[Reggie Graham]: The meeting will come to order. Motion to open the meeting.
[Chris Murphy]: Motion to open the meeting.
[Reggie Graham]: All right. We have a lady in the audience.
[Unidentified]: Linda Hamilton.
[Reggie Graham]: Linda Hamilton? Mm-hmm. OK, Ms. Hamilton. Would you care to step forward, or were you comfortable back there? It doesn't matter.
[Unidentified]: It's the first time I've been here, so I don't know how to.
[Reggie Graham]: Oh, just so we can hear what you have to say.
[Unidentified]: I'm on the front row there. We're all family. Don't worry. We don't bite. Okay, I just hear on behalf of the neighborhood. Oh, I'm on the fringe of the park and early three tennis courts that the in the fall, a woman came up and my partner. and said that a huge chunk of time had now been taken, and I don't know if it's a moneymaker or what, but it had nothing to do with the Placement Park neighborhood, but that they were gonna come a couple hours, I think in September and October for every weekend. And there's only three courts. The last court is taken over by a coach who coaches and gets paid, and then there's two courts left. And Pickleball has taken over Dubber Park. And so, as we used to, if it wasn't a free court, a place to go to Dubber, there's a dominance now of Pickleball. It's like five, at least five courts are taken over. People bring their own Pickleball court, set it up. So, you know, I'm just totally squeezed out. And I don't think it's fair being part of the Placelet Park neighborhood that someone from the outside can come in for that many hours and establish territory. That's why I'm here.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Okay.
[Reggie Graham]: Um, just, uh, we do have, they were on the schedule last year, the USTA, if I'm not mistaken.
[Unidentified]: Yeah, that's what it is.
[Reggie Graham]: Okay. So USTA, they, they actually are in a partnership with the Recreation Department. Okay. The Recreation Department has given the Recreation Department several advantages if you will.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, I can speak to the partnership on that because what USDA has done in the past has given us grants for the tennis courts itself, reopening after COVID-19, the city has grants from them there. But also USDA has helped us out to start different programs for us. We run a lot of our kids youth programs. They've given us equipment. They've taught our staff, how to teach tennis. So there's been a really good engagement with them of trying to create more learn to play tennis. At the same time, that group itself wanted to start an adult league with us. So I know some of the people who are there are Medford residents, but the idea is, with this partnership with USTA, is to try to offer some type of adult league in Medford for people to play as well.
[Unidentified]: Well, there must be other courts, because as I said, there are only three. Third one is always taken over by this tennis teacher. And then if you go to Dubber, There's no, there's like two courts left for tennis. So it's really squeezed out. Is there another, like, could they play at the high school? Does it have to be the three tennis courts a place that they're squeezed out? Because there's always a line. You know, people are waiting. And then now there's a chunk of time that USTA. Is the instructor she's referring to?
[Kevin Bailey]: That's what I was going to ask. Is that USTA or someone?
[Unidentified]: Like, does it on her own? Okay, so that gets there at like eight and she has consecutive hours.
[Kevin Bailey]: So she does not have a permit that if she's there coaching, she should not be given permits to people for profit to coach.
[Unidentified]: Yeah, I don't know about her business. I just know that people keep showing up. This is the last court. And then that means two courts. It was a line always and then this this USTA is coming in. And that's a huge chunk of time. Could there be a compromise where the USTA plays another place somewhere else at sometimes, but you know, it's like every weekend in September, October, I believe. And it's the morning hours, which is a good tennis time. It's like a huge block of time. Yeah. And then when you have pickleballs taking over Duggar, what are the options for the tennis players? Yeah.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Well, you bring up a legitimate complaint.
[Reggie Graham]: We haven't had this complaint come to us before. But if I remember correctly, the USTA is only using it for three hours on Saturdays and Sundays, correct?
[Unidentified]: Yeah, but that's just Saturday.
[Reggie Graham]: Just Saturday? Just Saturday. So they're using it for three hours on Saturday. So that means.
[Unidentified]: Are they using one court or?
[Reggie Graham]: The whole court, all the police department.
[Unidentified]: Yeah, I believe it's two fronts.
[Reggie Graham]: So, so we have to understand that, you know, we would love to be able to accommodate everybody in the city. Okay, and we do know that it's a public park. You know, there's a little bit of a quid pro quo here. Okay, we're getting something from USTA. And we're offering them something a little something, you know, they pay for their space. Okay, they they they've been perfect. Okay, absolutely, absolutely, absolutely, without a doubt. So, you know, there's a balancing act that we have to do as a board. Okay. This is the first that we've been notified of any
[Unidentified]: We have to sit out pickleball and it's taking over. So it's like if we now have to leave play set because there's no possibility of playing, then we go to dugger and now dugger's all pickleball. It's almost all pickleball. And I saw that that was on the agenda. I'm like, are you kidding? We need one more pickleball court? I mean, people bring their own, set it up. And it's, you know, there's, I think two, maybe three tennis left, but it's pickleball, pickleball, pickleball, pickleball. yeah so it's in saturdays and sundays but we're only talking one day a week yeah that's the best day for you weekends are recreational time for people. And it's like prime time. Why doesn't USTA take it on a weekday? And I'm not just speaking selfishly for myself. I'm talking about the neighborhood of the place in the park. I think that they should have first dibs. There's a lot of houses around, a lot of people in line. If someone comes and sees how people are squeezed out,
[Reggie Graham]: So let me ask Kevin, can I ask you a question? Yeah. The lessons that USTA is given, are they open to the public?
[Kevin Bailey]: It's open for registration, so they can go on the USTA website and sign up for the league itself. I'd have to look it up. It's somewhere around $100, $200, but I don't know the exact details of it.
[Reggie Graham]: OK. Well, this is the first we've heard of it, OK? We'll take it under advisement. They won't be coming back until the fall.
[Unidentified]: No, I understand that.
[Reggie Graham]: They usually request for the spring. Well, so they'll be coming back in the spring, OK? Before they come back in the spring, we'll see if we can meet.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, we have discussed looking at some type of plan of reservations for tennis and pickleball. It's come up as far as like, you know, an issue. let's have a plan for that, because we are getting a lot of requests for the courts.
[Unidentified]: Can I ask you another question, too? This woman who's got her own private... Should not be there. She should not be there. So I don't have any power or right, you know, like I can't... I mean, she doesn't have a permit, so she can't. I mean, she doesn't have a permit. We don't give permits to that. We don't give permits to any sort of topic. I have to admit, so then, you know, the USDA doesn't want to work. She can't belong in the tool house, and she shouldn't be given that. But if you don't think I don't know if she's all morning but I know she's there like eight o'clock and she has like four people and like a family or something and then she has another set. So I don't know I can't go up to her and say you're not supposed to be doing this.
[Kevin Bailey]: There is an online calendar that If the person was there you could let them know that they're not have that space reserved. I know that's really tough for someone to just go up and say that the other option is you can try calling the rec department. I know Saturdays, you know, it's a skeleton crew and the people who are working are typically teaching classes. But if there is someone available more likely in the summertime than any, any other time, because of the pond pool being open, we can try to get a staff member over there to try to talk to them about it.
[Unidentified]: Yeah, absolutely. And we're going to put signs up there too. she may not have a permit. She needs to produce one. And you know that she doesn't, because we would have record of that, correct? Yeah, and the public can see it as well, too. And you're talking to the board, but the one person that says issue the permit. Yeah, we would know. We would see it come through. Yeah, well, she teaches everything.
[Reggie Graham]: We have that lady come a couple of years ago, and we thought we had, because I think she comes from Winchester, to be honest with you.
[Unidentified]: blonde hair, usually in a pony, and it's me.
[Reggie Graham]: Like I said, she, I think we believe she comes from Winchester. We thought we had gotten her out of there some two years ago, maybe two, three years ago, probably because of COVID. Yeah, I think it was before COVID. But because we heard about it, we kind of went over there and said, hey, listen, you can't just come because we certainly can't go to Winchester and play on their play courts. You know, the little play courts on that little, next to that pond and across from the cemetery? We can't go over there because it says Winchester residents only. So, you know, we, you know, kind of escorted her away, but evidently she's said that she's coming back, but you have every right to say, do you have a permit for this? And then, you know, said, listen, you know, But anyway, that's getting beyond us. What we'll do is we'll discuss it amongst ourselves during the year. And we'll try to make a solution that's amenable to everybody. Yes. I mean, listen, the parks are there for, like you said, rapid residence. And we'll see what we can do as far as coming up with a balance.
[Unidentified]: Okay, sounds fair. Okay.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Thank you. Have a nice night. Bye bye. Thank you. Okay, let's get together.
[Kevin Bailey]: I mean they can we've given them plates dad but we can certainly tell them. Yeah, so internally for our own programs I'm trying to do that too because I know we're heavily using Duggar, particularly because we have the lockbox and we can store our stuff there. Duggar and Playset get heavily used because they are our two largest courts, right? Duggar has five courts, Playset has three. Everywhere else, the largest size is two. Correct. So a lot of programs happen to go on those two courts, and that includes the high school team as well. So my idea is this year I'm talking to the high school tennis coach about doing our youth tennis program, actually during the high school permitted time, The thing is the high school permits right now go all the way to 630 in case they have a game. We're gonna run our youth program when they don't have tennis matches. So it's a kind of a way to try to maximize that permit time. But the adult program is actually gonna go over to Barry. And then our internal youth program is probably gonna go over to Morrison. So I'm trying to spread it as much as I can. Yeah.
[Reggie Graham]: So what would be an alternative for USTA? I know Saturday mornings is probably precious time for people that work during the week and trying to get out and get a little bit of exercise and what have you.
[Kevin Bailey]: So USTA I know actually wants to expand the program. I know they show that interest already, so I think they would actually want to use more time and more space. Certainly don't know if that's going to be approved or not, but. I did mention to them that there is a Morrison and Barry as well. You know, since we're only use that once a week, if USDA can take another time, like during a weeknight and use that, particularly during Tennessee's and when Duggar and. Doug replaced, I guess, used the most. So I guess those are the two other alternatives. I can't think of another spot besides those other two courts that have the double. All the other ones are relatively single courts.
[Unidentified]: It'll work with what we have, but we should have a discussion with them. We can talk about it later on, but we should open the session telling them, listen, this is what we have coming. Yeah. Yeah. We need to come up with a plan. And we've got a for-profit person who's acting Nice thing.
[Reggie Graham]: We have the one thing. The one thing that I'm thinking about, you know, USTA is a for profit. Okay. And I understand that they give us a nonprofit nonprofit. Yeah. Okay. But they charge a hundred dollars. to get involved with their program.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, the money goes back to the grants and the instruction and stuff.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah, so the one thing that we're entrusted with is making sure that everybody gets a fair shot at the resources that we do have. We've got to allocate the resources that we do have fairly amongst the folks. So, you know, when you talk about USTA, maybe they should come here rather than dealing just with you, Kevin. They do come here. All I remember is them coming to get a permit, that's it. But you know, you're talking about negotiations behind the scenes that we're not aware of.
[Kevin Bailey]: There is no negotiation behind the scene, they come in with a permit application, but there's no negotiation for a permit to then do something with our youth programs. I'm assuming that's what you're insinuating. No, I'm not insinuating, I'm saying. Okay, so that's not happening. It's not a, you'll get this permit. If you run these classes for us, I will just say that there is a partnership with them that they do give us grants they do help us run a youth program. We've been recipients of grants, but they still get their park permit application and pay the fees like everybody else.
