Board of Parks & Recreation

Parks Board Minutes APPROVED 3/27/23 PRESENT: Ken Hesson, P.A. Bowler, Mike Pike, Jimmy Head, Jeremiah Bennett, Jill Rathert, Lee Peterson, Thom Golden, Mahlon Hellman, Andy Gilley, Keith Bruce, Trevor Cole, Wade Evans, Orey Fugate ABSENT: Bubba Perry CALL TO ORDER / OPENING PRAYER: Ken Hesson called the meeting to order and led the opening prayer. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE APPROVAL OF AGENDA: A motion to approve the agenda by Mike Pike, 2nd by Jeremiah Bennett. All in favor. CITIZENS COMMENTS: None APPROVAL OF MINUTES: A motion to approve February 27, 2023, minutes made by Mike Pike, 2nd by P.A. Bowler. All in favor. OLD BUSINESS Park Project Updates – Andy Gilley • LPRF Grant from State of Tennessee – We are on step 16 of 18 with the State LPRF grant for the soccer turf and Rugby lights. • Security Cameras – We are working on the next round of security cameras to be installed at the Civitan Quad concessions area and the fields adjacent. That will be a huge help. • Pickleball at Senior Center – We will have a design contract for the new Pickleball installation at the Hendersonville Senior Center in the next week. NEW BUSINESS Social Indoor Advertising Proposal – Doug Wilson Andy Gilley is explaining this proposal in Doug Wilson’s absence. He stated that a few years ago at this point, Civitan had a program with a group called Graffiti Advertising to put up advertisements in various facilities in the park. It’s been a great thing as they have been able to donate back to the Civitan Club which in turn has allowed them to help us with special projects. Social Indoor Advertising purchased Graffiti Advertising so there was a need to redo the contract. At this point we thought it was best for the civic groups involved, if the contract, since it is the city’s facilities is with the City of Hendersonville, but it states withing the contract that the revenues will be split and go toward clubs that are driving traffic to those facilities with the understanding that they will still help us with those special projects. Social Indoor is probably something you have seen in restaurants throughout the city. They can also use digital boards which gives a lot of flexibility with advertising. The Parks and the City will receive two of those spots at no charge. This contract will go to Public Works tonight and then it will go to the Board of Mayor and Alderman next month. Motion 1 Parks Board Minutes APPROVED 3/27/23 to recommend this contract with Social Indoor to BOMA for approval by Jimmy Head, 2nd by Jill Rathert. All in favor. USSSA Slowpitch Softball – Jason Campbell Jason Campbell is the State Director for USSSA Slowpitch Softball. He stated that we would like to be approved to host a tournament for adult slowpitch softball. Wade Evans explained that he needs to be approved as a tournament director even though we haven’t already settled on dates. Jason stated that they also do the Jim Beam Classic tournament. For that tournament, the lowest we ever had was 80 teams that year. This tournament would be women/men and co-ed. We will have a senior program in the future. Motion to approve Jason Campbell as a tournament director by Jimmy Head, 2nd by Mike Pike. All in favor. Jae and Zeke Foundation Event – Jamie Johnson Jamie Johnson stated that the Jae and Zeke Foundation was started in 2021 after the tragic loss of Jessie Binkley and her 9-year-old son, Zeke Iacob, when they were murdered in their home. We partnered with the City Parks Hendersonville Jam series in the summer of 2021 to have a concert for the benefit of our foundation that was just kicking off at that time. Now what our board would like to do is have a Christian Concert in Sanders Ferry Park and the vision is to have this event supported by all the local churches. We would like this concert to be free of charge on Saturday, September 16th. This would obviously be a non- alcohol event. We anticipate this to be at a minimum of 5,000 people. We would like this to be a kid and family friendly event. Mike Pike asked if there was a way to handle the food trucks differently to allow this non-profit to make more money. Motion to approve concert at Sanders Ferry Park with vendor fees going back to Jae & Zeke foundation and facility fee will be waived by Jill Rathert, 2nd by Mahlon Hellman. Hendersonville Titans Cornhole Tournament & Silent Auction – Rachel Taylor Rachel Taylor is the Cheer Director for Hendersonville Civitan. This fundraiser is to help us get the program off its feet as we just started back up last year after covid. This money will give us a little more cushion to be able to offer scholarships for those who may not be able to afford it and make sure our coaches’ training is not coming out of their own pocket. We are also hoping to bring in a competition team this year so this money will help with those fees and travel costs. We are hoping to do a corn hole tournament at Drakes Creek Park on the football field. We will divide it into a singles tournament, teams’ tournament, and a kid’s tournament. We will also have a silent auction. Motion to approve this event fundraiser by Thom Golden, 2nd by Jill Rathert. All in favor. Bodies Race Company Hometown Half Marathons – Meaghan Weygandt Meaghan Weygandt stated that this race is part of a Hometown Half series. We would like to have this event on May 27th at Veterans Park starting at 8:00am. The setup would be at 6:00am. Wade Evans stated that he is working with Meaghan on a route for this Half Marathon which would start and end at Veterans Park. The only thing we would need to get clearance on is that they would have to cross the actual road behind Sam’s Club and HPD would be made aware as well. Meaghan stated that they have these all over the nation, but this series is special to the Hometown Half Series in the State of Tennessee. Motion to approve event by Jeremiah Bennett, 2nd by Jill Rathert. All in favor. Event Application Update – Wade Evans Wade Evans stated that we had an Athletic Committee Meeting last month where they discussed some of the ways that we can make changes to aid with medical procedures at sporting events. We have added to the event application a place where it says, “will emergency assistance be provided?” We also added “please specify medical provision and point of contact number.” We will also work with them to come up with a plan before it even comes to the Parks Board for approval. Andy Gilley added that he spoke to the mayor and the COO and the items that we added here do not need to go to BOMA for approval. Motion to approve Event Application updates by Jill Rathert, 2nd by Thom Golden. All in favor. 