Parks & Recreation Advisory Board

Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services Advisory Board Meeting Minutes Wednesday, December 4, 2019 | 6:30 p.m. | 5th floor City Hall, Canty Conference Room Members Present: Shawn O’Keefe, Steven Raudman, Dr. Norman Merrifield, Jennifer Colton Members Absent: Kathy Dermanis Staff Present: David McCauley, Alison Eubank Guest(s) Present: Jen Parker Art Thatcher Opening Business  Call to Order - Mr. Shawn O’Keefe called the meeting to order at 6:30 p.m.  Approval of Minutes – Mr. Raudman motioned that the minutes for the November 6, 2019 meeting be accepted as amended, Ms. Eubanks seconded. Motion passed. Events & Items of Interest Event Date Time Location Santa’s Attic Arts & Crats Fair Dec. 13 10:00am – 5:00pm City Hall Arboretum Tours Dec. 14 10:00am - 11:15am Bluebird Gap Farm Holly Days Open House Dec. 14 10:00am – 4:00pm Hampton History Museum Carousel Park & Hampton Selfies with Santa Dec. 14 1:00pm – 6:00pm Carousel Carousel Park & Hampton Hampton Holly Days Parade Dec. 14 6:00pm – 8:00pm Carousel Working, Building & Racing on Through Dec.31 10:00am-5:00pm Hampton History Museum the Water exhibit  Director McCauley introduced special guest speaker, Art Thatcher with GreenPlay. The lead project manager for Parks Master Plan and a resident of Hampton. Director McCauley Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services 22 Lincoln Street | Hampton, Virginia 23669 www.hampton.gov | P: (757) 727-6348 instructed board members to view presentation and provide any questions or concerns. This is an opportunity to assist with Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services direction. Art Thatcher Presentation – Hampton Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services Master Plan GreenPlay LLC – Experienced consultants that continue to research, to teach and work with communities all over the country. They bring the best practices and experience from their national work of over 550 projects. A customized approach to create a Master Plan (MP) that will help Hampton thrive. Parks and Recreation Master Plan Parks, Recreation and Leisure Services Advisory Board Briefing December 4, 2019 The team reviewed the request for proposal, began the kick off with the project team and work with the community. The vision of the master plan was to be realistic, inspirational, look at redevelopment and reuse, re-imaging of our assets and also repurposing some of our facilities and amenities we currently have within our system. Mr. Thatcher shared pictures of our current assets that we can build on and enhance. They look at current projects we are doing such as the Hampton 20-40 plan and Resilient Hampton to ensure the Hampton Parks Master Plan compliments those planning opportunities and other community plans that are going on like the Fox Hill Neighborhood Center and the Hampton Aquatic Center which is being developed. Park System Benefits Social aspect – playing, education and community safety Environment aspect Mental health – time spent outside is a great stress reliever Economic benefits of parks – land values (homes around parks typically are 10% higher in value), tourism, sport tourism, historical tourism, etc. People are moving into communities because of the parks, aesthetics, bike trails, etc. See this happening in downtown Hampton, Phoebus area, and in Buckroe. Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services 22 Lincoln Street | Hampton, Virginia 23669 www.hampton.gov | P: (757) 727-6348 Process • Strategic Kick-off (June – July 2019) Started process, setting goals and vision • Community Engagement (August 2019) Focus groups, stakeholder meetings, leadership interviews. Provided a public presentation at Hampton Roads Convention Center and work session. • Inventory (August 2019) Toured all Hampton’s parks, walked the trails and looked at all amenities. Identifying, inventorying and mapping the amenities. Along with doing an existing condition ranking. • Level of Service Analysis (September 2019) Inspected and ranked current conditions of amenities. An Existing Conditions Report was provided with the cost involved to bring the “1’s” to at least a “2” standard. Condition Rank 1-3: 1- May not be functioning the way it was designed to function. (Need to be replaced or a major repair) 2- Functioning in the way it was designed but needs TLC (Needs extra ground cover or a coat of paint) 3- Operating above (New playground equipment, a new backstop just installed) • Survey (December 2019) – Currently in the Survey Process Conducting a Statistically Valid survey; mailed 3500 surveys to random sampling of households in the City of Hampton. Survey can be done on paper copy that was mailed or on line; already receiving feedback. (TBD - December 2019) An Open link survey will be done so that anyone in the community can take the survey. The link will be provided to share and push out through your social media contacts. (Hoping to push that out around Dec. 11 or 13) Also encourage the neighborhood associations to get survey out to their communities. • Findings Presentation - Once all data is back and analyst is complete, GreenPlay will do a findings presentation at a community workshop. o Community Workshop #1 (TBD – January 28, 2020) Will present the outcomes, inventory, the initial service analyst, recapping what was heard at the community engagement and be presenting the community work