[Chris Murphy]: I asked this question. is there going to be any wind situation for Saturday morning tennis? So like, I feel like, all right, if we move them to Morrison Park and the people that play tennis on Morrison Park on Saturday morning, they get pissed. But if we tell them to go to Barry Park, people go to Barry Park on Saturday morning, they're upset. So I feel like there's no... I almost feel like we should discuss our reservations. I don't think there's any wind for Saturday morning tennis. just based on like driving around and seeing people Saturday morning playing tennis at Morrison Park all the time.
[Jenny Graham]: I mean, there's always a line, like, and nobody else has come to us and been like, I can't play. I mean, the top thing we have, we have no enforcement.
[Unidentified]: Well, knowing that, knowing that pickleball was taken over, you know, that drought was going to happen. We can't get into Denver, so where do we go? As long as we're having discussions going forward, fine. I'm going to talk to USTA. We can have a discussion with them again, but they can spread the wealth throughout the city. I know they want four, but we don't have four in any part of the city. It's like we don't have a pickleball in our city as well. So everybody's going to be growing up in share.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, I think eventually when the dedicated pickleball courts are up at Carr Park, that'll make a big difference, too.
[Jenny Graham]: That'll lead to a tennis court, yeah.
[Kevin Bailey]: It should. When's that going to happen?
[Jenny Graham]: In seven days.
[Kevin Bailey]: They got the CPA. Did that get approved, or is that this Thursday?
[Jenny Graham]: I think that's the last meeting side of work, so. OK.
[Kevin Bailey]: I think it's closed. I think it's.
[Jenny Graham]: I think it did get. Yeah, I think it was just a question of the whole.
[Chris Murphy]: I mean, you're probably talking at least a year out, though. Like if they saw construction this year, they weren't going to be done for next year. Two years, yeah.
[Unidentified]: So. We're already in the winter, so if nothing's happening now, we'll miss the whole fall.
[Chris Murphy]: Especially with how backed up construction is right now. I mean, I don't think we see that. I don't think that's for a couple of years. I don't think we're looking at anything this summer or even next summer.
[Jenny Graham]: I do feel like if it continues to be an issue, we should revisit a reservation-type system.
[Reggie Graham]: Which is not a bad idea. Makes it difficult, because- There's no one there to police it, but at least- Well, it's not to police it, but the thing is that when you're talking about the reservations, who takes the reservations? That's Kevin's area, if you will. and it's not like everyone has super staff to do something like that.
[Jenny Graham]: But does your online system have something that can monitor it on itself, like knows when there's blocked time, like won't let someone blow up on top of each other?
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, they could put like a request and then have us just be able to approve it. I would imagine that it's tough getting our own internal renters to create a household account and know how to request it. I think once we go to the public, there's gonna be a lot of people calling and being confused on how to either create an account or how to do the reservation. We had a secretary, like a full-time secretary. I think it's definitely doable. There is other apps like places, not places to play that's pickleball is one similar to that for tennis, the same idea it's like an app that someone can download, and then if the city goes into it, they would be able to request off that app. The disadvantage of that, what I've heard from other REC departments is now there's a fee attached to it. So even if the city was offering that service free, that service might charge $5 a reservation. And I don't know how a lot of people feel about having to pay that.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, I agree. All right, well.
[Reggie Graham]: It's difficult because you go to different cities and one of the reasons why Duggar Park is so, not only because of Pickleball, because it has the proximity to both Arlington and Winchester. And sometimes when you have that nice facility that, you know, everybody wants to play on a nice facility. Everybody wants to play on a good court and so on and so forth. And so what we have, what you'll find is that, you know, we won't have just record residents fighting for times and so on and so forth. And that's even true of the pickleball. You're finding that there aren't just Methodist residents playing pickleball. You get people that come from out of town that are playing pickleball. It's in Winchester. I don't know about Cambridge. I haven't talked to enough of those folks over there. But it's a situation where if we shut it off or if we just limit it to Methodist residents, I'm sure the Methodist residents would love it.
[Chris Murphy]: You know, but... How do you police that though?
[Reggie Graham]: You don't. You don't. You don't.
[Chris Murphy]: The cops aren't going to go down there and ask people for IDs. It's better than anyone else, Chris. You're going to get me beat up if that was the case.
[Reggie Graham]: Oh, I'm sure you can handle yourself. I think it's going to... Take your one... permit request. Maybe not three. All right, so let's go on to the next step. We done with this issue for now? For now?
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, I mean, we don't.
[Reggie Graham]: We really don't have a resolution, but what we can do is we can talk about it as the permits come up, OK, during the year, or after some of the meetings that we have. We take care of the public, and then we can sit down and talk about it.
[Jenny Graham]: Do you have agendas started for each month or no? I don't know if you want to just like make a note to bring this up in like March, you know?
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, I can do that. Yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: Like revisit it in March.
[Kevin Bailey]: I mean, yeah, I mean, they're going to probably want to submit an application for the next meeting. So we can discuss it when they come back.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, just figure out like, maybe just have it mapped out what their options are, what their time options are.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah. Do they have mechanisms in other cities that are similar to the one we were offering?
[Kevin Bailey]: I know they do it in Malden. Malden? I'm sure there's other places as well.
[Jenny Graham]: They possibly do just maybe a linear time slot.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, I'm sure we can talk to them about that stuff. Right now, even in the spring during tennis season, they usually go during the weeknights. The only time they did the Saturday was when there was no high school tennis. So then it was just USTA that Saturday at playstead. But when playstead gets used for the high school team, they only went during the weeknights. So they've been,
[Reggie Graham]: Flexible, you know.
[Kevin Bailey]: In the spring, USTA went weekdays. But then when there was no high school tennis, then they went to Saturdays at play stand.
[Reggie Graham]: All right. So let's see, the cot permit application. All right, so. I see we have some changes here in ink.
[Unidentified]: Were these the recommendations you talked about over the last month?
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, some of it's like, I mean, some of it's the obvious of changing 2022 to 2023. The only ones that were questionable. We'll start with the easy ones for us under cancellation and refunds I just put an ad in about just how to know when there's when there's a field closure that's posted at the top of the recreation website. We started to do that in our newsletters but just people who are coming to you know our facilities or looking at our program, I think people are starting to get used to checking on our website seeing that that alarm. So I just wanted to add that in there for the other permit holders.
[Unidentified]: Yeah, I don't see that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Second page.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Yeah, it's missing a page. Yeah. I'll pass it around.
[Jenny Graham]: There you go. Yes, we're missing this whole page.
[Kevin Bailey]: Coffee and double-sided. But this is the add on that we do at the newsletters as well.
[Reggie Graham]: Chris. So field closures will be posted as an alert at the top of the recreation website www dot method. recreation.com. What about the- We also send an email to every one of the permit holders, correct? Yeah. Sorry, Chris.
[Chris Murphy]: What about the city alert system that like when I get these 900 COVID clinic emails a week about, is that something we could tap? Like say, you know, we need to close fields for the week. Is that something we can utilize for that? I think we do get a telephone call to but like you're away like off of that email list the city has for people sign up for alerts to send an email list, you know, due to inclement weather metric fields are closed. for till further notice?
[Kevin Bailey]: It's something I can look into to see if it can be separated. And I believe the way it looks to me, it's an email. The email is the voice message that everyone's getting.
[Chris Murphy]: I think- There's gotta be a way to do an email, just an email right now.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah.
[Chris Murphy]: But we do an email now. Just a permit holder.
[Reggie Graham]: So, but you know, sometimes you gotta- You wanna put this out to everybody in the city?
[Kevin Bailey]: Yes, and we already do that. We already do that and it just covers ourselves so that if we, cause we're manually emailing everyone. And that means if I'm out, that means another staff member is going in and trying to see who has permits and email it to them directly. So this is just an extra safeguard that, you know, if there's someone that is missed off of the email or if it's just telling their individual coaches, you know, they're not getting that email. They might be just telling the coaches, Hey, if it's raining out, check on the website to see if you should have practice or not. It's just an easy way to communicate to people.
[Reggie Graham]: So Chris, because you don't have the advantage of being here and reading this, right?
[Chris Murphy]: I have the email I'm looking at.
[Reggie Graham]: All right, so that cancellation refund, that's in that same paragraph. The last paragraph on the application
[Jenny Graham]: The second page of the application.
[Reggie Graham]: Right. So it's second page down the bottom it says cancellation refunds.
[Chris Murphy]: I don't have that on my. My thing.
[Reggie Graham]: Okay, so let me read it to you. Yes, please refunds what's the schedule. is submitted and permits issued, refunds will not be given. And the event fields are closed by the city due to inclement weather. You must email Kevin Bailey within 48 hours with a make-up date. If a make-up date cannot be scheduled, the credit will be applied to your organization for a future rental. Field closing will be posted as an alert at the top of the recreation website and it gives the recreation website.
[Jenny Graham]: I think it's a good idea.
[Adam Hurtubise]: I'm cool with that. Go ahead. All right.
[Jenny Graham]: I think it would just cover someone's butt. If people are like, I didn't get an email, OK, well, then you have a second resource.
[Adam Hurtubise]: And it's fine.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah. Right. And like, keep Kevin saying, too, like, you know, NYGS is getting an email, not necessarily the coaches. And NYGS can be like, you need to pick a training and check the website. So that way, he's not getting a million emails from individual coaches.
[Reggie Graham]: I'm perfectly willing to do this. That seems like a no-brainer.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Yeah.
[Unidentified]: I mean, all the leagues should have their own vehicle in place.
[Reggie Graham]: I wonder why.
[Kevin Bailey]: Anyway, go back to that's the only other thing is nothing. That's the easy one. The other one is to talk about the fees again.
[Reggie Graham]: Right. So on page one, all others. So you got method open youth leagues, $200 per league, open registration and method youth leagues under the age of 19. So pay per season $200 per league. $400 for lighted fields and courts includes league, all-stars, playoffs, sponsored select teams, tournaments, and fundraising events, little league baseball, youth soccer, record Mustangs, football, M-Y-G-S, and W-M-B-L. What's that? What's record baseball? No.
[Kevin Bailey]: I'm sorry, I missed that. It's probably, is it West Method Basketball League? What was the abbreviation?
[Jenny Graham]: W-M-B-L.
[Kevin Bailey]: The West Method Basketball League. Oh.
[Jenny Graham]: All right, so those are all just pretty much, I think I've used them. Just give it a- I think I've used the pricing, it's fine. I think it's appropriate.
[Reggie Graham]: Medford select youth teams, blah, blah, blah, $200, blah, blah, blah. Non-open registration youth teams across the 75% of Medford residents under the age of 19 shall pay $200 per team, $400 for lighting, Non-lighted field court, $50 per hour, down from $100 for three hours.
[Jenny Graham]: No, that's up. So that makes it $150 for three hours. That's an increase.
[Adam Hurtubise]: OK.
[Jenny Graham]: I think it makes sense to do it that way, only because if someone only needs it for the hour, then they only need it for the hour. And we're just charging them for the hour. I mean.
[Unidentified]: Well, what else? We get into a game where they're taking a three-hour block. and the game is over in an hour and a half credit.
[Jenny Graham]: I don't think they should. They both have had a lot of fun.
