Yeah. It's easier. I gotta be honest. I don't off the chair. Or someone.
Yeah. See this too. I think
he's got the presentation. Good evening, everybody. It is Monday, 11/25/2024. This is the regular meeting of the Recreation Advisory Board. Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll?
Chairman Simon. Here. Vice chair Sanchez.
Councilwoman Vargas? Here. Jenna Lafayette? Here. Kenneth Phillips?
We have five present. We have a quorum.
Thank you, madam clerk. And I would just say thank you. This is the first time I think we've had a full meeting, I think, probably since we've been meeting. So thank you guys for for attending. I know it's a busy week with Thanksgiving, so appreciate you guys making the time.
We are here at the Baddestini Recreation Center today. I wanna acknowledge councilwoman Joanne Ryan, who is with us today
Who will be a part of this meeting, you know, inviting you to to to feel free to chime in when when you'd like, especially as it relates to Baddistini Center. I will start off by saying that has been an amazing advocate for this center. In fact, they would not be here but for her efforts. And we had a chance to do a tour, before, starting the meeting today, and there's a lot of assets in this recreation facility, which we'll be hearing about that don't exist in other facilities and really are an asset to the city and opening them up, after school hours. And, hopefully, I think into the future as we start to talk about more programming for here too, it's a huge asset to the city.
So Councilwoman Ryan, thank you for for all you've done for this
Thank you, mister chair. For this center. My pleasure.
And for all you've done award. We're in Mighty Ward 5 over here, Lisa. My home ward.
Well represented, I hope.
So agenda today, we're gonna do, as we always do, we're at the direct center, a presentation from the VADESTEEMI staff. We have John Barnoli here who is, who is the director of the center. Director Grace is always... Is with us today, and will be a part of the meeting. And then, I did add an agenda item.
I'm not sure there's gonna be too much to talk about on this, but I did not want the meeting to go by without at least touching on it. There was, as everybody read, I'm sure, the past couple of weeks, a lot of back and forth between RIDE, and the city as it relates to the school budget. There's a lot of talk around what the potential implications for recreation could be, so we'll talk about that briefly. There's a lot of information just yet, but I did not want to read you about it without talking that. We are in the middle of, basketball, and we are about to enter into the the bigger basketball registration phase.
So we'll touch base on that. And then we're gonna talk about website, online registration, and communications. I have on here a discussion on winter and spring programming. I think this may be... This will probably be the item that that I'll continue to the next meeting.
We have a lot of agenda items to get through today, and I don't wanna keep everybody here until late in the second. This is probably one that we'll we'll kick out to the next meeting. And then, obviously, as we always do, we'll open up a public comment. So before we get started, are there any other additions anybody would like to
make to this or any conversations talking about the agenda?
Alright. Then director Grace and director Vargnoli and chair councilwoman Ryan will also have a to say about this presentation. But I did jump in. We are very happy to be here at the Badistini Center, and the floor is yours. It tells us about all the great things that are going on here and how we can continue to help you.
Alright. Welcome to Baddest Union. We recently took a tour, so you've seen it in person. But we recently got our front lobby, our gymnasium. We didn't get the pool redone, but we got the cafeteria and the activity room redone.
Wanna go to the next slide?
What's going on with the playground?
The playground is under construction. We, we have a temporary playground in right now. I believe we're working on a grant.
Yes. It's multiple sources that we're trying to get funding. Yes. So
we're trying to That's on us as the recreation department to find that funding, is city? Or is it
the No. We're still looking, like, to find grants. So, like, we've been... We've applied for one, but we're waiting to see if a couple others that we can apply to. And when the second round of those come around, so we're trying to...
And we're working with, the principal as well. Okay. I got it. So construction started, but you're not funded? No.
No. No. It hasn't started. Okay. Yes.
So the playground that they're referencing is the school playground. Obviously, there's a lot of green space around Battersdine And Rec that the rec center utilizes in the good weather. The field, the soccer field, and all that. And we've put a considerable amount of investment in grading the soccer field, putting in the concession stand. There's bathrooms out there.
We're putting in a scoreboard that's going in. There's gonna be irrigation, and there's gonna be a splash pad in the back. And we're working with the, school department to make sure that the splash pad is in a form and, functional for special needs population of the school. So they've always had a very small playground at the heart in between the middle of the pod, between the, gym, as a matter of fact, and that school when we went through that door, to get into the school. It's a very tiny playground, and it was special needs functioning playground.
But over time, the equipment has, degraded, and they are trying to get, dollars so that they can rebuild that. It will be a partnership, I'm sure, with the rec department and the school, because, obviously, we all wanna work together and maximize the dollars that are invested into the facility. Yeah. Definitely. Yeah.
I have a question, Shirley.
maybe this is for... To my colleague. Why wasn't, like, the playground renovation included in, like, the rest of the school?
Yeah. They did the best they could. And I think that it became apparent that there were challenges after the scope of work and the contract was executed. Mhmm. But I do think that there's room for modifications.
So it's a focus of mine, and and we'll work on it.
And is the school construction is
the school construction completely done at this point?
No. Mostly, but there's there's
There's still some options
Yeah. And one of the big pet peeves for me was I asked for the trash to be removed. If anybody came here before, you come in the back Yeah. And you were greeted with huge overfilled dumpsters that were in clear sight foul smelling, and that's the way youngsters and families were greeted when they came to this rec center. So, one of the things that I have been fighting for and hopefully successful in, at least that was the last commitment that I I gotten from the contracting and public property folks.
They moved the dumpsters to the the other side or the end of the driveway there. I think that you probably can see it. It's easier for the trucks to come in and pick up the the trash and and take it out, and it got it away from the front door. I asked for there to be a ramp built up there, so that it was handicapped accessible. Here we are, a special needs facility.
