Okay, well, good evening, everyone, and welcome to the December 11th 2025 Alameda Recreation and Park Commission meeting.

Could we start this evening with a roll call, please?

Commissioner Alexander.

Commissioner Robbins.

President.

Vice Chair Schwartz.

Present.

Chair Radies?

Present.

Thank you.

The first item on our agenda is non-agenda public comment.

Members of the public may speak for three minutes regarding any matter not on the agenda.

Commissioners will not respond to comments or answer questions.

The city welcomes speakers, providing public comment, but please be advised that this is a limited public forum.

And as such, speakers must stay on topic if speaking to a particular agenda item.

And if speaking during non-agenda public comment, they must address matters within the subject matter jurisdiction of the city.

If speakers fail to follow these rules, they'll be warned.

And if they continue to disregard the rules, their opportunity to speak will be ended.

Do we have any non-agenda public speakers tonight?

We have one in-person speaker, Speaker Laurel Orduña.

Welcome, Speaker.

I really kind of know that I would say within three minutes.

So hello, everyone, my name is Laurel Orduña.

I'm a public high school teacher.

Therefore, I appreciate and I share your civic responsibility and the fact that we're all here on a Thursday night.

And you've been very helpful at suggesting lots of outdoor venues.

But I want an indoor venue for roller skating for the following reasons.

During inclement weather, there's nowhere to skate.

Rinks typically charge between 15 and 20 dollars for a two-hour skate session with music.

Alameda is the perfect place to bridge the gap between Sonoma County and Santa Cruz County.

Besides providing a place for us to skate, ARPD could make some money.

There's a large Bay Area roller skating community filled with individuals of all ages and races that love the community and joy of skating together to music.

Alameda Park and Rec support skateboarders, pickleballers, model plane fliers, bocce ballers, and I look forward to Alameda Park and Rec' support of indoor roller skaters.

I have been in communication with Joey Carroll from Alameda Point Gym.

And he was cautiously optimistic, but I haven't been able to get an answer.

We I've been back and forth, back and forth, phone calls, emails.

And so I would like this issue to be put on the agenda for discussion at the next park and rec meeting.

Thank you.

Have a wonderful holiday, everybody.

Thank you.

Our next item this evening is our staff communication from Recreation Parks Director Justin Long, Director Long.

All right.

Thank you, Chair and Commissioners.

We've had a uh a busy uh winter here in fall.

Um just to go over some uh upcoming uh citywide community events.

We have a our coastal cleanup, the monthly one.

It takes place at Saturday, December 13th at 10 a.m.

at Seaplane Lagoon.

We encourage people to bring gloves and a bag or bucket.

Um, this is sponsored by the Community Action for Sustainable Alameda or CASA.

We have a meeting at Little John Park Community uh right at the Recreation Center in the park on December 17th at 6 p.m.

till 7 p.m.

Uh to discuss uh little league usage on uh how they're currently using the uh field there.

Uh we have the City of Alameda uh our winter warming shelters, they're open from 6 p.m.

until 7 a.m.

Uh through April 30th, 2026.

There's various locations throughout the city.

Services include showers, a dinner, breakfast, and case management.

Um you can find out more information about those facilities at the city's website under the Housing and Human Services.

For our department's upcoming events, we have the Elks National Hoop Shoot Contest that takes place Friday, December 12th at 6 30 p.m.

at the Alameda Point Gym.

This is a free event for Alameda youth ages 8 through 13.

Uh, please register by noon the day of the event.

Uh and it's co-sponsored with the Alameda Elks Lodge.

This takes place again is at the Alameda Point Gym.

Um the Alameda Community Band holiday concert is taking place uh Friday, December 12th at 7 30 p.m.

at the Massic Senior Center.

Um, this is a free event and all are welcome.

Uh Alameda Sings Winter Concert is taking place on December 13th at 7 p.m.

7:30 p.m.

at the Veterans Memorial Building.

Enjoy a tap dancing Christmas, the A Tap Dancing Christmas trees in the Bay Area Music uh Project Children's Chorus.