[Reggie Graham]: According to this, once the schedule is submitted, just putting it like that. No, I think that that's probably a little bit. We'll see what they'll do now is, I think, Kevin, tell me if this is where your thought process was. What's his name? Joe was telling us, well, I only used it for two hours. And I don't wanna have to pay $300, I wanna pay less, because I'm only using it for two hours.
[Kevin Bailey]: What's the minimum amount of time? So it's a couple of things that made me suggest this. So I think Joe is a good example, and Joe's not the only team that has this issue, is if you are a league and you're only looking for a one hour or two hour practice, Essentially, you're gonna make your practice three hours because of the way our fees are. It just wouldn't make sense renting it for two hours when there's a up to three hour block. The second thing is the way we do our billing through our operating system. It calculates it, you just put in like how much money it is, but there is no three hour plus an extra amount after that. So we're manually doing that math. So I just think it's a little bit cleaner and easier to be able to say it's $50 an hour and then just have that automatic when we submit any field permit for a private rental, it's $50 an hour and it calculates it.
[Jenny Graham]: And it's comparable to other cities.
[Kevin Bailey]: And that was the other thing I was gonna show is this was coming through the Massachusetts Recreation Park Association. They did this last year, but usually about every two to three years, they put out a survey between all the rec departments around the state. And those who are willing to give the information, they collect it and then make it easier for rec departments to be able to see and compare what their prices are. Yeah. So that's just some of the neighboring towns and what their charges are.
[Jenny Graham]: $45 for the register? I think that's fine.
[Unidentified]: I have no issue with it. Make sure I like these. Make sure I like these. Just getting back to the email that was listed on the second page, do you have an email that says direct recreation or is it your name at Method Rec?
[Kevin Bailey]: It's my name and then we have a general account. It's methodrecreation at method-ma.com.
[Unidentified]: I think I'll just use a more generic one. I don't think that's happening.
[Kevin Bailey]: Um, yeah I mean we did talk about doing like a field permit one, at some point, because we do have a staff member who does a lot of permits with me as well. It's a great idea, because the reality is, if I'm out for, you know, something happens to me and I'm out for a month or two during, you know, baseball season or softball season, that could be, uh, I think like sanity wise, if that's all in one place, that's the only stuff that goes in that email is that. Yeah, I can talk to IT and see if I can do that.
[Unidentified]: OK. I'm fine with that.
[Reggie Graham]: So getting back to this, all others, why did you put $200 for three hours, $100 per hour, $100 for each additional hour, or no, just $100 per hour? in line with everything that's everybody else's around.
[Unidentified]: Chris, what do you think?
[Chris Murphy]: More? So we're going to allow people to do by the hour now, instead of a minimum. That's what I'm just trying to grasp.
[Kevin Bailey]: So I think the way it's written right now would be per hour, but we could do a minimum of two hours.
[Chris Murphy]: I just feel like everywhere, like everywhere you rent something, there's always like, like I had to rent the cafe at the bulk for a three hour bank, but they said, well, it's a four hour minimum. Every time you're at the hall, it's a four-hour minimum. Every time you're at the building, it's a... I just think it's, you know, to pay the bills, you know, if you start doing hour here, hour there, hour there, hour here, hour... So what do you think is the most appropriate?
[Reggie Graham]: Two hours?
[Chris Murphy]: I think two hours is... Yeah, I think going over two hours would be fine. That would still work. You're at least getting 100 bucks. You're at least paying all your overhead every time you submit a permit. That's paying the guy who's got to do the billing, the company that's going to do the billing.
[Reggie Graham]: So why don't we just put that language in there? So we'll add a two-hour minimum.
[Kevin Bailey]: Everywhere that's an hourly. For private, right? We're not going to make NYGS or method B as well. No, no, no, no. Just want to make sure.
[Jenny Graham]: They submit, like, schedules.
[Kevin Bailey]: They submit for a permit for a season. Yeah. Just want to make sure. That's clarified. That's all.
[Unidentified]: Yeah.
[Reggie Graham]: That's the only adjustment, essentially, on the permit. Yeah, this is the original. Send it back to him.
[Jenny Graham]: Thank you. There's nothing on it, sir.
[Reggie Graham]: No, nothing. What now on page two? I mean, page three, there are no changes.
[Jenny Graham]: The only thing I would suggest, only, well, it's on the agenda, talking about like memorials and dedications. You know, obviously we're going to discuss separating this from that. Yeah, maybe somewhere on this make like it very blatant that this is like fields and parks and courts. You know what I mean?
[Adam Hurtubise]: Like literally put in parentheses, like baseball, softball, soccer, like fields, playing fields, playing fields or what are you trying to say? Yeah.
[Reggie Graham]: I like to make things like crystal clear. So what we can do is we can put an addendum on page three. I don't know. It seems like page three was pretty busy. Page two, rather, was pretty busy.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Yeah. But what you can say was all other Let's see, what would be the proper wording?
[Jenny Graham]: You could say inquiries for memorials and dedications, please, and direct them where to go.
[Kevin Bailey]: Do you think it might make sense putting at the top so when you see the 2023 field permit application, And then a small file I promise will be issued each season. Maybe on that I just say, if you're looking for a dedication, you know, please see a separate form on.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, like whatever we decide to label this application.
[Unidentified]: Would you be willing to set up a separate application for monuments of dedication?
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah. Because I think it has a separate set of rules. You know what I mean? And it's a, I just think it's, they get like too many details and they don't know.
[Reggie Graham]: So, so when you, when you go into the city method, pots, permits, frequently asked questions, the second one said, when do I need a pot permit, right? What we could do is we could put in, in a little bit bolder type, a larger pot. All of the park requests need to be addressed by, and we want to use that, this new thing that we're going to do, this request to memorialize a dedicated public space. I think that would probably be a better place to put it. I mean, because quite frankly, you see the permit, how busy it is. It's busy. It's real busy. Yeah.
[Unidentified]: Yeah, we are.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah.
[Kevin Bailey]: Under the PowerPoint FAQ, do you want to put that as a separate Q&A? So it could be. how do I request a memorial or a dedication at one of the city parks?
[Jenny Graham]: So why don't you put like who needs a park or what do I need a park permit for? Like, I know this is like when you need a permit, but like, what requires a park permit? Like youth sports, blah, blah, blah. And then like maybe link that in there somewhere like. Okay, yeah. like you have here like our current application located here with the link that goes to this yeah and then maybe if you like request to memorialize dedicate with link here yeah yeah i think that's they'll probably take away some of them because that that application is pretty busy busy as it is you know even being online it's pretty busy I feel like once they get to this, they're going to realize that there's no question regarding this. But I feel like once they get to this, if they're looking for a school, they're going to realize they're on the wrong page.
[Unidentified]: You know what I mean?
[Reggie Graham]: So that's the next thing on the agenda. We should probably hit both of those at the same time. The frequently asked questions and the request to memorialize or dedicate. Since we're going to put something in there, Kevin, I don't think it should be below seven. I think it probably should probably be three.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Three or two.
[Reggie Graham]: want to make it separate. I think it should have its own category.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, I think it should be up towards the top because they should know where they need to go.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah, and it's right after, when do I need a POC permit? And then you say, all requests are memorialized, and then you go to a different link. I think that would probably eliminate some questions.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Less phone calls for you guys. While we're on the FAQ, the other thing was just, I was going to, oh, sorry, there's two things.
[Kevin Bailey]: Probably the easier one, subject to COVID guidelines at the bottom, is that good to remove at this point?
[Adam Hurtubise]: Yeah.
[Kevin Bailey]: And then the question number three I had was for the birthday party. Um, we talked about this a little bit and one of the meetings. I know we talked about, should we have something. Should we have it, people are looking for a birthday party right now they don't need a park permit but do we want to put a certain amount of people or some parameters where it does warrant going and getting a park permit through the commission. And the second part is, do we want to add, because I get this question a lot about bounce houses, if we want to add language of that, if we don't want to allow bounce houses, if I should add that into the language?
[Reggie Graham]: They lie anyway.
[Jenny Graham]: I mean, I would definitely just put a bit of cubby on, but.
[Reggie Graham]: But see, the problem isn't that they lie. Remember the people who wanted to have a reunion? Hickeycock, was it? Or they said they're all going to have 25 people or something like that. And they had 200, okay? For example, I forget what the Hindu temple or something like that. They wanted to have something at Columbus. And then that was the Indians, but the Hindus, I think, or whatever, they looked at a place that they wanted to do a place that they said, blah, blah, blah. And they said, okay, we're only gonna have 200, they had 1,000. So even if you put in, you know, we should have a minimum or maximum.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Maybe we put in a minimum or maximum. Yeah. Only because people really don't know.
[Reggie Graham]: But if they come to us and we say, Well, is that on the application? How many people?
[Jenny Graham]: But every park is different, because every park is a different size. Like, every park has a different task.
[Unidentified]: Do you have any requirements for city ordinances that we need to find out about, about group sizes? Like, do you want to have a gathering? It's what's considered the original in the realm of the world.
[Kevin Bailey]: I don't remember seeing any of it under Parks or Recreation for city statutes.
[Unidentified]: The police department? What do you require?
[Jenny Graham]: I mean, yeah.
[Unidentified]: What's the maximum you require? I'm sorry.
[Reggie Graham]: What do you require before you have an instant care? See, the thing is, we've been doing this for a number of years, and we've been using our estimations, our best guesstimate of how many people are going to fit into what size space that we're talking about. We know how big the parks are as a rule. You know how much parking is there, you know how much the neighbors are going to complain about certain things and so on and so forth. So if we stop putting in specifics about people that are coming to a certain spot at a certain time. I don't know. I think that we need to know how many people are coming to realize, you know. And then I think we'll probably have a good idea as to whether or not, you know, 50 people can fit, you know, at Cape and Park, you know, or.
[Unidentified]: But again, if there's something already on the books, we don't want to reinvent the wheel. So they might have some kind of open source idea, you may require to have a detail.
[Reggie Graham]: Hey, don't leave him to go get a brew just because you knew that you were going to pick this one up. You may have a small birthday party for like 125 people or something. So that was, I had to, because 25. Can you talk to either the chief or one of his subordinates or what have you and find out what their, not requirements, but ideas are for how many people would be required to have a detail assigned to? That was one of the things that I talked to Chief about, and I said, we needed to get together. He said, we're going to get together in January.
[Jenny Graham]: 25 people doesn't sound like a lot of people, but if you have 25 cars coming to a park, that's a lot of people.
[Chris Murphy]: That's what I think it becomes. I don't think it's so much the people as much as the cars.
[Reggie Graham]: But we still want to know how many people would be required for a detail. What is his? You know, how many people are would be required to, you know, have a detailed credit.
[Kevin Bailey]: I know how I'm always usually 100. You know, sometimes it does change you know if alcohol or beer guys there that's an automatic police detail. It's just like the SSC and they might be just over 100. We won't have police detail, but as a rule of thumb, 100 police detail and then 500 would be to police detail.
[Reggie Graham]: I'm sending the email right now.
[Chris Murphy]: To Danielle's point as well.
[Kevin Bailey]: It's even with the 25 people, it's when you have two or three birthday parties at the same time at the same park, you know, even if there are, you know, 25, 30 people, that gets overly crowded. Or if you have a soccer practice and, you know, someone trying to use the field for a birthday party, so.
