Zionsville Board of Park and Recreation

Summary Minutes of the Meeting of the Zionsville Park and Recreation Board November 9, 2011 The Zionsville Board of Park and Recreation met Wednesday, November 9, 2011 at 7:00 PM. Ellen Butz, Steven Mueller, Scott Bruns, and Neil Clements were present. Board member Phil Howard was unable to attend. Matt Dickey, Superintendent, and Roger Burrus, Park Board Attorney were also present. Minutes Scott Bruns made a motion to approve the October 12, 2011 regular board meeting minutes as presented. Steve Mueller seconded and the motion passed unanimously. Public Comments/Presentations Mr. John Ulmer, with Eagle Creek Watershed Alliance, requested approval of an interpretative sign to be placed at the USGS gauge station. The sign will be at no expense to the Board or Town and would be placed between near the path so as to be easily read by those utilizing the trail surface. The Board needs to approve the sign since it is on Park property. Ellen noted that there is a new sign package approved and the Board would like all signs to look the same. She would like Matt to have a final approval of this proposed sign's message, materials and look, as well as it's placement to ensure it matches the new look and is placed appropriately at the site. Mr. Ulmer also discussed the USGS proposal to upgrade the instrumentation at the site and requested permission of the Park Board for that upgrade to occur. Mr. Burrus asked about potential vandalism and sign replacement. Mr. Ulmer stated he did not think this sign would be vandalized, but he thinks it would be easy to replace the sign if it were to be damaged. There was no discussion of how any such potential sign repair would be funded. Mr. Mueller stated he liked the sign and the overall message being conveyed. Steve Mueller made a motion to approve, pending final approval from the Park Superintendent once design and location are finalized. Scott Bruns seconded and the motion passed unanimously. Mr. Dickey noted there are also plans to upgrade the power at this USGS site and these upgrades will be placed as part of the instrument upgrade. Ellen was concerned the new instrumentation might be highly visible and wants it to be placed below the water line or inside the shack. She would like written assurance of this. Mr. Dickey mentioned that a USGS Email included some written documentation on this point. Mr. Clements made a motion to approve the proposed power upgrades and to give final approval authority to the Park Superintendent (final Supt approval apparently based upon 1 a communication about level of instrumentation visibility). Scott Bruns seconded, motion passed unanimously. Staff Reports The reports from the Superintendent of Parks & Recreation, the Assistant Superintendent for Maintenance Services, and the Naturalist were all part of the Park Board packet and available for review. Mr. Dickey began his report by informing the Board about a pipeline notice received. A section of the Marathon pipeline had been previously exposed through years of natural erosion (at Starkey Park). Upon arriving in 2009, Mr. Dickey had called it to the attention of a Marathon engineer on site and pushed that it be appropriately dealt with. The Marathon representative at that time, noted the pipe did not carry any petroleum products. At the present time, Marathon has applied for approval to cut that section of pipe from the stream and cap the ends. They will access the majority of the work from the non-park bank although obviously there will be some bank-work on the at Starkey Park side. They are in the permit approval process and it is expected to take several months before any actual work will commence. Matt Dickey also updated on the Starkey IPL easement plantings. Things are progressing nicely with planting cover crops on the hillside areas and the prairie plants are scheduled to be planted before Thanksgiving. There are also good inroads being made concerning invasives removal at Starkey, about 8 acres targeted this year in addition to the nearly 6 acres cleaned up in the easement. Roger Burrus updated Board members on the donation agreement with Family Farms of Indiana. He is still waiting on the owner’s response. Mr. Burrus asked for comments from members. He will have a corrected draft agreement at a later meeting. Mr. Mueller stated he would like to clarify dates of construction so as to tie in any potential restrictions to the actual stream bank location measurement for the final legal description. Mr. Burrus has finalized items for 400S 800E property. Mr. Burrus also reported the Manchester Square agreement has been finalized/recorded. Mr. Burrus noted ongoing discussion with the attorney representing RL Turner for Elm Street Green. There was a proposal, and Mr. Burrus responded. He's not heard from RLT regarding the Board’s counter proposal. He will continue to keep the Board updated. New Business None Old Business: Joe Mayes, with Rundell Ernstberger Associates (REA) , was present to answer Board member questions about various components of the Draft Conceptual Master Plan/Phase One Plan for the New Park at 400E 875S. 2 Scott Bruns discussed omitting the dog park, but adding bocce court to meet the “unique” element in the grant application. After considerable discussion, the Board by consensus, decided to not remove the dog park concept completely from the Master Plan. But instead to remove building a dog park component from Phase 1; leaving the designed space for it so that the dog park (as originally envisioned) could be placed in the park at a later date if so desired. The ~$16,000 that becomes available then would be targeted to the Bocce court concept (for two courts). This would satisfy the "uniqueness requirement". Steve Mueller then noted the tot playground equipment should be in this phase of development. He believed it was in the bid estimate, but not on the plans. It was discussed it was shown on one of the sheets of plans (but at this conceptual level, was just a labeled colored swath). Steve also asked about restrooms. He stated that in his opinion restrooms are very important to park users and he would like to have this component in the park. He would prefer not to have that attached to the fire station, requiring folks to walk that distance from the play components to the adjacent fire station building. He would like this added to the bid documents. Joe Mayes noted that with the budget constraints, the Board probably should not add a stand-alone restroom facility for the Phase 1 development. The cost of the facility and required sewer would be about 1/2 of the overall target Phase 1 budget and therefore would