shop and the data from the survey. Looking at similar themes “saturation point” of the information. There will be some table top work. Looking at some opportunities for some conceptual thoughts around some redevelopment of parks, repurposing park areas, etc. o Community Workshop #2 (TBD 2020) Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services 22 Lincoln Street | Hampton, Virginia 23669 www.hampton.gov | P: (757) 727-6348  • Visioning Workshop (January 2020) with the project team. Looking at the Key Issues matrix; where issues were heard and how they were prioritized. Begin to look at recommendations how we would go about approaching each one of those issues. Possibly attend a board meeting and share the Key Issues matrix and get feedback and recommendations. • Draft Recommendations Presentation (TBD) develop draft recommendations and actions. Begin to put together the draft master plan which GreenPlay will come back and present. Will be taking a pause during the election time. • Draft & Final Plan Presentation (TBD) working on drafts and recommendations behind the scenes with the project team. Will do a public presentation of those to get feedback from the community. Then draft final plan and bring it to the advisory board and take it to the City council for final adoption. Priorities - Public Meeting Focus Group • Creating amazing spaces • Addressing preferred maintenance • Addressing personnel service goals • Taking care of what we currently have • Need for Aquatic Center • The sustainably • Working with Resilient Hampton • Increasing water activities and the connections to water • Communication in marketing • Interest in adventure and recreation • Emphasis on Darling Stadium as town jewel • Looking at conservation opportunities Looked at the results from the Public Workshop you see some reoccurring themes: • Maintaining what we have • Connection to the water • Creating amazing places • Creating connectivity – walking, biking • The sustainability • Communicating in Marketing • Way finding – some signage is old & dated, some parks are not well known • Desire for an Aquatic Center • Reimagining and repurposing some existing parks and spaces • Nontraditional sports and activities – Pippa ball, Pitztal, Cricket • Developing resources Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services 22 Lincoln Street | Hampton, Virginia 23669 www.hampton.gov | P: (757) 727-6348 Questions and Discussions: Dr. Merrifield – Is governance being looked at in relationship to Virginia State Law and other successful Parks and Recreation departments across the county in terms of educating our elected officials? Mr. Thatcher - Yes, we do. We are looking at the organizational structure of the department and other departments and organizational structures that have been successful. Hampton is unique in many cases to many locations around the country with your kind of neighborhood centers philosophy and your governance models for those centers. A group of former directors got together and had a work session over a 6-month period. They looked at the neighborhood centers and reengaging them. GreenPlay has that data and is looking at how that plays into the master plan and to providing services to the community. Those are all pieces of what the final plan will incorporate. Dr. Merrifield – It’s critical because at the very least they need to know what has been successful in the country. Whether or not some of those systems are acceptable here is not the point, really it is for the elected officials to know, generally speaking, the requirements or what has been found to be successful in the State of Virginia as well as around the county. Most of them are semi-independent systems because of the sustainability that they provide and other factors; they are critical. Everything else is really secondary. Parks is different from Education. You can ask the public about problematic things that they are interested in but you cannot ask the public about systems. The system has to be the best you can make it or the success rate is just ok. Merrifield Inquired – Are you keeping the data from the Statistically Valid and Open Link survey separate? Mr. Thatcher – Yes, they are kept separate. Merrifield – Not interested in the questionnaire, but at a later time would like to know how those research questions were developed and what that constituted. Mr. Thatcher – Brief answer / we develop our surveys from the information gathered from the focus groups and the work session. We customize the survey and the survey questions to the community. It’s a needs assessment. Will still sit down in the near future and provide more detail. Director McCauley – Did we give you all the asset inventory information you needed? Mr. Thatcher – As far as I know we got it all. Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services 22 Lincoln Street | Hampton, Virginia 23669 www.hampton.gov | P: (757) 727-6348 (NOTE: Parks did not have an accurate inventory since Director McCauley has been director. He had to brief council on the program prior to Art Thatcher coming on board and provide inventory. His uneasiness about the inventory had him start thinking about all the waterways in Hampton. He came across an old brochure Art Thatcher put together on waterways. Director McCauley, Alison, a GIS Person along with a couple of staff started digging. He is now comfortable with the inventory list.) Director McCauley – Would you do a presentation for the Neighborhood Centers Commission? Mr. Thatcher – Yes, sure. Director McCauley – Of the 3,500 surveys mailed out, what does success look like as far as feedback? Mr. Thatcher - 10% is a good result; will keep the department posted on the numbers. Director reemphasized he wants the board to be kept engaged throughout this process because he wants their opinions to help shape the MP. Request was made for advisory board minutes to be sent out sooner, within five business days if possible. Ms. Eubanks – The statistically valid mailed survey and the open link survey are the exact same survey and questions. Location of where they are completed is different in order to compare responses. Working on getting surveys out to the schools; believe that will be coded differently also. Peachjar was recommended as a tool to send out items to the schools. Hampton MP Survey.pdf The MP Public meeting is scheduled for January 28, 2020, at the Hampton Convention Center.  Director’s Updates – Three briefings going to council next week • Fox Hill Neighborhood Center is moving along well • Old Hampton Neighborhood Center – Public meeting tomorrow night at the Gospel Spreading Church of God (300 Lincoln St. Hampton) to vet the idea of what the Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services 22 Lincoln Street | Hampton, Virginia 23669 www.hampton.gov | P: (757) 727-6348  building is going to look like, layout, function, rooms, amenities, etc. The City is looking to spend the exact same amount at each center. • Buckroe Boardwalk – Assist. City Manager DeProfio will brief council Dec. 11, 2019. James T. Wilson Fishing Pier – (Barge hit pier) Over 1000 liner square feet taken out leaving over 6000. Not as bad as originally thought, able to save the building. Barge also hit observation pier and took out one of the pylons behind the stage. Person responsible was insured and under contract with public works. Hope to get back to normal business late next summer. Financially Sustainability Work Group – Currently looking at the different fees throughout Parks. Looking at our goal, do we want our programs to be self-sustaining or quality of life? We have some of both. We want our contracted programs to be self-sustaining. As far as when we are running the program we are looking more at quality of life. Group is looking at doing a cost study on our membership fees at our Neighborhood and Community Centers and the James T. Wilson fishing pier and golf courses. A draft recommendation for a new membership fee structure has been done for the James T. Wilson pier, Golf Courses and Community Centers and has been vetted with Parks’ staff; just got comments back yesterday. The Aquatics Center membership is included in the draft. Currently still working on fee structure, Director McCauley may vet with the advisory board in the near future. Ms. Jen Colton – Senior ladies have informed her it’s cheaper for them to pay an out of city fee in Newport News and get unlimited use then to pay for passes in Hampton where they live. Discussion regarding non-referring funds - fees that go into a different account. (The golf course is an enterprise account.) Some departments have separate accounts and that sets the structure up for special programs vs general programs. It was suggested to look at that with the financial manager(s). The consultants could help. It does not necessarily have to be defined as an enterprise. An afternoon school program can be an enterprise also. Mr. O’Keefe - When Parks ran the before and afternoon school program that Healthy Families does now, they had a separate account. Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services 22 Lincoln Street | Hampton, Virginia 23669 www.hampton.gov | P: (757) 727-6348  Question to ask: Your special fee-based activities be placed in a non-reverting enterprise type of fund, itemized. You have to appropriate the money; it does not go into the general fund. This will benefit your non-revenue facilities, activities which are your social activities, your parks. Look at what Parks is putting into the schools; Darling Stadium is also an area to look into. This is a revenue plan; more than just looking at your fees. This is a basic process. Dave advised he needs to look at this for the Aquatic Center. Mr. O’Keefe – Y. H. Thomas was the 1st neighborhood center; the 2nd was Salina Street. Salina Street is where John Tyler Elementary school is located. Tyler Elementary school was opened up after school as a free neighborhood center. That was the original model for the neighborhood centers. It was to open up schools after hours for recreational opportunities. He ran the after-school program at the Salina Street Neighborhood Center for Parks and Recreation. One of the reasons why Parks did the maintenance on the school grounds was because they were allowed access to the schools. That agreement was not in writing. Meeting Date Change – Steven Raudman motioned to move the PR&LS Advisory Board meetings to the first Tuesday of every month, Dr. Merrifield seconded. Motion passed. Meeting end – There being no further business, Dr. Merrifield motioned and Jen Parker seconded. The meeting was adjourned at 7:48 p.m. Next Meeting: Tuesday, February 4, 2020 @ 6:30 p.m. 5th floor City Hall, Canty Conference Room Parks, Recreation & Leisure Services 22 Lincoln Street | Hampton, Virginia 23669 www.hampton.gov | P: (757) 727-6348