[Unidentified]: This park is actually the bigger example I'm thinking of, so that's a big party.
[Jenny Graham]: So maybe we just say no. I know, but at least like, we're not like, don't even say by saying you may have a small birthday party at the park. Maybe we can say we don't allow.
[Unidentified]: I want to stay as far away from birthdays as possible.
[Chris Murphy]: I want to stay as far away from birthdays as possible.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, I think once you let one you use that.
[Chris Murphy]: I think I want to go there and have a bunch of kids play and you're going to define small.
[Jenny Graham]: What can I do? What can't I do? Like it's now we have to have stipulations because we said you may have a small party.
[Chris Murphy]: And then, you know, people are going to come in and say, oh, there's only 20 kids and then they show up at 60.
[Reggie Graham]: But if you look at the frequently asked questions, it says, do I need a popcorn for birthday party in the box? Due to the frequent request, the city does not reserve box space for birthday parties. We already don't do that. Yeah. OK, so that's not the issue, OK?
[Jenny Graham]: But maybe with that, we could say no and then put a number eight in here that says, do I need a police detail for my event?
[Reggie Graham]: OK, but it says you may have a small birthday party in this box. But the impact with the space.
[Chris Murphy]: I mean, do we do we do we put the park commission reserves the right based on attendance and traffic to require you to have a police detail, can we add that wouldn't have to.
[Reggie Graham]: That would be one of our automatic questions.
[Chris Murphy]: And put a note, because there's a four-hour requirement for police details. There is a four-hour requirement. And I think it's $65 an hour. We said we're not going to do this.
[Reggie Graham]: But we said we're not going to do it. Oh, the police details? No. It says, do I need a park permit for a birthday party in the park?
[Chris Murphy]: I guess I'm running back to the, what events, you know, talking about having events requiring police detail. Should we have something in there in this frequently asked questions or on the permit itself, you know, the park commission reserves a right based on attendance and traffic to require you to have like something like, you know, like something like an event like what they do with like a park, like an event of that kind of scale.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah. Well, now here's the story, right? If the police don't have it anywhere where we can go and actually grab that information and just put it into our, you know, embed it into our application process, I'd still wanna, you know, get the information from the police before we add that component.
[Chris Murphy]: All right, nice, it's set. I sent it to the two detailers, Sean Maloney and Angelo Raphael. They run the detail office.
[Jenny Graham]: They would know. I really don't want to overstep our bounds in that respect, without guidance from them.
[Reggie Graham]: I think it's hard to know that.
[Jenny Graham]: and literally have it in front of us would be helpful. You know what I mean? Like when someone says, okay, have food, we're like, okay, go to help, you know? We're always like teetering on, well, do they need to contact the police or do they not? You know what I mean? And I feel like having that, having them come in knowing that they're already gonna have to do that, like.
[Reggie Graham]: Well, that's another thing. That brings me to another part of that whole discussion. Once during the year, we had a situation where the cornhole, the guys wanted to do certain things, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And so the cornhole guys decided that they were A, gonna get in the park. They were supposed to have called the police to have a detail. They didn't do that. They were supposed to have gone to the Board of Health to make sure that they would be able to cook down there. We don't know whether they did that. and so subsequently what happened was that we could possibly have been on the hook for not asking the proper questions. Okay, they could have come back and what did you say and of course we keep a record of our meetings, right Jeff?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yep.
[Reggie Graham]: Okay, so we keep a record of our meetings but we don't keep a record of responses that would be on other departments' okays to give out a permit. We give out the permit, but we never get confirmation back from those departments.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Maybe that's what we need to do here.
[Reggie Graham]: No, we don't know what we need to do. What we need to do is we need to make sure that we can leave them, they leave the chief from us, okay?
[Unidentified]: What's the kind of victim like that? you have all these signed off.
[Jenny Graham]: Well, that's what I'm saying right here where it says like, you know, have we received the roster schedule? Have we received border health approval? Have we received, you know, police department approval?
[Unidentified]: And that's on the permit.
[Jenny Graham]: Right. That's what I'm saying, like, we should add those things here and say, like, okay, we're giving you a permit back. But until you have these things, we cannot issue them.
[Reggie Graham]: I like the fact that whoever, whatever department, whether it be the Board of Health, the police, or what have you, signs off and gives it to them, and they actually give it to Kevin.
[Kevin Bailey]: So I do have an, as a match, I have an event form for Hormel and the con and show. And for that, it's just a checklist of, are you serving food? Do you have alcohol? How many people are going to be there? And it gives just, I use electricity, I use an amplified sound. So it just kind of goes through a checklist of the different questions that you would ask for an event and would have an impact. Hormel also has, like I said, if it's a hundred people, So what we're already telling people up front when they're renting is if it's 100 people or more, you're gonna need police detail. If it's 500 people or more, you're gonna need a minimum of two police detail. And we say it's a four hour minimum and the applicant is responsible to pay the bill from the police department, because the police will separately send them that invoice. So there's no confusion that that's not included in the permit fee. So that has helped us a lot, if anything, And it does say that as well, that for details or if you need a quote to email us. Most of the permit holders don't really ask, but on occasion, it does prompt that question from them. And it gives us the opportunity to call the police department, find out how much it would cost them. And so before they submit the application, they already know what those additional fees would detail.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Do you have a copy of that that you can get to us?
[Jenny Graham]: I feel like we've seen it before.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Yeah, you have seen them before.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, we've seen them before. Because we brought it up when we had the Indian Festival at Columbus is when I think we brought it up. Yeah. Because we had a lot of questions in that round.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, and it's really tough when you're in the commission meeting to think about all the different questions. So let's just kind of systematically relax those questions. Yeah. So I, so just like, um, you have this and then I just throw it to the back and it says like, this is for our events and everything. So people, if they are reading the top of it, we'll know that this is only if you're requesting the park permit to have an event, if it's a, uh, practice games and all that, they don't need to fill it out.
[Unidentified]: Daniel wants to take it to the next level, which I agree with, which we're talking about is having to sign off before we issue the permit. So they can't come the month before and say, I want to do this. It's going to have to be a planned event.
[Jenny Graham]: My thing is, too, that we're going to have to communicate with these other, like, we're going to have to communicate with the Board of Health, and we're going to have to communicate with the police. They're going to come to you. We don't want them to go to the Board of Health and say, well, where's your permit for the park? You know what I mean? I just want to make sure we're all on the same page.
[Reggie Graham]: I'll write to various departments, but I've got to figure out who the particular people are that would be the ones that would have to sign off. And quite frankly, I know this is more paperwork, right, Kevin?
[Kevin Bailey]: No, it's not much so. I think it's honestly, it's probably Mary Ann from the Board of House, police chief, or someone that he designates.
[Unidentified]: Or the retail office, which is already set up. Yeah. Yeah, whether they pay their permit to it. What department are we talking about? Fire department. Maybe the fire if you want, yeah. Why would the fire department do that? If you're going to bring a barbecue down? But they don't allow grout now.
[Adam Hurtubise]: No.
[Unidentified]: Well, if you have an event, and you have them come down with a food truck, they have to be able to be certified. That statement's a little interesting. But if you have someone that must see it. Wouldn't the board of health may pass those questions?
[Kevin Bailey]: I think the Board of Health usually oversees the food trucks. They issue the cards.
[Jenny Graham]: But grills are not allowed in any park.
[Unidentified]: Grills are not. But if you have a catered event, and you come in with grills, they're invited to have a white fire hookah, sandwiches, and so on and so forth. They can issue a permit for that. But again, it's a catered event. It's not just you or I. Oh, I didn't understand.
[Jenny Graham]: I didn't understand.
[Unidentified]: I mean, we've done a lot in the past where we've advocated, we have someone come down, they come down, the flight attendants actually be able to bring down Robert's damage reports because of the use of that. But they're also having smoke bombs, they have a firetruck there. But again, they're overseen in some way, shape, or form.
[Reggie Graham]: I still believe that whatever department we send it to has to sign off, and we have to see it. It has to be passed on. Well, that's the same with ATREX, but it could be filed.
[Jenny Graham]: It could be the actual department. somewhere on the actual permit like requires what a health approver requires that's that's that's that's for us in general, no I'm saying, but if we. They come into us, and they're like, I have this application. I want to do this. Well, you need to get signed off on these things before we can accept this application. So if they just took their application and went back to those places, got it signed off, and brought it back, brought the actual physical application back to us, then they would have it. And it would be all in one place.
[Unidentified]: So we're not issuing them. We're just saying, we'll get your permit. But you need to sign off on all these applications, come back and forth, because it's a type of bank we want. And then we'll issue the permit after.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah.
[Unidentified]: We don't have to follow up. They are following up on it all.
[Jenny Graham]: They're going to do it anyway.
[Unidentified]: What we're saying is we're not going to tell them.
[Jenny Graham]: We're going to give you the permit, but you have to do it yourself.
[Reggie Graham]: We're not giving them the permit until such time as they come back. But I don't want to give them back their permit. I want to give them one sheet so that they can go to whatever department. how much they go to, and they bring the sheet back, not the permit of itself. The permit of itself should stay with Kevin.
[Jenny Graham]: The application.
[Reggie Graham]: The application.
[Jenny Graham]: I'm saying put it on the application.
[Kevin Bailey]: I see what you're saying, because if you don't go that route, what's going to happen is we're going to say, OK, here's the form. Go to all the departments and get it signed off.
[Jenny Graham]: Somewhere on here. Like somewhere in here that says, like, requires. You know what I mean?
[Unidentified]: Yes. What's the question? I'm good with that.
[Jenny Graham]: like somewhere on there, you know what I mean?
[Reggie Graham]: Okay, so for our use only.
[Jenny Graham]: Not for our use only, not that part.
[Reggie Graham]: Okay, okay.
[Jenny Graham]: Somewhere just in this application.
[Chris Murphy]: Well, I know, I know like when I do my, for the football team, like the common vigilance license.
[Unidentified]: Yeah.
[Chris Murphy]: Like on the paper, there's like a thing on the back when I get from the state clerk, it goes like city clerk, board of health. Right, that's what we're talking about.
[Unidentified]: Yeah.
[Chris Murphy]: And then it's just like signed off date.
[Unidentified]: Once the application is completed, all the departments that are involved, then we can issue a permit. Until both are filled out, we determine that they need the Board of Health, and they need the police detail. But they don't need to fight about them. They can be the Board of Health, and I'll leave whatever it is. Those two departments sign off, then we can issue a permit. But they're going to come back to us with those two things.
[Jenny Graham]: Because that can make the permit complete. So they need a complete application.
[Reggie Graham]: OK.
[Jenny Graham]: make sense?
[Reggie Graham]: I'm trying to wrap my head around it. So in other words, we give them back their permit. Their application. We give them back their application. Okay. And we're not going to give you what you need until you fill out these things.
[Jenny Graham]: So we've already collected their money.
[Reggie Graham]: No, we won't collect their money.
[Jenny Graham]: We don't collect that money until they come back with the application.
[Chris Murphy]: I think it's like when I when I when I did the vitriol license, it's the city clerk that sends it to the health department, not not me. So the the originating the clerk will send it to the health department and then the other various departments, and then they'll send it back. And then I'll get a call saying, all right, you've been approved, come pick up your permit. Not, hey, come back to us when this is done.