not be a good choice as an add (or deduct) alternate. It was further noted from the detailed restroom estimates provided by the consultants (and based on a similarly sized restroom built in a central Indiana park), that building a restroom before the Fire Station ran in their required sanitary sewers would cost considerable additional money. REA's detailed conceptual estimates provided to the Board earlier that week, showed that a restroom component, built at the time of the fire station and as a part of that construction process would share in some of the station's economy of scale, not require running 1000's of feet of separate sewer line, and therefore cost about $91,476. REA's separate restroom building estimates, built before and as a separate construction process the fire station, and with running our own force main system, those figures came in at a figure of ~169,785. If the Board built a separate standalone building, before the fire station ran their own required sewers, and built a gravity system to take the waste away; it would be a higher initial cost then a force main system and higher yet than a restroom built at the time of the fire station and benefiting of the service line they would have to install. REA's estimate placed that number for a gravity system built as a standalone building and prior to the fire station at ~$228,690 (but with lower yearly maintenance costs than a force main system and no eventual pump replacement costs). Also while a force main has cheaper initial install; it has higher ongoing maintenance and operation costs as it requires a sewage grinder pump that needs maintenance and eventual replacement. Force main pumps also typically have alarms for power failures or other pump stoppages which may force requirements for phone lines or some other remote notification. This is why, according to Dennis Mackey, gravity systems are always preferable and wastewater sanitation facilities are built with gravity-feed unless that is just not feasible. 3 Ellen Butz mentioned that perhaps "nice" portable restrooms might be a temporary and viable, cost saving alternative until the fire station is completed. Joe Mayes suggested more refined numbers could be generated as his firm goes through the formal design and engineering for all the park elements. The Board can then use those numbers to help with making a final decision. This would require additional design fees. If so desired, Board will need to take action on an updated contract for construction documentation; perhaps including restroom building design, which mandates additional survey and infrastructure design. Steve Mueller asked for an updated design and paperwork incorporating elements discussed in this and the previous board meetings so they can make a thoughtful decision at next month’s meeting. Mr. Mayes stated he will prepare those; getting the information to the members prior to the December meeting. Moving on, Mr. Mueller brought forward discussion points by the Communications Advisory Committee for the Park Department website. He described the type of content his committee would like to see on the web (maps, rules, general park highlights, etc.). Steve has met with Joe Rust about site content and management. Steve noted there are still some issues with the Town web site as a whole as well as with park specific documents. Document management will be an ongoing issue for all. Ellen expressed her desire to have a clean, easily readable home page. She also asked if every park document needs to be on the website. Certainly the Board agenda and minutes should, but does every report (Superintendent, Maintenance Report, etc.) need to be there. It was discussed that the Town Council Departmental highlight reports are also present and taken together with the posted agenda and the minutes when they are formally approved... probably represents a sufficient Board level communication at the monthly level. Obviously special notices are a potential if deemed needed. Scott Bruns questioned if there needs to be a specified document manager for parks. Scott asked Matt Dickey if he would have the time on a regular basis to manage the website and upload the appropriate documents in a timely manner in addition to all the other responsibilities his position entailed. Matt noted if there is a heavy load of either "regular work" or web site content to add, replace, or adjust, that would be difficult. Creating new content that is appropriate and approved to be placed on the web site will be harder than putting on already approved, created documents. Many larger departments would have availability of a separate web-site designee and the parks is the smallest department. The degree of variability and flexibility being discussed as potentials for the park web pages could suggest a great deal of weekly or even perhaps daily changes. There was consensus that there needs to be clear direction and clear responsibilities so no tasks are redundant but also that no information slips through the cracks. Members spent some time discussing particular items for inclusion. These include: grant programs, volunteer opportunities, park descriptions, rules and procedures, and estate planning. Citizen Advisory Committee Reports: Land Resources – Phil Howard. No report. 4 Finance/ Funding – Neal Clements. Neal has met with Superintendent Dickey to discuss and assign grant responsibilities. He gave a brief update on the urban forestry grant application and the proposed plan (focusing on supplementing and perhaps expanding already existing initiatives). Communications – Steve Mueller. The Friends group has decided to hold Z’GreenFest at the Zion Nature Center next spring (April 22nd). There will be an emphasis on education at the 2012 festival and the Park Board should have an opportunity for a table. Steve also raised the question if the Boy Scouts could be utilized for invasive species removal. This time he considered it would be honeysuckle, which is more difficult than pulling garlic mustard as it involves at least hand saws (if not power saws), and chemical applications to be effective. Recreation –Scott Bruns. The main focus continues to be negotiations with ZYFL and Mulberry Fields use. Scott hopes to bring forward something soon for the Board to consider. Facilities– Ellen Butz. No report. Other Board Related Items None Claims Neal Clements made a motion to approve the claims. Scott Bruns seconded and the motion passed unanimously. The meeting was then adjourned with a motion made by Neal Clements and seconded by Steve Mueller at ~8:43 PM. ______________________________ ____________________________ Scott Bruns, Secretary Ellen Butz, President 5