optimistically June 1st, but sometime July I think that's the goal. We've done most of the per that should be the longest of the construction once it starts because that's quick. It's just a matter of getting the weather and the rest of the process done. That's all I have. All right. Well, staying in the middle of the board here at the master plan. Well, um, we spent a good deal of time focusing on all that information about where we've been. So, I sent to Harry and Jake a document about as a a collaboration space where we can start wrapping our head around. We know where we're going to be at the end of this year with all of our projects. We have so many of them. So, as we approach this the beginning of the next five year master plan, what do we want to do? So, relative to everything we've accomplished, what what do we want that master plan like? So look at all of our parks just start brainstorming and I'll share entire board so we can all consider what do we want to achieve and improve and add to our parts in the next

five years that what's that vision look like right we've accomplished so much so got to look back pretty well organized what's like so I think as a board and staff we consider where we're what are the big things that that we want to aim for and include in that master plan to to reach for. So I'll share that document with everybody and I think we all need to start wrapping our head around that and aim real and aim high and all those things for a master plan and see what we can accomplish. Absolutely. on on that note just me putting some old conversations together and just mention of the the beer garden you know I think some you know we we're doing all these improvements to parks and you know opening new parks and now you know the next five years what are we going to do to bring people to the parks with events like a beer garden or you know like a popup uh farmers market or something at at all these different places um to and you know serve different areas of Porter County too not just at you know Sunset Hill even though you know it's it's central and it's close for a lot of people but you know maybe you know beer garden at a at a different place in Brit or or somewhere else where serves that community too and then brings people to check out a different Great point. Great idea. All right. Thank you, gentlemen. Um, let's see. How about maintenance and land use? Um, maintenance. I think they're probably messing with the trees. Um, I know they're working on a hot bridge, doing the fans, clean that up, and get the stone down. Um, getting more stuff, more

uh, uh, mulch for the playground areas. That's going to be coming. getting that finished at Cookdale and also at sunset. Um and then land use is the same stuff going on 700 out still talking with the folks at the Presbyterian key. Um the bathroom has been submitted for for Sunset Hill now that's become something that's be permitted. So we're working on that. I think that's probably about I can't it's homeland security again, right? Homeland security for our bathroom. So this is The state level the state they have it in their the state health department has a portion of where they oversee these types you know restrooms they oversee restrooms that get put in throughout the state and I was working with the environmental director for the department of health because this is the first one going in as far as county there's no real we had to look through it ourselves and we looked through it suburbage that the way we read it, it sounded like it didn't need state approval and then he actually had a phone call with somebody in the department of health on the state level and they reassured him no they do have to approve it. So because it's a it goes back to homeland security a department of homeland security controlled facility which is basically any public facility department of health has to to approve those restrooms those so there's a special application for it's not it's not terribly big I've been talking to to John about it we have to do a site plan with an landscape architect So, I have to do another site plan for the amphitheater with the bathroom on it. And then I've got to have puff cut stamp the engineer drawings for the middle, which that's not going to be a

big deal. I do have a color sheet that pass out. These are as as close of colors as I can match stained wood to bumblebee pollen for the Sherman Williams color code. Is that what's on the bumblebee? Is that is what on the amphitheater? No, we just it's just stained natural wood. Okay. They don't have that color in true catalog. So, I'm trying to match any random yellow and brown. The roof's going to be forest green that I'm actually going to take that out to the amphitheater tomorrow. I'll get into it up. Yeah. I'm just gonna hold that up the amphitheater like which one blends the best pictures. It's just hard to tell unless you Yeah. But but we found out so we do have to do an application to get stamp submitted. There's a fee of course once they stamp it then I can work. What's the time cost on how far is that pushing us? I don't think it's going to take that long. The state didn't actually take very long to approve the amphitheater plans. They had it within two or three weeks I think for the amphitheater. They do tend to move pretty quick and this is the same model that a lot of the state parks are using. Uh we put four of these up at D. So they see this plan on a regular basis. So I think as long as you know the eyes are teur that's all. That's it. All right. sitting on my hands. I guess uh we want to work the proceeding of our in budget.