[Kevin Bailey]: So when someone sends me their permit applications, which I get throughout the four weeks, somebody sends me the application, they want to have an event, they fill out the event form. HAB-Jacques Juilland, Moderator): will just then forward that to the appropriate departments, get their signatures on it and then. HAB-Terry Palmos. HAB-Terry Palmos. HAB-Terry Palmos. HAB-Jacques Juilland, Moderator): And then contact them, so you better prove. HAB-Jacques Juilland, Moderator): It might be in some ways just easier for me to forward it to the departments, then they're not getting people. HAB-Jacques Juilland, Moderator): it's easier for that person they're not coming to city hall trying to get all the signatures or. find out their email address. I think that's what we can take on.
[Unidentified]: I do feel that it's not a whole lot more work. I mean, we don't have that many events to come through. Correct. But I also feel it should be.
[Jenny Graham]: It should be blind and white. It should be blind and white. Maybe 4 o'clock.
[Reggie Graham]: Maybe 4 o'clock. But at the same time, we need to make sure that we're coordinating with those departments before we give them their actual permit.
[Unidentified]: I don't really want to add additional work for the recreation department. I agree. Okay, I mean because Kevin's
[Reggie Graham]: keeps saying he needs more people, he needs a secretary, he needs this, he needs that.
[Jenny Graham]: What is in the application that had the links to who they had to contact? Like, border health with their information, Metro Police Department with their information, Fire Department, if applicable, with their information.
[Chris Murphy]: We wouldn't require this on every permit, just certain events.
[Jenny Graham]: But I feel like they really don't know that they need that information until they come to us. But if it was on this, they might know that they already need that information or it was, you know, specified, like, especially the one here, you know, the food thing, they know they need to contact people to help if they're going to have food. But, like, I think the police detail, if we add that to this, it would you know, they would know coming in on having more than. Yeah. Right. Right.
[Unidentified]: Yeah. Yeah. So
[Reggie Graham]: Do we want to include that here, or do we want to put it on the application?
[Jenny Graham]: I think it's, yeah, both.
[Unidentified]: I think the guidelines to a... It has to do with the application for that. Yeah. And that we're going to give a special next guideline for the application to the museum, and then we'll include the application in the deliberation in detail, and then we can wind it forward. We'll have to redesign the permit applications.
[Reggie Graham]: A little bit more, right?
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, we'll add it to the so just like the whole mile commission, you'll have all this and then just on the back, we'll have the event one. Yeah, we're on the back. Yeah, the last page.
[Jenny Graham]: It's gonna be like a page to the the application, but it'll be for it will only be for events.
[Kevin Bailey]: So right now we have three pages. I'll just add a page. And now maybe a special event one. But it starts right at the top saying, you know, please help fill out this form. If you are hosting a special event at one of the city parks to help the departments and like an appropriate commission. Okay. But it's a standard one that we already have for the con and shell and Hormel stadium and the field.
[Reggie Graham]: So we should still, we should still notify whoever we are going to send this to that is has to be done in a timely fashion, so on and so forth, before we send it to them. I mean, we're not going to send anything to them for a couple of months anyway. But at the same time, I would rather them know about it beforehand and not know about it, and then find out and say, well, what the hell is this? And put it in the aisle. So that's good. That's good. I think that's pretty good. We should hear that. All right, so what's next on the agenda next on the agenda would be the.
[Adam Hurtubise]: We do the dedication.
[Kevin Bailey]: Okay, so as a reminder on this one this is something that has come up before between hormone the parks commission of people requesting. whether it's signs, products, plaques, all that. So the idea is to try to streamline this because right now it's just through emails and there's no written form. I guess this is the idea that with Hormel and the parks that we would have a form like this that can be submitted and would also need the final approval from the mayor, but would at least ask consistently the questions that both commissions would need in order to make an approval.
[Chris Murphy]: So has this come up with all the Hormel ones? Because I mean, so are these a request or are these I'm paying money and this is what I'm doing?
[Kevin Bailey]: It is a request, but believe I did say that there is money involved.
[Chris Murphy]: So who's in charge of betting these people?
[Reggie Graham]: So this year, we had a couple of different requests. So the guy down at Playstead Park that passed away and he'd been there for a number of years, they came and asked if they could put up a little sign, okay? They just, they, what's his name? No, it was only a small one.
[Chris Murphy]: Tommy Hines.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah, thank you, thank you. They came to us, we said, yeah, okay, well, you know, blah, blah, blah, show us the sign. And, you know, they did a mock-up or, you know, and so on and so forth. We looked at it, everybody okayed it, and we did it, you know, and so on and so forth. But- I don't think they put that up yet either. I don't know that they have none. They have none? When are they going to do it? In spring? Well, you know, But that was one of the, one example. And then remember the lady that got all this.
[Jenny Graham]: And she said, well, we said, well. He was a postman. He was a postal guy.
[Reggie Graham]: He went postal. You know, so I think that this is something that we really need. It doesn't come up every month. It doesn't come up every, you know, every couple of months or what have you. But it should be, yeah, someplace where they can, you know, give us the information. I'm a little, I'm a little, some of these questions are a little sensitive. I don't know. It's the person probably alive. Well, most of the time they wouldn't ask for a memorial if it wasn't.
[Jenny Graham]: Well, dedication. Maybe one day we'll talk after a little bit. Yeah, imagine that. Why not bricks? What? Where are we going to put bricks? They're digging up every brick they can.
[Unidentified]: There's walkways.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, but usually with that, it wouldn't be a one-off. That would be probably something that, yeah.
[Chris Murphy]: Why don't we do this as a one-off?
[Kevin Bailey]: I think that's a separate discussion. I think this is more of that one-off request that we get.
[Chris Murphy]: I mean, like my only thing with this, like, all right, what if we get 90 requests for benches, for like, for tables that, car park or 30 requests for benches at a specific park.
[Jenny Graham]: But if someone's willing to spend.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you have 90 people willing to spend money to buy a bench and put their name on it.
[Jenny Graham]: And it's not something we're gonna advertise, like, hey, I just wanna have a plan that people come through with.
[Reggie Graham]: A box bench, $900, a table, 1,000. It's not gonna happen that often, Chris.
[Jenny Graham]: I would be willing.
[Reggie Graham]: And these are just examples of these types of memorials. When you're talking about the smaller memorials, like the one for Tom, okay, those types of things we can check out real quick.
[Kevin Bailey]: We don't have this information, but I was saying, you know. I bet you that sign still costs a good amount of money. Yeah.
[Reggie Graham]: Would that sign? But we don't know where they're going to put it, too.
[Chris Murphy]: They're going to put it on the Playstead Road side, like facing Playstead Road when you drive by, I believe.
[Reggie Graham]: Anyway, I was getting back to this, the questions. Is the person currently alive?
[Jenny Graham]: was, is this person a Medford resident or were they a Medford resident? Like, are they or were they a Medford resident and for how long? Is this a dedication? or a memorial, because that's very clear, like.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It doesn't really have to.
[Jenny Graham]: Are they dead or alive? Is it a dedication?
[Unidentified]: Yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: Or is it a memorial?
[Unidentified]: It's a memorial. We can clean it up, yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: And then I feel like the last question, like if deceased, like you can get rid of that, because if they are deceased, they're going to explain it in the space below where they fill out why they want what they want. Because then if it's a memorial, they're going to say like, blah, blah, blah, and they passed away, and we want to remember them.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, and I know like the Hormel, Chris, I know you've been attending a lot of them, but as you know, the presentation to look back for Mr. Hormel himself, It has a very lengthy background on it and it really tells.
[Chris Murphy]: That plaque should have been installed in 1964. Okay.
[Kevin Bailey]: But with that said, you can see the background that we got.
[Chris Murphy]: My worry with the whole thing is, is I know that there's a plaque for a certain person and my thing is that they're gonna install that, if that plaque gets installed, you're gonna have a bunch of people saying, all right, now I want a plaque for this guy, a plaque for that guy, a plaque for that guy, a plaque for that guy, a plaque for that guy.
[Jenny Graham]: And the Whole Milk Commission can either approve it or they won't.
[Kevin Bailey]: And the wall is nice, and when it comes to benches or picnic tables, I mean, it's great that someone gets a dedication.
[Chris Murphy]: I mean, my thing is, I'm good with the picnic benches and the other benches, because I think when you start adding plaques up, that's where I get kind of like,
[Kevin Bailey]: PB, Peter Vitale — Governor's Office Staff Moderator): And that's why it is a request that still has to go. PB, Peter Vitale — Governor's Office Staff Moderator): So case by case basis that Commissioners.
[Jenny Graham]: PB, Peter Vitale — Governor's Office Staff Moderator): make those decisions. PB, Peter Vitale — Governor's Office Staff Moderator): don't want to tell us why this person.
[Reggie Graham]: She contributed to the city and why they deserve a very, very upset.
[Chris Murphy]: Yeah, we're asking you questions, I think, I think we're going to run into an issue to where people are going to say, Why do we have to pay to honor this person to Again, if someone's willing to pay for it, but I think you're going to run into situations where people are going to say, well, this guy works for the city for 50 years.
[Reggie Graham]: Why should we have to pay for that? If that was the case, Chris, the city would have to pay for it. And quite frankly, everybody doesn't have the same opinion about some folks. Do we want to put a dedication up for Mayor McGlynn because he was mayor for 28 years? There's going to be some people that say yay, and there's going to be some that say nay. So they're going to come to the various commissions and we figure it out.
[Unidentified]: But again, it's a case-by-case basis, and we have to provide the information that's going to prove they're relevant to our town.
[Reggie Graham]: These benches are expensive, huh?
[Kevin Bailey]: Those are actually relatively cheap. They're relatively cheap? For commercial grade, yeah. Those are not the most expensive entertainers or benches. They're not the cheapest ones. They're not the cheapest ones, but they're still cheap. Yes.
[Jenny Graham]: Like the bench. Do you want to throw flags on all those paper tables you put up in the verse? Where are those going?
[Kevin Bailey]: Red Spawn? Mostly Red Spawn, Test Pool, and they might some go to Test Park.
[Jenny Graham]: The ones you just thought are in better shape than the ones below. Oh, OK.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, cleaning them up. And then I want to get a picture for the spring and take John Rose on that. Because that was a lot of benches. And that saved our pumpkin float, too.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, those all came from you. Yeah, Brandon.
[Reggie Graham]: OK, so we had talked about, are we done with the subject?
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, I think if we have a. What's up?
[Reggie Graham]: Are you OK with this language that we've changed in this? Yeah. OK.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Yeah.
[Reggie Graham]: OK. With the concept, we even with the plaques and so on and so forth. Yeah. I like the idea. I'm just.
[Chris Murphy]: Don't worry. I'm just waiting for the first one we approve and then things start to say, well, why is this person good? And you're going to explain them, well, this person paid if you want to pay. I know how this city is, just like you do.
[Jenny Graham]: And I hope I bring this information to all of you.
[Reggie Graham]: So next thing on the agenda is the fees for the pond and for the pool. And we had talked about this earlier in an earlier meeting. And these are the proposed numbers. The walk-in pass for Rice Pond would go from 20 to 22. The vehicle pass would go from 50 to 55. And the senior and the handicapped pass would go from 30 to 33. Now, we actually had something new, the caregiver pass,
[Adam Hurtubise]: which I'm still questioning, okay?