The 23rd annual breakfast with Santa's taking place on December 13th from 10 a.m.

till 12 p.m.

at uh the officers club out at uh Alameda Point.

We have Crafts and Games in the Park.

This is part of our mobile rec series.

It's taking place Wednesday, December 17th from 3:30 until 5 p.m.

at Longfellow Park.

All ages are welcome.

Our Santa visits, Alameda homes is taking place on Saturday and Sunday of December 20th and 21st.

And then our Santa's virtual visits will be taking place on December 22nd.

The annual rose pruning is taking place on January 17th at 10 a.m.

at the Lincoln Park Rose Garden, hosted by the East Bay Rose Society, and they'll be providing members with rose pruning demonstration and question and answer.

The fourth annual family snowball dance party takes place on February 6th at the Officers Club.

This is a this is a beloved event, is for children's ages 5 through 12 and their favorite adult or adults.

Registration is open on until January 21st.

Want to give you a couple of project updates.

Estuary Park Phase 2 has started construction.

They've done a tremendous amount of site work so far clearing the site, removing soil, and starting to lay out the actual park design.

So we're happy to have this project and have the weather working with us.

So this will hopefully move along pretty quickly.

As you well know, we're already underway for summer planning.

So right now staff are working together putting together our very busy summer series, and we'll be working on that activity guide, and then we'll be getting that out to the public as soon as possible.

Just a highlight on December 6th, this last Saturday, we held the annual winter light celebration.

We had our dancing Christmas trees, the Alameda Free Library had book giveaways.

We had performances from the Tap Dancing Christmas trees, and we also had the Alameda Strings Collaborative.

And it was a great donation and toy station for the Firefighters Toy Drive and the Jammy Drive, and also as well for the Alameda Food Bank.

So it was a really it was a really busy event this year, so it was it was really nice to see everyone out there.

Join us for a fun afternoon of festive fun with and swim with Santa and get some hot chocolate and make some crafts.

They're taking place on Monday and Tuesday, December 15th and 16th from 9 a.m.

until 12 p.m.

at Godfried in McKinley Centers.

And then on our non-school day camps are taking place during winter break, December 22nd and 24th, as well as the 29th and 31st at Cruzy Leidecker Center, Harrison Center, the Alameda Point Gym, and the Vets Building.

Take place on December 18th and January 8th.

This is where teens help seniors with technical questions.

This will take place at 4 p.m.

at the Massic Senior Center.

Our ARPD, we're still facilitating the Queer Teen Alameda Center that takes place at the Teen Underground Center at the Vets Building.

This is Fridays at 6 p.m.

Our youth sports programs.

So we have our 2026 Junior Warriors Youth Basketball.

This is now this will take place every Saturday, January 10th through February 28th at the Alameda Point Gym.

And this is a program for kids K through fifth grade.

And then we have our after school pickleball for middle school age kids.

This is taking place Tuesdays and Thursdays at 4 p.m.

through 5 p.m.

at the Alameda Point Gym.

We're also offering homeschool PE Wednesdays and Fridays, 9 a.m.

till noon at the Alameda Point Gym.

Our open gym is still continuing every Sunday from 6 p.m.

until 10 p.m.

That's a drop-in use of the basketball courts.

And then we have our tennis lessons, private lessons, and group lessons are available.

Our group lessons will resume in January of 2026.

We have drop-in pickleball on Fridays and from 9:30 till 12 at the Alameda Point Gym.

And then the adult woman's flag football program is running Thursdays, January 10th through March 12th, 7 p.m.

till 10 p.m.

at Estuary Park.

For Mastic, we have table tennis, and that runs Monday and Friday from 9 until 3.

This is free, drop in.

The game is easy on the joints and burns calories and includes reflexes.

We have SquareDance on Mondays from 1 30 to 3.30.

This is free and ongoing, so please drop in.

And then we're running the a new member orientation Thursday, January 8th from 10:30 at 10:30 a.m.