Yeah, that was one that was your budget. How do you want to Ryan? How you want to do budget personnel with the uh I guess there is a giant budget request. I guess there's a giant budget request. Yeah. In here somewhere. Um yeah for the if we prove the transfers so why don't we when we go through the appropriations part of it now we'll have Ryan comment on appropriations as we go through you understand all right so there is uh and I did preliminarily send this to Joy and county council because the date to have submitted was two days. Yeah, two days ago. Well, all things are board approval. So, we can always pull it back. I just they don't like it just submit late. But, so the first one uh the first two actually are in the park capital. So the first request the 115,000 is into other equipment. So that is just the continuation that's to to cover you know the electric that we're going to need out that side and then as well as a significant portion of that is a key based. It's basically entirely a key portion of the four pine concept money is that 115,000. So that'll that'll appropriate the bulk of that mech so we have it ready to use when we can start on certain things and then as well to to cover the electric for sign when we get to that point. the 10,22.37

uh into consulting. Uh that is to cover the cost of the consulting fees for what will never be the Brookdale storm water permit review uh to plan commission and then the vault restroom permitting site plan. So that's just to give us some some cushion to make sure we've got funds ready to go for for those. And then the next two are the dedicated AI key fund and then I put working with with Ryan. We put 100,000 in landscape restoration which is what we use to actually hire somebody out to work the ground to get it ready for seating and to purchase uh the seed that is in the quote or in the packet and then have it seated have what? the first 22 acres that bottom st. Okay. So, we took that out of we Yeah, we took it out of the crop rotation this year and we're going to turn it all the we're going to turn all the green space and start getting at least a canvas that we can start working on out there. And then that'll also then will put us far enough into it that we can still use the the egg limits to come in and out of it with equipment as we're out there as we continue to work through the First church on the east and stuff like that. So this is the northern half of it that butts up against the southern half the southern half. Southern that bounces up next to the So it's the it's I thought the church was on the Oh, my bad. So it's it's that portion of it and Carl's the farm. He's going to put a line. We'll let him we'll let him decide the line. We're going to let him do 42 acres. What he decides that is that's where we stop. And we Yeah. We'll see the rest. And for it's about 22,000 all it's 4,400 to hire out the guy and do all the all the work with the equipment

time and then force just Yeah. And this is or sorry it's not 22,000 because this quote is the weather system works. We had them give us an estimate for two grasses and organic fertilizer to We're going to go we recommend going with the advanced height one. It's more drought resistant and grows well in full sun without irrigation at first. We want something that's a lot better. And then talking to some companies around they don't recommend fertilizer at first. maybe as a post applicant do some fertilizer, but because of the soil down there, the fertilizer is not really stick just yet. So, but that's what that part of that $100,000 would go for. And then as we continue to do stuff out there, use that funds for under that landscape restoration, depending on how this goes in the next few months, start working that first pond in there. Storm water drainage put in, start getting dry. We don't need to do any terraforming before we put grass. No, because the the length of time from when any agricultural herbicide or pesticide was used is greater than six months. It's no longer present in the soil. So the terraform going to do is someone's going to come in with a disc dis discip the soil and then they're going to actually And then what they will do drill and or slice seed. So we'll drill into the ground to plant the seed

or slice seed. So we'll go over two different directions as that's what cat was. I know, right? So, yes, that's that's all the work. So, that's about 4,400 for them and then about 11,500 to see. So, about 15 16,000 to get the first 22ish acres turned into grass, which at least gets us a start. They can they can see it's no longer at that point and then we can start chip away. Gets it in the right direction. And then the other 407 2000 is into consultants uh that is continue working with you know John and Duke group on new engineer documents site plan up toate engineer documents and as well as if we're able to get to that point where we've got access for real development per and all that stuff we have to go a certain amount of that will have to go to the state because that does go towards the high ditch. So, we do have to have state's approval for that part with the pond and an entrance coming off the parking lot going through, we'll need state permission to drain into the ditch. So, we'll have to do some state permitting with that as well as some peritting. So, that just gives us enough funds that if we get to that point this year, we don't have to wait. So, you're just asking to transfer the money from our fund to an operating fund to be able to use it. So this so this is a usable fund but it was never appropriated. So it's been it's in its own dedicated fund. We can spend that fund but we have to appropriate it for use just like we do the the operating budget every year as we bring in revenue. It sits there until the board and the council appropriate