2 Parks Board Minutes APPROVED 3/27/23 STAFF REPORTS Recreation Coordinator – Keith Bruce shared Cindy’s report. The special needs egg hunt is tomorrow at Mary’s Magical Place. This means that the playground will be closed to the public from about 2:30pm – 7:00pm. There are three different sessions. There are 25 signed up for RAPTORS Baseball and will start meeting this coming Friday. They will meet on either field 1 or field 3 for the rest of the season. Registration for RAPTORS Kickball will begin May 1st and end May 12th. Kids Club will be at Whitten Elementary and will be June 12th – July 14th. If anyone is interested in working or volunteering with Kids Club, we will have applications at the Parks Department April 11-21st. Please email Cindy at chamblin@hvilletn.org if you have questions. Athletic Coordinator – Orey Fugate stated that adult softball started last Monday with seven teams total. Kickball was supposed to start last Friday but was rained out so will being this coming Friday. Summer 5U & 6U T-ball and Quickball registration begins today and runs through April 19th. Men’s Open Basketball registration begins April 3rd and runs through April 28th, and we will have a max number of 16 teams. Special Events Supervisor – Wade Evans stated that this past weekend was busy in the parks as we had something going on in every location, including shelter rentals. This weekend we have normal league play and a couple of groups coming in. Unfortunately, the Kid Rock concert is not happening, but we do have some really great Hometown Jam concerts in the works right now and some other big events. Parks Maintenance Superintendent – Trevor Cole stated that we are getting back into the swing of things. This past weekend was a bit hectic but kudos to the maintenance staff for getting fields ready. A couple of projects we are working on are de-winterizing and opening the restrooms and fountains and then at Sanders Ferry Park we are about to start pressure washing all the shelters. We are also going through and starting to fix some of the storm damage issues. Assistant Parks Director – Keith Bruce shared Dallas’s report. Rec soccer was supposed to start this past Saturday the 25th but they got rained out. TUSC soccer officially started games and the big TUSC tournament will be April 21-23. Middle School Soccer season is ongoing until April. HHS Soccer had their JV tournament this past weekend. Flag Football was also supposed to start Saturday and they were rained out so there are a lot of makeups going on. The Lacrosse season is ongoing through April, and we are looking forward to having lights added to the Lacrosse fields at Memorial Park. Rugby season is ongoing, and the big Nash Bash tournament is coming up in April. Assistant Parks Director – Keith Bruce stated that Fast Pitch is practicing and has a couple more weeks and April 10th is their first set of games. The Hockey Rinks were used for a very large tournament this past weekend. Middle School Fastpitch tournaments start tonight and will finish up this week. Middle School Baseball is ongoing with games. Civitan games started two weeks ago. Senior Men Softball will start mid- April with a couple divisions and the older division will begin May 1st. The High School Softball, Baseball and Tennis teams with TSSAA started about two weeks now with games they will go until about mid-May when district tournaments start. Parks Director — Andy Gilley stated that he wants to thank the members of the Hendersonville Inline Hockey Association that had some folks out as early as 4:00am in order to clean up rain so that everyone could start playing Saturday morning. Net Elite is hosting a tournament in conjunction with the Atlanta Braves this weekend for 12U and 10U division and Friday night Mark Wohler’s, former professional baseball pitcher for the Braves, is coming to speak to the kids. We have several promotions and a couple of new employees. We are about to full staff. We are looking for part-time workers. Budget discussions are underway. You guys will see our budget proposal to make recommendations in April or May. Orey and the staff have been working with Ms. White at the Senior Center about some opportunities for senior recreation. We hope you will see some of those ideas come forth in the next couple of months. I want to thank Brian 3 Parks Board Minutes APPROVED 3/27/23 Whitaker with the Civitan Club. They have agreed to purchase some new hats and shirts for our maintenance staff. ROUND TABLE P.A. Bowler – None. Mike Pike – None. Thom Golden – None. Jeremiah Bennett – None. Jill Rathert – None. Jimmy Head – If there were any hectic things happening in the parks this weekend, you could not tell it. It was really busy and hats off to everyone who was working. Mahlon Hellman – None. Bubba Perry – None. Lee Peterson – None. Ken Hesson – Thank you to this group for all the support you’ve given me through these medical issues. I could not make it without this support. It has meant the world to me. Motion to adjourn by Mike Pike, 2nd by P.A. Bowler. All in favor. Meeting adjourned at 6:43 p.m. Respectfully submitted, __________________________________ ________________________________ Ken Hesson, Chairman Kristen Emerson, Administrative Assistant II 4