And this is where we give you a guided tour and lunch and go over everything that you can find out about Mastic.

And so we'll go through all of that.

And then the thrift shop holiday schedule.

The days that it is closed are Tuesday, December 23rd through Thursday, January 1st, and then it's going to reopen on January 3rd.

For our uh highlights, 52 seniors went to the SF Holiday Lights tour on this evening, December 11th.

They'll dine and see the Christmas light show at Pure 39.

And then for some just some numbers that we like to give, MASCA served over a thousand lunches.

They had over 119 volunteers and just about 1700 volunteer hours this month.

So we thank everyone for all their help.

Massick survives on our volunteers and our volunteer programs.

The Leisure Club is going to members will attend a production of Peter Pan on December 14th at the Presidio Theater.

Then on Thursday, December 18th, members will take their annual stroll down Christmas Tree Lane, and then be followed by a hot chocolate and then treats at the Harrison Center.

For our park operations, just to give you guys a few updates on some projects, our sports field renovation is ongoing.

The bulk of the restorative work has been completed, and now the field still remains closure while everything grows in and settles so that we'll be ready to invite all of our user groups back in February.

Our park staff attended a maintenance manual school.

This is a five-year program hosted by the California Recreation and Park Society.

Staff learned a resource management, budget management, participated in self-evaluations, and this is just a really good thing that we can get our our main management staff, you know, ready for that next level.

So it's really helpful to have that.

And then at Main Street Linear Park, there was a tree planting on Saturday to December 6th.

Families and friends of Anacosta donated 22 redwoods and spruce trees.

And then I'd like to recognise recognize and congratulate Enrique Balanos.

He was our park maintenance worker, and he recently retired.

He dedicated over 30 years of service to the city and took great pride and care on his work.

And we extend a heartfelt appreciation for everything he has done and wish them all the best.

So with that, that's the end of my update.

Thank you.

Do we have any questions for Director Long this evening?

Go ahead.

So unrelated to a lot of the stuff you said, but there was some talk at the last city council meeting.

This seems unrelated about just developer fees and I know you were there for that meeting.

How is it decided?

I think correct me if I'm wrong, but I think seaplane lagoon promenade the first part was built by the developer.

Just curious kind of what that process is for how when a developer buys some land to do a development, how any kind of park building gets built into that that plan.

So as as part of development fees, there's there's a there's a park diff that's usually or a differential fee that's associated with the price of that development.

Depending on how much square footage they provide within their property for open space, it can give them a discount potentially.

But uh, like you said, seaplane lagoon was developer paid for and built, and that's as future development happens, contributing into that is what will provide those additional park spaces to uh provide services for those extra residents.

Um as uh Director Alan Ty stated that if they do a Nexus study, it'll help them to determine what those values are, and if park park fees are usually included as part of that study.

Great, thank you.

I have a question.

I'd like to revisit something from last month.

I'd like you to clarify who runs the holiday boutique.

I know that Commissioner Robins has some questions about that, and I don't think it was clear that it's really not ARPD, so could you clarify that please?

So our holiday boutique, there's actually a group of volunteers, a small nonprofit organization that is actually the organizer of the event.

We are uh graciously host them at the uh O Club.

Uh, all the benefits go to our leisure club.

So this generates like last year's uh donation to the Leisure Club, it was just over $6,700.

So all of that goes back to supporting the Leisure Club program.

So they've been great partners as a nonprofit for helping to do that.

And so but it's not run by ARPD.

Thank you.

And I have one more question to clarify.

Incidental swim centers had a lot of issues lately with pumps not working and heaters not working, all that.

Can you define who's in charge of all that maintenance down there that is that ARPD or is it the school district?

So we we have a joint use agreement with the school district that grants us access to provide programming at those facilities.

That agreement uh comes with an annual fee for them to provide the maintenance and service of that facility, including capital repairs.

Um our joint use agreement does specify in there that we will split uh repair costs 50-50 as they develop, but the organizers and ongoing maintenance are all AUSD, the school district.

Thank you.