it. And so this is this is just us appropriating funds that properly and that's that's how this funded properties. Okay. So do we need a motion to approve all these? Yeah. Appropriation individually or can we do it? It's up to the board if you want to do amend it. Brian, would you would your office suggest individually or is whenever it's an appropriation, we suggest individually. If they're transfers, you can group them together, but appropriations. So, I I recommend that we um allow the appropriation for the first 115,000. I'll motion to do that. I'll second it. Motion. We have a second. Any discussion? There being none. Jake Bradis. Yes. Carl English. Yes. Bob Dur. Yes. Peterson. Yes. Ron Cub. Yes. We have a motion for the second appropriation 10,21237. I'll make a motion for that for this second appropriation on the list. 10,212 37. We have a motion. We have a second. I'll second that motion. We have a second. Any discussion? There being none. Jake Bradiser. Yes. Carl English. Yes. Bel. Yes. Peterson. Yes. Brad Cub. Yes. All right. The third one was uh out of fund number 4918 for an even $100,000. Need a motion for that appropriation. Brian, I'll motion that we uh appropriate $100,000 for that. restoration. We have a motion. We have a second. I will second the motion. We have a second. Any discussion? There being none, Jake. Brian Weisen. Yes. Carl English. Yes. Dur. Yes. Peterson.

Yes. Brian Keel. Yes. All right. And the final one on my sheet of fun 4918 for $42,732.87. We have a motion. I'll make a motion. We have a motion. We have a second. I'll second that. We have a second. Any discussion? There being none, Jake. Brian Weisen? Yes. Carl English? Yes. Bob Dur? Yes. Mayor Peterson? Yes. Brian Cubell? Yes. All right. We spent a lot of money. What was our budget? We just moved a lot. Technically, we only moved it. We haven't spent it yet. Moved it for potential. We're building a motion to go with probably should. Okay. Yeah. Or the seating. Yeah. Do you want to There's either this or this. Yeah. So, it's just the middle line. Got it. Yeah. Do we want to do the full or do we want to I would just approve the and approve anticipation of later on or basically want it done right now like this. I would just do it right now like this like they recommended about fertilization because we can always just go back and we need to start to think we're having issues with it, but I would just do C and actually So what's what's the number you want for So it'll be 1595. 15905. All right. I'd like to make a motion that we allow D to spend $15,95 for Advanced Turf Solutions to put some grass at AU Keys. I I'll second that. All right, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion on

that? So, we'd be purchasing it from Advanced Turf Solutions and then Cats would be and they would install Yeah, they would. Yeah. And that's a specialty seed that's meant to hold moisture. So, it's it's meant to grow in droughts. Okay. And that that may be a risk down there. So without irrigation needs, you had mentioned cats, but I didn't see it on here, but I just um So yeah, I could send the I had a internal email from Matt Brown that described the process and has on it, but they're Oh yeah, they would do all the work. Yeah, they're out of cats. Have the right cats. Yeah. Road. Yeah. In county. Yeah. In county also. Yeah. They probably know that land. You're invested. You're investing Porter County dollar county. Yep. Motion. Second. Any further discussion? There being none. Jake. Brian Weisen. Yes. Carl English. Yes. Bob Durant. Yes. Harry Peterson. Yes. Brian Cubell. Yes. Now we spent some money. Now how's our budget now? I'll tell you when to stop. I don't see anything in personel working toward all our counselors hired, trained up, and ready to go for June. Yeah. the process resource. How did how did spring break camp go? Good. Awesome.