[Reggie Graham]: And the reason why I'm questioning is because caregiver pass can only be used to bring a Medford resident adult to the park. The pass will be sold to the Medford resident and must be present in the vehicle when entering the park. A photo ID must be presented to the park ranger each time when visiting. So the question begs, and I got to make sure that I understand this.
[Adam Hurtubise]: The pass that we're giving is something that can be interchangeable.
[Jenny Graham]: I buy a pass.
[Reggie Graham]: No, I understand the concept.
[Jenny Graham]: But then my mother drives me there, and she's not an active resident. But I have to be in the car. I understand that.
[Reggie Graham]: I understand that. I'm talking about, we're talking about elderly people, okay? There are multiple caregivers for different people. So, for example, my stepfather has multiple caregivers, okay? They might take him one place, another place. So then if he wanted to go to the pond one day, Monday it might be Olga, Tuesday it might be Cecil, Wednesday it might be so on and so forth. You understand what I'm saying?
[Adam Hurtubise]: So I'm asking if this particular pass, which goes to the adult, is... Thank you.
[Jenny Graham]: There's no license plate tied to this pass. That's the thing.
[Adam Hurtubise]: It's tied to this person.
[Reggie Graham]: So we talked about giving them rather than something that went on the window, which is what you use now, right?
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, so right now it's, um, yeah, it attaches to the windshield. So we're talking about something like a, almost like a handicapped placket, just like a cardboard type.
[Reggie Graham]: A small card? Like, can we do a laminated card about this
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, like hangs on the rear view.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah. Do we do that? That's a thought. We're going to talk to the company that does the pawn passes, see if they have something like that, that hangs over the mirror. If not, then in years past when we did the Tufts pool passes that used to be those like stock card that the people at Tufts pool used to handwrite, we would have something like that. but we would handwrite the pass itself to that particular person who doesn't have the driver's license. So the caregiver will be able to take that just like a handicap placard, being able to take that. The only caveat to it is to just make sure that the person who has that pass sold to, we would just need to have their ID shown to the park rangers. So we know that what's their name written on the pass matches the driver's license that they give us.
[Reggie Graham]: That's not gonna happen a tremendous amount of times, I would say maybe five times a day, maybe.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I would imagine.
[Jenny Graham]: So you're going to get a lot of people that are going to use this feature often, often enough that the people that are working the gate are going to recognize, oh, this person has a care vehicle pass. Absolutely.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah. So I'm good with that. But then, do we agree on this $55 fee?
[Adam Hurtubise]: It's the same as a vehicle pass. Why would it be different? We didn't agree to anything. Today is where we are delivering.
[Reggie Graham]: OK. OK. So hear me out. Hear me out. OK. Usually, that particular method resident that you're talking about is either a senior or a handicapped. I'm just thinking about it. Because most of the time, you're not talking about people that are able to go to the on their own. Okay, so that's a $22 increase from the senior the handicap, even though it might be a little bit different circumstance. It's still that type of Most of those people are going to fall into that category.
[Jenny Graham]: So what if we did it like and put an asterisk, like senior handicap pricing may apply when applicable?
[Adam Hurtubise]: It is whatever is in the carload and only one carload per day.
[Kevin Bailey]: So yeah, if you're a mini man, you make out, if you're in a little coop, not too many.
[Unidentified]: But if you had a kid in the house, and they came in with four people, would you let them in? That's a very good question.
[Jenny Graham]: But if they were senior, and they came in with four people, would you let them in? Right? If a senior citizen came in with, you know, Reg rolled in with three of his friends, Would you let them in?
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, so a senior handicap pass, you could have a senior with four or five people in the vehicle, they would be coming in.
[Jenny Graham]: It's the same as a carload. I mean, obviously, like stipulations are somewhere on the website that tells you. Yeah.
[Kevin Bailey]: It doesn't happen often. I think on occasion, there was some people that come in two or three times with a minivan. And that's where that role came about.
[Jenny Graham]: Make it that, you know, if you're a senior handicap, obviously that that pricing would be applied.
[Kevin Bailey]: So I'll do $55 and then just like a little Astra senior handicap price applied.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Yeah. Does everyone agree on that? Chris, you okay? You're good with that? Yeah. You're muted, huh?
[Chris Murphy]: You don't wanna talk to us no more? No, no, my wife got home, my mother got home. I don't want too much background noise for you guys. Us?
[Reggie Graham]: We're too loud?
[Chris Murphy]: No, my background noise.
[Reggie Graham]: Oh, we ain't worried about that. Let them kids play. Are we good with the membership, just a 10% increase with?
[Kevin Bailey]: the cost of the lifeguards and the lawn care, piece management, everything has gone up for our expenses that typically go through our revolving account for the pond. So that's why we're looking at that 10% to just try to maintain that balance, but also don't wait to a point where we have to do a dramatic increase to be able to get some places.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, maybe people started buying a car right now, right?
[Reggie Graham]: It's scary how much they are now. Okay, so so in the same in the same vein, right? So cool, you're only going up, but $6 for a daily fee for an adult $3 for two for a resident child, a non resident adult goes to $12. A non resident child goes to $6 don't deal with these must show proof of residency, such as a driver's ID or current utility bill if no proof of residency can be shown, you'll need to pay the non resident rate sounds fair.
[Kevin Bailey]: So when I was so I am. We're asking our law department to look into being able to restrict non residents, and whether it's only so many non residents allowed per day, or we can take out the daily fee of non residents but still offer the membership rate. So they are looking at the legality behind that and whether or not we can have that as an option. So I might come back to the next meeting once I hear back from the law department, what our other options are.
[Jenny Graham]: I almost feel like the daily fee like daily should almost be non. they should be resident only for daily. And if people outside non-residents have to do a membership.
[Kevin Bailey]: And that's what I would like, but I need to make sure that we can legally do that first.
[Reggie Graham]: Is OPFU associated with DCR at all?
[Kevin Bailey]: It is not, but I do believe federal funds were once used, and that's what the law department is looking at right now.
[Reggie Graham]: So the federal funds, we might have, I don't think there's a problem with, designating fees for residents versus non-residents. But exclusions might be a problem. I don't know. So when you get the response from, I thought we didn't have a legal department.
[Kevin Bailey]: When I say legal, the law department, I'm saying KP Law, our outside attorneys right now.
[Adam Hurtubise]: All right. Okay, all of it.
[Chris Murphy]: All of it.
[Reggie Graham]: We do we do the measure, the membership is justice. We changed the non resident family from 135 to 150. So the membership allows you to go in as an individual from the time the pool opens in the spring to the time the pool closes in the fall anytime you want. When it is open swim. Yeah.
[Kevin Bailey]: So that's usually around 12, 15 to eight o'clock at night during the week, and then seven o'clock on the weekend is 10 to seven. 12, 15, we have a lot of camps, but it dies down around three o'clock.
[Reggie Graham]: And that might also- So let me ask you this, Kevin. If somebody had a membership, an individual, would there be a time that you would turn them away if the pool Was not full? Besides the morning.
[Kevin Bailey]: Was not full? Not full. The only time we turn them away is when there's no open swim. So when we have swim lessons, that's really the only time I try to close the pool. Yeah, they can view the schedule. I put it out far in advance. I'll probably have the draft. Actually, I already have the draft ready. So it will be out far in advance for people to look at, but I try to always keep open swim. It might be limited when we might be running a program in a couple of lanes, but I try to keep as much open swim as possible and utilize that pool as much as we can. And actually open swim, sorry, open swim is actually on the right-hand side of the bottom. So those are the times when you have a membership when you would be coming in. Again, there are times where, you know, especially at five o'clock, like during the weeknights, you'll see a couple of lap lanes or programs.
[Reggie Graham]: We have adaptive learn to swim from seven to eight. I think that you should go there at seven o'clock.
[Jenny Graham]: Like it's just not as a city?
[Reggie Graham]: No. It's fine. You don't have to pay. Because you're a commissioner. We're supposed to get you your membership fees.
[Jenny Graham]: I'm just going to walk in with a VIP?
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: With like a big dress and a hat?
[Reggie Graham]: Now, wait, wait, wait. Don't ask him. This is established protocol. We used to have little badges. Remember the badges we used to have? We used to have little badges. Here I am. So that's not a problem. Go to the open swim. I mean, go to the adaptive swim. Don't put her in the deep end, please. All right, group rental rates. $30 an hour for 100 people. 125 people is $30 for 45 minutes. 25 to 50 is $50 for 45 minutes. 50 to 75. Oh, it was $30 per hour. Now we're going per with how many people you got. So we went to 30, 50, 70, and 85.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, this is what we discussed about in the past about certainly the more people you have, the more lifeguards you need.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Right.
[Kevin Bailey]: And the more overcrowded the facility is. You know, someone coming in with only 10 or 15 children, which does happen, would be paying a lot less than someone coming in with 100 or 120 kids.
[Unidentified]: Can you approach any of the groups with these rates yet?
[Kevin Bailey]: Not yet. I'd like to try to get it out. That's why I really want this finalized today so that I can email them appropriately.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah. I really don't like this, not being able to see you.
[Kevin Bailey]: I can see you though from my computer, if that helps. So the question begs, when you schedule your life cons, how are you going to know
[Reggie Graham]: before, if it's a nice day, you say, well, we'll need seven today or we'll need nine today, because obviously, you know, it's going to be dependent on how many people.
[Kevin Bailey]: No, perfect question. No, it's a great question. Honestly, what we try to do is we staff five lifeguards. We need most days on a normal operation, it's four lifeguards. And then we also have rotations. If you have a high day, you have five or six. We have supervisors that are lifeguard certified. The supervisors are really supposed to be walking around, testing the water, and supervising. But in a high bather load, they would actually jump into rotation. So there's someone that's off schedule that can jump onto the schedule if necessary. So that's one way. The second thing is when it rains out or if it's a a quiet day is a lot of times we will send lifeguards home and then on a really busy day we call them up or if we know ahead of time that it's going to be 9 degrees, well a couple of days beforehand we'll try to add extra lifeguards down. Everyone needs to do advanced first. So yeah, they're on schedule and stuff too. So the public also knows. So even though Open Swim starts at 1215, you have camps between then and three o'clock that we have 100, 120 kids coming in, in addition to Open Swims. So, you know, it gives people an option to, if they really want to come in during that time, they can come in, but they also know the pool is going to be busy with a lot of campers. and it's staffed, we have more staff on in the morning. There's actually a drop off at three o'clock, unless we projected that it's gonna be a busy day.
[Jenny Graham]: The water's gonna be very warm. Water is necessary.
[Reggie Graham]: Last question, how do we go with the construction?
[Kevin Bailey]: The concrete is already done, poured, so that's completed. The fencing is still down right now, but the core drill, The posts are already there. So they have to put the fence back up, but they've already drilled the posts and everything. So they said it would only be about a day or two to complete all the fencing. There's some depth markers. Some of the tile is in there, others are not. So they have to finish that up when it gets a little bit warmer again. And then the water mushroom itself has All the piping and the pump is already installed. We just need to physically get the water mushroom so they can put that in.
[Jenny Graham]: I can't wait to see that. I'm really excited about that.
[Kevin Bailey]: And then we fill the water.
[Jenny Graham]: I think it just aesthetically will look very nice. Yeah.