Nice. Does that mean go play? Is that for is was that for their benefit or yours? How how did you end up busing them? That's awesome. Good. Outstanding. Well done. Thank you. Um I guess with all these uh new programs and camps should probably talk about our accessibility enhancers. Jump right into that. Yeah. So in the packet a it's a lift for improving ADA accessibility for our wagon rides. So Yeah, we'd like to pursue one of those. We've talked about it, I think, for a couple years now just about I think conversations that started last year and I think this year we we actually have money that we could we could buy it with and and pursue it. So, yeah. So, we would like to pursue purchasing or purchase a mobility lift chair lift for one of our wagons and we'll figure out Matt and Matt working on like how we might into one of the wagons. Were you guys able to look for the wagon? See how it might might work?

Space. I research. for the whole thing for the wagon with the thing installed handling. Oh, well, just can I just change my request to Well, yeah, you could fish that corn real quick. I think we because that makes more sense, right? You get it. It's it's it's brand new. Yeah. No, that would be a lot easier as far as you know installing its batteryst is that on side accessibility in the back rear. In the rear both. Awesome. Both. Fantastic. Could I just ask for like a cap of 14,000 to spend on that and keep it under budget? Put an additional appropriation for that. We've got we have 15,000 in capital and that gives us an entirely new additional wagon. Yes. Still have your smaller one. Now you got a bigger one. You got a fleet. Exactly.

They were supposed to come yesterday. in that instance. Yeah. So, what all do we use? So, meet the animals, we have the wagon thing. What else do we use the wagon for? The need for a And I feel like we're not also quite frankly thousands of kids every Absolutely. Do we do we use them for NIPA or hay rides or what else? And then nipple on top of that. I just want Oh, don't No, don't you dare.

Okay. Okay. So, cover the 15 grand's good. You have a picture of it. We'll just use this as a proposal if you don't mind that. Yeah. You started this, brother. Yes, Lance. I can attest to the four times you use it because we see the back of our Y those occasions, right? Yeah. We see our Yeah. Also trunk or treat, right? It's not bad at all. Hey Matt, when you get back, can you do screenshot photo? Yeah, just if you can certainly not you want to see That's why I said you're not circulating pictures of the thing. Thank you very much. I don't need It's under Well, I would like to make a motion that we appropriate the funds to purchase that that ADA accessible wagon. We buy

two not 15,000. Yeah, it's exciting. I second the motion to allocate and purchase this PDA wagon. We have a motion. We have a second discussion. Brian Wesman. Absolutely. Carl English. Yes. Please. Carl Durrence. Yes. Peterson. Yes. Brian Cubell. Yes. Buy ourselves away. All right. Um, anything else under budget that I'm missing? Think that's all of our committee reports. So, well, how about our staff report? Well, we've hit most of it now. Cindy, do you want to talk about the Brinky Cross work that's going on or do you want me to start and then kind of hand that over to you? All right. So, there's been a lot of work going on at at Brinky Cross in collaboration with the Park Foundation. So we did a lot of work on on Daff Hill, the butterfly garden, this whole prairie as well as a lot of hazardous tree removal on the trails. We have a lot for trail heads around the house. So that work is continuing. The inside light update I believe is completed or completed back up and from what I've heard it is night difference on the lighting. So that's that's good to hear. There's a lot lot of good work going on at Cross Linda and Danielle on some more grants. One is one is for those

treatment offset costs associated with that and then other grants for shelter to cover that. What's our time frame on that? It'll depend on Well, we find out community foundation if we get 10 grand from them because that'll then 20 grand to go towards the shelter which is all in cost of about 39 or 29,000 we got concrete so we still have about 20,000 to to still kind offset but we're getting there. We got the building permit for the new shelter by the animal exhibit for the 700 house. We're still just waiting on the commission to make it a legal document or I guess a transfer of document. So follow up with that Kevin. The amphitheater road will take place in about a week or so in mid April. Wait for weather. So we're actually I was I was talking to to Maxwell and we had talked about making our trail switch off the key 10 wide so it can accommodate more usability and emergency access. So in in the spirit of that, we went ahead and bumped that out to 10. So it'll be more vehicle heavy vehicle. So if you do have to back a truck or an ambulance to the get right back. Yep. So I mean a stone shoulder and then once that's set, we'll come back out.

We'll do a dirt shoulder and grass. So grass will be level with it as well up to that point. That way tire off. It doesn't take as talking with Flight Levels Entertainment. They are the parent company to Hometown Jams. So I'm walking around with we got to confirm the time one of those guys tomorrow at the amphitheater and we're gonna talk about some pricing structures and some show scale that we can do at the amphitheater like their first performance or like a summer music concert series and their whole their whole tailored front to back company. So they can run the whole thing for us or they can consult for us on on us running it kind of support expert on it. So then there should be some different price categories because you can put on small medium size performances retail artist or maybe an upandcomer local artist Nashville for 10 $15,000 and that's that's the whole thing and they provide expertise on how to make money offer food trucks. So they they provide that institution that we don't have yet. So, I'm work with them on that. Start working on that first first show because I want the first show to be a good one. I want to I don't want to flop right out of the gate on $400,000 investment. So, I'm gonna work with with these guys. I'll get some estimates and I'll start I'll loop you guys into market and we'll start going from there.

Say you might want to reach out to like supposed they were, you know, big name there too. So we for the county fair. Yep. Her and then Tom on the foundation was actually part of I believe. So he works directly with Hometown J at these shows which we won't get these names because these guys have three phase and the hookups and everything, right? But you know, we can put on a scale appropriately size for us working on the beer gardens. We're going to do we're going to do them all the way through October this year. So, we're gonna add add another one. It's going to be pretty exciting. What What did we do last year? Four of them. You took five this year? Yep. We We left the October date to be determined last year because we weren't we can find a weekend with a little enough competition and good enough weather kind of thing. So, we're actually going to do it the same weekend as Trunk Retreat. We're going to do the same day. So, we'll have it that that weekend. So, it's over here. Yeah. So, we're gonna we're gonna actually stagger it so there's only like a one or two hour like a one hour, hour and a half overlap kind of thing. So, as trunk or treat starts to fizzle out, we're going to find trouble treats. Yeah. And all the adults that are trying to run around kids can can run up to the amphitheater for we'll use the amphitheater area as that. So it'll it'll draw more people out into the rest of the park. We're gonna we're gonna move beer to the for that one event. So it'll be monstrosity, but

it'll be interesting. We really test how many cars we can fit in and out of sens. Are we gonna be laughing with October? Probably not. I'm gonna I'm gonna That's the October J. Yeah. And the programming is starting to ramp up. You know, we had we had the spring break camp that well the field trips are going well. Meet the animals. We got that tomorrow. I stay tomorrow. Beautiful. Yeah, decent tomorrow. Imagine little sloppy but are showing growth. She actually one of our programs hit capacity here just the other day. Awesome. So, so we're getting getting all the way around. Yeah, the guys are hard at work building all the parts. I keep stuff to go out there. Hawk Ridge, the big one right now. The stones down, work on the fence, the fence roads all cleared out basically at this point. We're going to repair the fence and then paint it. The maps that break up. Yeah. Yeah. So, it'll be identical to break up. We're going to sign a We're trying to figure out how to make maps. We don't have the software that he used to make the old maps anymore for the person. So, so we're at scratch from from those. Luckily, he stayed long enough to where sunset was accurate. So, we're going to figure that out. Oh, yep. And we've hired Karen from the office. She is going to help with rentals, office administration, customer service, and things like that. And that's real real good level of

consistency up at the front as far as how we handle rentals customer service and stuff like that and getting information to where it needs to go so somebody doesn't get lost in treat and that's going to help good and miss Jackie I see here that you're continuing your final certification what's your what's certifications CPI So there are you. Well, thank you for doing that. Yeah, thank you very much for doing that. So that is already [Laughter] So that is through NERPA, the National Recreation Parks Association. So they are the big name in park standard across the country. So They they're a huge advocacy group, big resource group, a big continue education group. And so they are they're also the company that you can do like your playground inspection certification, your water operator certification. So they're they're essentially as far as parks and agencies. Well, good luck. Any questions on that? That's all we got. How is our summer camp sign up? I think we're just about full. I haven't yet in a couple days. Is it pretty close to full summer camp? Yeah.