[Kevin Bailey]: And we chose a color that matches the mural in the kiddie pool area. It has a lot of that green, that aqua tail type of colors. the mushroom is going to have that look too. So I kind of blend in with the barrel.
[Reggie Graham]: Any more discussion on this? Pickleball, forever. So if I remember correctly, we decided that we were going to have, we didn't really decide, recreation decided they're going to have certain hours for pickleball. And the pickleball players have been pretty damn good about it. Okay. I think it's eight to 11, 1130 or something like that.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Feel free to jump in whenever you want to. Sorry, I'm just writing something real quick. Sorry.
[Reggie Graham]: So anyway, you know, the pickleball players have, you know, been pretty good as far as adhering to the hours that Medford Recreation has put up for them to play pickleball. So I think it's 8 to 1130 or something to that effect. 830 to 11. Yeah, yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: So the pickleball players being more reasonable than the tennis players?
[Reggie Graham]: The pickleball players, Well, you know something, they are very cognizant of having a nice place to play. And they've been pretty, pretty okay with it. I don't know that the neighbors are as forgiving. Okay, but there's some, there's an awful lot of elements that are going on with, with Duggar Park and so on and so forth. And of course, the additional courts that will be coming in at Carr Park won't be there for at least two years, I don't think. I don't think.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, I do think Hickey will be, is more, Hickey should be done relatively soon. I would imagine within a year, you'll see Hickey Park, the basketball and tennis courts done over with pickleball lines, which I would imagine will help.
[Reggie Graham]: So, you know, one thing, that I'm hearing. I hear from the neighbors and so on and so forth. They're not too happy about having their popover run from 8.30 to 11 every day, because it's seven days a week. They are out there, whether it's 80 degrees or whether it's 80 degrees.
[Adam Hurtubise]: No cats out there having said that, OK? They're not disruptive. They're nice folks.
[Reggie Graham]: They come and they go, and they clean up after themselves, and so on and so forth. So what we've done is we've actually created a conundrum.
[Jenny Graham]: Well, this isn't part of a you move next door park.
[Reggie Graham]: No, I understand that. I understand that. But what I'm trying to say is we've created a conundrum, because we have
[Adam Hurtubise]: five pickleball courts there, okay? They wanted to add a sixth. I don't know.
[Reggie Graham]: What we've created right now is a situation where every day somebody
[Jenny Graham]: They're using them, which is great.
[Unidentified]: That's what we want.
[Kevin Bailey]: So I know what you're saying. We have two and a half tennis courts lined for pickleball. So the sixth court would put, and court three right now only has the pickleball lines on one side of the tennis court. So adding the sixth court would just line, yes, the other side of that.
[Jenny Graham]: We're not losing a whole other court. complete in the other half, which is already being used, so it can't be used by tennis at that time anyways, because it's already being used by pickleball. So it might as well just lie on the other side.
[Adam Hurtubise]: I'm just thinking that, you know, quite frankly, it was only supposed to be four. By the time they do,
[Jenny Graham]: But at this point, they're already using half the court. You don't live there. They're already playing on half the court, so why not just let them play on the other half of the court? It's not being used by anything else. Right now, it's dead space, but it's only playing pick ball ramp.
[Unidentified]: They said they're bringing in their own courts, so they must have something that they can use.
[Jenny Graham]: So they're setting up. They're just probably making a little makeshift court on the side.
[Reggie Graham]: There's no lines for that. Yeah, they're probably just hanging out. The lines are a little bit, you know, Compressed from the tennis courts.
[Unidentified]: And we're all using the court and it's being used for pickleball. Either we take one away or we add it. I don't think we're going to be able to change all the lines. We couldn't. We couldn't. I'm just saying.
[Jenny Graham]: I feel like they're using it. They're utilizing it. They're being respectful to the schedule.
[Reggie Graham]: Yes. But I'm trying to say to you that there's an awful lot of folks down there every day. Awful lot.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Wow.
[Reggie Graham]: Every day. What I'm just telling you is the neighborhood's not going to like it. I'm just telling you. So there's four per assignment.
[Unidentified]: Is that what we're going to have to think about? It could be up to two people for five.
[Reggie Graham]: Four.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, it could be two names going on for four.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Four, eight, 12, 16. Well, that's what I'm getting at. There's a lot of people.
[Unidentified]: Yeah, it could be up to 24. Right.
[Reggie Graham]: But now, what's the limit? There's no limit. It's just a drop-in. There is no limit. Drop-in. We talked about this. You and I talked about this. Should we have a limit?
[Kevin Bailey]: We have a pickleball survey. I think it's going to be really hard to do a limit.
[Jenny Graham]: It's like the game. Is it to a certain point level? I don't know how it works.
[Kevin Bailey]: It's to a point level. If it's really busy, they cut the point level down in half. So I think most games, I want to say about 10 minutes. It's not, but they do when there's a larger line, when there's a lot of people waiting, it is roughly about 10 minutes.
[Jenny Graham]: Are they like respectful to each other when there's a long line about like playing and letting other people in, or are they like hogs about courts?
[Kevin Bailey]: I think it's a mixture, you know, when you're getting 20 to 30 people,
[Jenny Graham]: I mean, nobody wants to go down.
[Kevin Bailey]: There's different personalities. No, no, it might be 10 minutes. Then you sit out a game and then another, then you need to come back on. There's sometimes conflict that, well, I just won that game. Why should I have to sit out? I should be able to continue. So I think no matter what, 20 or 30 people.
[Jenny Graham]: Like a time limit and stuff like common courtesy rules posted.
[Reggie Graham]: So let me ask you this. I'm a little unclear on the content. Do the winners stay on the court?
[Kevin Bailey]: No, I think right now they're making them come off. Everybody comes off. And then, well, the next person.
[Jenny Graham]: But maybe if we post something.
[Kevin Bailey]: But there's also, yeah.
[Reggie Graham]: There's no step rule.
[Kevin Bailey]: We have people who are there that their job is to make sure that everyone gets to play and it's welcoming. I do hear it's a very welcoming group. They help new people learn how to play. I will say I'm seeing now, or what I'm hearing from the pickleball players, and this is why a survey is out right now. We're trying to collect that feedback right now to get a better idea. What I'm hearing from different players is if you're new to the game, there's so many players now that have been playing for several years. They're very good. So it can be intimidating for a new person coming on. And it's really hard if you're a good player, you don't necessarily want to be matched with someone who's just learning. So we talked about either changing out the times or dedicating Right now, what we're doing is saying certain courts, like court one and two, that's for beginners, three and four, that's for intermediate. So they'll try to break it up by that. But again, I think the survey will help us out a little bit more on deciding if we need to structure it a little bit differently or add like an introductory class after the general time. What we've already started to do is just offer pickleball lessons. So we have introductory class, we have coach workouts, so we're trying to add different programs in there. So someone who is learning and feels intimidated coming to that community group, they have the ability to first take some lessons with us before they get out there.
[Jenny Graham]: I think maybe posting some like rules and common court courtesies somewhere in the courts, but maybe both tennis and pickleball. would be helpful.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: So that way, you know, if it is like winner stays on the court and plays the next round, it's kind of posted like, Hey, this is how we're trying here. Like this, regardless of what way it is, like if it was posted, I think it would be just helpful for an outsider coming in. Like if you get someone that does come that isn't from Medford that, you know, and this is how Medford is doing it. You know, it's the same, like, you know, it's, it's,
[Reggie Graham]: It's the same with baseball. I just want to add to that. I don't know what your survey says. I don't know what questions you have put in the survey. And if it's online, I'll have to look. But did you put anything in there about residents? Yes.
[Kevin Bailey]: Okay, and asked if you're a resident you taken a survey and asked about what draws you to the program whether it's the fact that we offer the pickleball and that's and set up is that the community is that the group is welcoming so all that stuff is in there. There is questions about money, about the idea of charging non-residents a fee.
[Jenny Graham]: I was going to ask, because non-resident, do you ask what city they're from?
[Kevin Bailey]: Yes.
[Jenny Graham]: I've got a pie chart going on that as well.
[Kevin Bailey]: I haven't seen it since Friday. But on Friday, we went out with it actually last Thursday. So on Friday, we had a 68 response already. Yeah.
[Adam Hurtubise]: So I can show you all. It's a mixture.
[Kevin Bailey]: I'm trying to, I have it right on the, at Duggar Park on the fence by the pickleball court. So hopefully it's attracting people who are playing at Duggar Park on those courts, but also went out on a newsletter. So there are people who don't necessarily play pickleball or might be a tennis player also have that, but there's also general comments too. So it'll be interesting to see what the public has to say about just the program itself.
[Jenny Graham]: I get what you're saying about the residents going to be mad if we line that sixth fort, but I feel like at this point they're probably already using the sixth fort online just to mess around, so why not just line it at this point? I doubt no one is being on that side of the fort. They're probably just doing it and just like... That's a good practice. Yeah, well just like you know you get the beginners are going over there just trying to learn
[Adam Hurtubise]: We have to be the city.
[Kevin Bailey]: I think if we're going to do a sixth court, I would probably speak to the parks department or DPW about it. And I would imagine if it was going to be aligned, it would be while they're doing another court resurfacing to just have that company go out and do the extra line.
[Jenny Graham]: Like when they paint that court, so we'll go and paint.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, I would imagine that's how they would do it. I wouldn't want to do a temporary one like we've done at Victory or... Victory is a temporary? Semi-temporary, yeah. It's not permanent? It's not professionally permanently aligned. It was through a, the Parks Department did it with, I forget the type of paint material that they use. I mean, it's good, but it's not professionally like if you had a court resurfacing. That's completely lined. No nets. People have to bring their own.
[Adam Hurtubise]: So let me ask you this. Yeah. We're getting an overflow at Duggar Park. Yeah. Even if we have a sixth court, we're still getting an overflow. Yes. At the same time that you asked for the lining of the sixth court,
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah. Can we also- Permanently line victory. Permanently line victory. And also provide that same, what's that?
[Jenny Graham]: That's what I never thought I would hear these words.
[Reggie Graham]: You have to understand, you have to understand. I'm going to bury, no, it would be two courts. At least other than four.
[Kevin Bailey]: Pickleball.
[Jenny Graham]: How many times for victory?
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, there's two courts and one tennis, one tennis court with two pickleball lines on there. And when I say that they're still visible, it's just that it's done with machine. So there's a little bit of not walking, but it's not 100% straight line. It's not professionally done.
[Reggie Graham]: So when you, when you would, if, if, if when we do that, you'll get 30. I want to do victory at the same time and I want to make sure that they have the same resources, so that if we have overflow that we can send them to victory in the interim because we don't have Hickey.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, so Hickey I think has faded at this point, but Hickey did have it at one point.
[Jenny Graham]: And Hickey being resurfaced.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah. And it's being resurfaced. It wouldn't make sense to do Hickey now, but when Hickey gets done over, we are putting pickleball lines on that as well. Okay.
[Jenny Graham]: They're doing the time play.
[Reggie Graham]: And then Power Park would be off in the future sometime.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, we've done it at Barry too. We could line Barry. We did one of the tennis courts at Barry. If we wanted to do that again, they would add another court.
[Reggie Graham]: But I think what it does is it. We don't know about all these wines.
[Kevin Bailey]: That was done about five years ago.
[Reggie Graham]: We still don't know about it. That's all I'm asking.
[Jenny Graham]: You know, I'm just asking.