The little camp too. Outstanding. Well done. That's awesome. Was it 105? 115 105. So it's 105 kids a week. We'll continue. I have trouble writing too little. So questiona He's He's still ghosting you, huh? We ran out of packs. I figured we shop around, too. But at this point, I think there's a there's another one out east bend way out there. Plymouth stuff. I think there's some out there. Yeah, I know there's a couple more. I know. Perfect. Ghost. If there's nothing else, we'll move on to our other partners. Uh again, remember when you address the board, if you can do it from the table, that way we catch everybody's voice. And as usual, we'll start with NIPA. Hello. Hi, Deb. How are you? Deb Armstrong with the Tractor Club, Northern Indiana Historical Power Association. Um pretty quiet this time of year, but we're getting ready to gear up. Um we had our first membership meeting this

past week and we'll have our um board meeting next weekend. Next Wednesday, we'll be talking about our budget. Um We're gonna start in try to schedule out building maintenance program. Maybe we'll get some input from Jake on that. Um, let's see. Uh, our 2025 show will feature the Oliver tractor, which known as the other green tractor, but we're also we're having the Oliver Gang, which is a regional club. We've been doing that the last several years. Last year, we had that national show, so we've been trying to get national clubs or state clubs, regional clubs to host their um gathering at our show. Brings in a lot of people from a little bit farther away. So um we're excited about that. Um next year 2026 show will be our 50th anniversary show which is really exciting. So we're going to have a battle of the brands kind of you know we welcome all all color tractors. Mine are mostly rust colored, but um we're excited about that. So, I think we gonna be digging into some getting out some historical photos, things like that. So, gearing up our web page for that. Um we're really interested in your discussion about the wagon. We've been looking to um procure a wagon for ourselves, too. So, maybe we can have some discussion before that's finalized. We've been borrowing Lake County Tractor Club's wagon um which is a liability issue for them. We've tried to tap into the um fair boards tractors but they don't want to those out. Um but we would like to get in discussion about the um absolutely the

handicap wagon. Um let's see. Um we had the ape group at our last meeting a board meeting and they've partnered uh I believe it's American Legion so they hope to have extra hands on debt to be able to do the haunted trails this year. We'll partner with them. So that's exciting. Um we're going to have a plow day. I think it's April 27th maybe. We'll let Jake know for sure. Um, are the haunted trails on foot or wagon as well? Uh, wagon. Wagon. Um, but yeah, we're planning a plow day um for planting field work and planting this coming up in April. Um, I don't think I have anything else. You guys have questions for NA? No, just any of the maintenance stuff. Just make sure keeping Jake and definitely I think our Jake and your Jake talk quite a bit quite a bit. So it's been a really good partnership really tickled to they'll be out there every year and be part of the demonstrations, the crop demonstrations. I think that's an important part of what the park offers. Um at our show last fall, we did have a lot of people that were there for the first time um and just so many compliments on the in the facilities. Everybody loves coming to the show there because there's plenty of shade. There's a lot to do and so it's been a great partnership. That show is great because it taps in origins of the park as a farm and keeps that all great partnership. It does. Um Oh, education day. We're reaching out to get a hold of you to

um we still have a good really good volunteer coordinator that's helped us get hands on deck. We partnered with Washington Township Key Club and Portage ROC and she's had another Purdue Equestrian Group and a couple other smaller groups that our volunteer coordinator is working with to get us extra hands on deck. So, really exciting. If you need let me know. And there are groups at Chester High School Key Club. Oh, yeah. NHS, different groups that need service hours. Sure. not sure would enjoy it. It's right there. Yeah. And I think RJ has been talking to you about maybe about the um the building trades. I know you guys have scheduled out things for them to do, but we have other projects too with building maintenance that we could share. No, I think I think they'd be a big asset for some of those projects. Especially Purdue if you replace entire I think they just did something and She'll I think she'll do it. Great. Yeah, we need to partner with them. We do. We do for both just the technical part of it and the experience and the expense. Right. Right. Benefits everybody. Right. They're always projects. Oh yeah. Well, there's plenty between uh some of the electrical work too. I don't know their qualifications. Jake, uh would they work through you or through Kevin or both? Probably both. Okay. Or I'll make I can make the initial contact. Yeah. Great. All right. Probably our Jake will be in touch with Yeah. Yeah. If he just talk I'll send both Kevin, right? So the other Kevin is the civil engineer and they get access to equipment. So Bob gets

tractors. So if you have in the conversation too. So if you got some, you know, concrete work like heavy machinery, I think, um, in our next board meeting, we're going to try to, um, finalize which one we're going to put our efforts in first, but think it might be the chicken, but had a lot of time roof and siding and Yeah. And the trees. But it's a low angled rook, so it's not as high pitched as some of the other rooks. So, all right. Well, any questions? Thank you, D. Thank you. Thank you. All right. How about the railroad? Good evening, everybody. Good evening, France. How are you? Wonderful. Wonderful. Can everybody hear me? Okay. Yes, sir. All right. Thank you. Um, things we got coming up. Unfortunately, the with the weather looking like it's going to be cooler and raining on Saturday, the mom's group reached out to us and they're going to have a a much smaller event this weekend than what they anticipated. Plus, it looks like it's going to rain all day on Saturday, which is not very conducive for anyone. Okay. So, we're going to stay in touch with them and hopefully put something together later in the year. I don't know exactly when yet. Imagine when their availability and of course we're there on Saturdays anyhow. Okay. So that was unfortunate. So we will not be out there this weekend for the Easter egg hunt. Um April 12th though and 26 we have work days schedule coming up. Going to be doing ballasting um just general cleanup weeding um of

the of the area the 12th and the 26th. And Mr. I caught your u uh suggestion. Uh our our vice president, Ray Rakowski, one of our vice presidents, his daughter Stephanie works at the front desk and she checked into it and we'd be looking, we're trying to confirm to get one of the groups at Chesterton to help us out. And the biggest thing they could do is obviously the hauling of the ballast. We're going to bring some more ballots down. hauling of the ballast. And one of the things we want to do is mark the spots for the uh for the railroad ties, you know, to put in. What we're looking to do is just peel back that that side, you know, just at those specific spots, put gravel down, get the get the railroad ties down, but basically mark the spots so that the park when um when you know you folks get together and use the skid steer, you know exactly where where we could use help for that. So, do I need to speak with you or further after this or who do we need to go to to confirm that? Yeah. So, let's talk and uh then I can work with our principal and what organizations would be interested in helping out. What kind of it might be a team, it might be. Sure. You know, and uh if if not the 12th because the 12th is coming up. I mean, it's only a week from Saturday. We've got time to do it for the 26th. Okay. And that's a Saturday. Yes, sir. Yeah, they're both Saturdays. What time? We're looking uh 10 o'clock to 2 o'clock both days. Teenagers might be up by 10. Any We'd have a problem if you were Well, we've got some older individuals that getting up them out there by 10 might be rough, too. So, you have tools and