[Reggie Graham]: I mean, you know, that's what this commission is about, you know, finding out what's going on in the parks. I mean, that's part of part and parcel of what we have to do. That's our responsibility.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah.
[Reggie Graham]: I'm just saying.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, I mean, you certainly knew about Victory Park, and you know about Hickey Park when we had it down there. I used to give you the program books that we had right from the beginning.
[Reggie Graham]: I don't read the program books, to be honest with you. I just think that things like that should probably come before us before they're done, not after they're done. That's all.
[Kevin Bailey]: So we couldn't do Barry as well. I think if you are doing other parks, other tennis courts around the city, you're gonna make Pickleball a little bit more accessible, easier if one court is full, there's another place to go. But I still think in what I saw initially in the survey, reason why people are going to Duggar Park is because you have that group atmosphere that you get to go down and there's 20, 30 people there to play games with. The bigger it is, the more people you're more likely to find that are equal match, and it essentially becomes a hangout for adults.
[Unidentified]: Is the same question that I asked earlier about USDA. Are they willing to take some of their group and go to another?
[Jenny Graham]: You know how you're saying it's split up by groups, like maybe experienced newbies, maybe newbies go to this park and more experienced will meet up at this park.
[Kevin Bailey]: That's an idea. I like the idea, it just means, instead of doing five pickleball nets, now I'm gonna need to buy seven pickleball nets.
[Jenny Graham]: I need to find a whole new group of people.
[Kevin Bailey]: Well, it's a financial issue. And a staff at finding people right now, we have people who... Yeah, actually we did, we talked about doing a tournament. Yeah, no, we talked about that to replace the nets too.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah. I'll help you.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Thank you.
[Jenny Graham]: That's my my thing to do that. But seriously, like just.
[Adam Hurtubise]: I just think. You just got to break it up.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, I think if we did like an introduction, our new players come down to one court. We have to alternate days because you can't take five or six pickleball courts and then the next day is only two.
[Adam Hurtubise]: And then the next day you go back to, but maybe breaking up by skill makes sense.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah. And then you're, you know, you're surrounded by people that are on your same level. So there's no intimidation, you know what I mean? And then once you're ready, just like baseball and stuff, well, they can support.
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah. We have the survey right now. We can digest what the survey says. And then I can do an open forum as well for Pickleball and maybe try to get some of their suggestions as well and offer that as a suggestion. That seems to make sense too. Because that also helps the whole intimidation part. If you're new, now you're going to your park and you're working your way up.
[Adam Hurtubise]: And I would imagine I can find someone to help us out with that too. All right, so yes to six, six point along with victory. And it was not a super expensive.
[Jenny Graham]: I mean, I mean, if you're going to have lines that you might as well just do those courts and then you can figure out the logistics of equipment later.
[Unidentified]: Right. Are you looking at a lot? Yeah. Yeah, I'd like to do that.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Those are about $800, I think. So do we want to take this to a vote? Are we all in agreement to add a six pick a ball? It's three to one. Who's the one? You said do it.
[Reggie Graham]: We're going to vote on it, and it's going to be three to one, OK? Chris, you say yes?
[Chris Murphy]: Anyway, if we don't put it in, we're gonna piss off the pickleball people. If we add another tennis court, I mean, if we don't put it, we put it in, we're gonna upset the tennis people. If we don't put it in, we're gonna upset the pickleball people. We're in like a lose-lose situation. I know tennis wants another court, pickleball wants another court. I don't know who to upset and who not to upset.
[Jenny Graham]: I mean, if you're respecting their timeline, time frame that they're given. Utilize the space to the fullest.
[Unidentified]: I don't think that's what the idea of what Regan was talking about. It's just that there's an influx. There's an influx of people at Denver Park. What I was trying to get at is maybe we can move them on. Maybe we can get less people at Denver. Yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: But if they have other options, other places to go by.
[Reggie Graham]: The thing is, is if they have other options to go, they're probably not going to go. Because you're talking about different levels of experience. Okay, the beginners, the beginners are not going to just want to play against beginners, because you don't get any better if you just play against beginners, right?
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah.
[Reggie Graham]: And the experienced people are not going to want to play against non-experienced people, but they're going to have to because, you know, they're intermingled right now. And that's fine. I mean, you know, yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: I think once the program is developed, and the people are guided to the right things, you know what I mean? Like,
[Unidentified]: And the reverse would be that they can't get back to the tennis court. Oh, and now get rid of that pickleball. But I think they're still going to play pickleball. They're going to just not utilize the lines.
[Jenny Graham]: They're still without the lines.
[Unidentified]: Without the lines.
[Reggie Graham]: You know something? It's a very difficult proposition. It's the end of the day, the end of the day. Yeah, it is, OK? You know, I mean, if you add the other courts. I don't know that just because you build it doesn't mean they're going to come.
[Jenny Graham]: I just like it's like with anything else like it just because we, we don't, you know, we tell somebody you can't use the baseball doesn't mean I'm not going to go and use baseball fields.
[Kevin Bailey]: I'm just saying in general. In the survey, people aren't saying they're going because we have tennis nets or because we have pickleball nets. They're saying it's because of the group. From what it sounds like in the survey initially, even if there is no lockbox, no nets, people will still show up there with their nets and play. They want a group of friends to go and play and meet new people.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Why do we have to put lines up if they're going to do it anyway? I'm just asking.
[Kevin Bailey]: Well, I think that's their argument is, like we said, like, because they're already playing on that third tennis court, now nobody can use that other half of that tennis court. So they're just hitting around. Why not put the lines and let them have another game?
[Reggie Graham]: I think the tennis people would say- I also remember that that court was dedicated to an individual who taught tennis. So that's all I'm trying to tell you. is that, you know, that's stuck there and it's there and it's not going away. And I understand that. I understand that perfectly. If we're going to have all that many people down there in that neighborhood and so on and so forth every day, seven days a week, that we need to make sure that we can spread it around as much as we possibly can. so that the residents are bitching and moaning about all these cars on the road and so on and so forth. I hear that. Because I live in that area. I mean, I hear that. So I'm torn. I know the pickleball people are doing a good job as far as maintaining their space and so on and so forth. And obviously, I've talked to Tom, and I have a good relationship, I think, with him and so on and so forth. I don't want to take anything away from them, but I'm going to hear a lot of shit if we add another pickleball court. That's all I'm telling you.
[Jenny Graham]: We're not even adding a court. They're already using it.
[Unidentified]: They're already using this court. No, not really. Can we find out if they are utilizing that court? Do I go by there every day? I do.
[Reggie Graham]: Are they using that other app? They're using the second app. They're not using the app that's online. So is the fear that by adding a sixth, there's going to be, instead of 25 to 30 people come in, there's going to be 30 to 35 people because now
[Kevin Bailey]: method as an actual court. Yeah.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah. It's just a difficult proposition. No, I know. No matter what I think or what, you know, we do. But I don't want to reduce it because now all of a sudden, you know, this X amount of people can't play. And like I said, they've been very
[Jenny Graham]: So why don't we do this? This isn't going to happen until another court is lined. So we're thinking what, he is probably the next one to be lined?
[Kevin Bailey]: I would imagine I can talk to the park department about lining it, but if we want to do it. I wouldn't want them to come down to a liner and I request a nice beautiful courts just on over and then I have a question.
[Chris Murphy]: Because they did this to my football field, they lined it for lacrosse and soccer. than all these other sports. Can you line, could you do white for tennis and yellow for pickleball?
[Unidentified]: That's what it is.
[Chris Murphy]: So why isn't it just lined for both?
[Jenny Graham]: Because then it's utilized for both and then it's more people.
[Chris Murphy]: So is it lined for tennis right now?
[Unidentified]: Yes, it's a tennis court. Half the court is lined for pickleball.
[Chris Murphy]: half of the time for pickleball, but the whole court is lined for tennis. Correct. Okay. I haven't been down there to see what it looks like. I'm done.
[Jenny Graham]: So the, what needs to be done is probably resurfaced. Yes. Which isn't going to happen until the spring. So let's throw this on the table for now. Wait to get the pickleball survey back, see what we need. And then if we need it, we tack it on then. And then if we don't, then we don't.
[Kevin Bailey]: So the motion is to table until- Motion to table. Until the survey is completed.
[Jenny Graham]: Do you have a deadline for the survey?
[Kevin Bailey]: Yeah, February 14th.
[Jenny Graham]: So the next meeting?
[Kevin Bailey]: Next meeting, I can actually share the results. And I think we're coming up with ideas, but maybe that's something as a public forum or at a meeting, see what the pickleball players or tennis players have for suggestions.
[Reggie Graham]: Problem is that, you know, the tennis players, the tennis players are going to tell you that it's a tennis board. They shouldn't even be there. But there was a motion. Motion to table. Motion to table. Second. So we'll take it to the February meeting. Yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: But we still have time. Like, Hickey's not going to get done till the spring, so.
[Reggie Graham]: Yeah, it'll be spring.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, I think it's why it is scheduled, I think, for the spring.
[Chris Murphy]: Even if we voted on this to align it tonight, this wouldn't get aligned for the spring either. So we have time.
[Reggie Graham]: All right. Do we have anything else that we want to discuss tonight? One last thing.
[Unidentified]: I had asked a while ago, do we send a letter to soccer about their netting? The nets that are run in Paris?
[Kevin Bailey]: No, I can do that. It is, it's to lock the vaults.
[Unidentified]: Because the ones in Paris are moving around as the ones on our campus. And we have to, we've had some weather this week, Now we've had that whole amount to the wind. And you said that was, was it placed in Harris she said?
[Kevin Bailey]: Thank you.
[Unidentified]: How do I do this? It should be awesome. They all can walk up and say, who cheated?
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, I remember. I think Hickey's baseball and softball are getting really dug up sometimes. We still haven't figured out whether or not DCF is going to finish the pandemic memorial.
[Reggie Graham]: You know, there's a very simple solution to that. A very simple solution. Move the fence to the edge of where that lift is, because there's a lift back of cement that goes, extends out beyond the fence. What they need to do is move the fence back out to the lift and put a gate in there where you can enter into the dugout. That's the simple solution, okay? There's no need to go back and reconstruct the dugout. But, you know.
[Kevin Bailey]: But it's, yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: It's dealing with them.
[Kevin Bailey]: Baseball has been meeting with the DPW director and I about the dugouts there and trying to get it so that it's playable again. I know the DPW commission has emailed DCR several times. And I think at this point, I think he's given them a deadline where then the DPW department is just going to remedy and fix it themselves. We've been waiting for a while for them to fix the problem. I think the city just got to see.
[Reggie Graham]: But, you know, at the end of the day, you know, just DCI hasn't really been responsive to any of the city's needs. No, what happens if someone needs to get hurt and then, well, you know, something DCI doesn't give a shit because they don't, it's not coming out of DCI's pocket, it might come out of their budget, but it's just coming out of their, you know, their insurance. Plus they're statewide, you know, so that little lip on that baseball field, that's a drop in the bucket for them. Listen, you know, COVID has really kind of goofed up everything as far as people were concerned. You have people that didn't go back to work. So you have an awful lot of institutional knowledge that's gone, ain't coming back. You know, you've got people that didn't go back to work.
[Adam Hurtubise]: You just got all these things, you know, where, you know, you don't have control over it.
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