stuff. Yes. Yeah, we we You just need bodies. We just need bodies. All right. Yeah, the Chesterton High School football coach had reached out to us and said that their team, they make them do volunteer hours. So, you maybe'll get some of the Chesterton football team out. Excellent. Because I've been friends with Coach Peterson from all the years I coached in Chester and Pop Warner. I've known Coach Pete for a long time. I'll talk to Mark tomorrow if you would please. Yeah. And and just let him know it's me. It's Lance. He'll know Lance from Pop Warner. Absolutely. Got it, Lance. All right. I'm on it. Okay. Thank you, sir. Um, let's see. After that, um, I will be emailing, uh, Jake and Jackie. We've set our schedule for our, um, our special events like our circus day, Thomas Day, things like that. So, I won't delay bringing them all out. Now, we usually do like one special day a month, but I can get get you that schedule. But, at least for the upcoming, for the short term, May 3rd, we're going to call it a soft opening. What it is is we'll be operating some of the trains, but still be doing some work out there post, you know, the 26th, Saturday the the 3. However, May 10th is our official opening day. That's when we're going to have the scenery out there, all the uh the trains running, you know, on the on the big layout and the small layout. The ones after that, like June, July, August, things like that, we'll go ahead and I'll email it to both of you. Um we board sat now. We've established all those days. Um, we're also adding um in the middle of June, you're all aware of the Southshore Brass Band, okay? They love to come out there. Um, Phil Han is a uh longtime contributor to the club and he reached out to me and and in June on a Sunday, we'll be having them out there. Um, it'll actually be June 22nd. I can tell you already we're going to have them. I don't know the times yet, but I'll get

that, you know, confirmed with you. But what they do is they set up the brass band right out there by the layout. Perform a concert. We run the trains. They'll do, you know, their songs. They'll do railroad songs. It's it's it's a nice gathering of another group that comes out there that they've asked with us before. It's worked out really well. Can we go back to the railroad ties real quick? Do you Yes, sir. Railroad ties. We do. Okay. They are all out there. If it's the National Honor Society, they're not moving the railroad ties. The offensive line probably if it's the up the football team. Yeah, there might be a balance in the pack. Yeah. So, if we have football team out there, we may be able to do um all of it, not just mark it, but they could physically carry and put put the ties in place, right? We were anticipating. We didn't know who who we might get to help. So, definitely, you know, peeling side, putting the gravel, and you know, loving leveling that pretty much anybody can can do that. We were gonna be relying on the skid steer to at least get them in in the in the rough at least get them rough spot. It's not hard to foot rail from my memory is about 200 lb about 200 lb. Yeah. We need two big folks football. So if it's offensive lineman that's a squat workout, right? I'm an old lineman myself in high school and college. I can't. Okay. Well, good. I'm I'm excited about talking to Mark because Great. potentially get it all done in one day. Would you uh um after after this is over, can I give you my direct number? Mark can call me directly, too. My contacts and I'll let you know what he says. Absolutely. Thank you, sir. Um really, let's see. Other than that, uh um for everybody involved with Camp Funset, we've talked to our membership and yes, we're excited about um coming out and reestablishing the day that we run

trains, whether that's a Friday, Thursday, you know, whatever it is. So, you know, we when we mentioned at our last meeting, they said, "Yeah, we're we're excited about uh getting back out there." So when we're doing camp fun, especially with all the kids you're going to have out there, we we're lining up people to do that. So what's that? Yep. And yeah, what's that? That's fine. We'll coordinate that. We'll do that with me and Karen Sar. She's our secretary. Other than that, that is it in the short quick term. Okay. Yep. Thank you. Very good. Yeah, let's get together right after this. Thank you, Lance. All right. How about the park foundation? Nothing. Okay. We have any public comments? There being none, is there a motion for adjournment? Motion signify by saying I. I have it. Thank you everybody. Let's get out of gentlemen. All right. Yes. Good luck, buddy. There's people actually It's a good I don't know.

So yeah, I don't know. I was on I was like I've got I have one. Oh yeah, the game. That's what I love. She goes, I'm gonna do this. Okay. Yes. I have a question. I said I know the guy. Yeah. So, a couple years ago would have affected the the way they have the way they chang we move money. We only spent we only spent about 15 authoriz I don't I don't know for the for the pictures of that That's what I think.

That's really awesome. Yeah. So, you won't be anonymous any Sometimes it's better at least with Mike J.