Thank you all.

Moving forward, our next item is Commissioner Communications.

Uh Commissioner Alexander, would you like to lead us off?

All right, thank you.

Um I attended the Turkey Dip Swim at the swim center.

Unfortunately, they do going to have any lap swimming because the boiler wasn't working or something, but I have to tell you there were a lot of families down there with kids all under the age of 10, I would guess, and they were having a great time on that water.

It was not warm out there, trust me.

Um, but they had a great time, and uh Stacy Thomas and her staff, those lifeguards are wonderful.

Kids had I think hot apple cider and crafts, and the parents just thought it was the greatest thing ever.

So I know the crowd was small, but I still think we need to continue those events.

Um I did go to the tree planting at Linear Park.

I want to thank the Alameda High School Leadership Club, I believe it was, who probably had I don't know, 50-60 kids down there helping with that.

It was really nice that staff had all of the holes already dug and ready to go.

All you had to do was take the tree out of the pot and stick it in and add a little dirt.

So it was very helpful that that was done.

Um I did go to the tree lighting ceremony.

Um, our dancing Christmas trees.

The tree uh looks really nice.

I know that uh Pat Russian Ashley were in charge of that, and it looks really great.

Um, and I did go to a tradition that's not really ARPD thing, but I want to mention it.

Several of the park kids from Cruz E Park have uh gotten together the Wednesday night before Thanksgiving for it's over 30 years now, because on Thanksgiving morning they used to play fake flag football at Cruzy Park.

Well, COVID kind of stopped that along with um aging, but they do still have their dinner the night before.

So I was um lucky to be invited this year.

We had it at McGee's, which is owned by one of our cruzy kids, and so it was it's interesting to see that these kids, 30 40 years later, are still close friends and can call on one another when there's an issue, and I think that attests to what the park system was way back when you've heard me talk about that I know almost every night, but it's really something, and um it happens at other parks too.

I'm not just singling out one, but uh hope hopefully with these new programs that we're having where we're having kids come to the park to do crafts and all that, that those kids will get some of those relationships and be able to have friendships like that where the parents will be comfortable having the kids go to the park and play and um enjoy what our parks have to offer.

So it's really uh it's a thrill to be able to go to that every year.

Women were not invited for a long time, it was just the men, but I got in, and so once I got in, the other one moms go too.

So um it was really nice, and I just wanted to mention that.

And although they were not playing at Cruzy Park as I drove around town Thanksgiving morning, there were flag football games at Tillman, Rittler, there were several, Cruzy, Washington.

So there were several out there, so it's kind of nice to see that that tradition was continuing even with another group of people.

So thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Robbins.

Thank you.

I do not have anything to report other than I'm really happy with the tree planning that's going on at Linear Park.

I I still think that's an untapped treasure for us, and I'm glad to see that we are um fostering that perk.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Vice Chair Schwartz.

I sadly missed the turkey dip uh because of the heater uh breaking.

I was in the pool on uh Wednesday when it was starting a little chilly.

Um, but um glad to see that's been resolved.

Um, you know, happy to see the covers coming on the pool.

Hopefully that maybe helps with some future maintenance issues.

Um, but again, appreciate I know there's a lot of work between you and AUSD to coordinate when these things happen, so really appreciate that.

Um I did spend some time at Cruzy over Thanksgiving holiday, including Thanksgiving uh later morning trying to get my son to get some energy out.

So it was really great to see the park busy.

I saw the flag football players, people playing softball, a lot of kids at the park, parents at the park.

Um, and so that was great to see even on a on a chilly morning.

Um that's all I got.

Thank you.

All right, thank you.

Uh for myself, my own time in the parks over the last month's been somewhat curtailed by the early onset of uh darkness, as well as the fact that it has been a little bit cold over the last month, I would uh I would say.

Um I gave me time to reflect, and I will note um in case uh in case it was missed, that uh the recommendation that our commission made last month to approve the 2026 uh fee schedule for uh for parks and recreation wasn't uh fully adopted uh when it went to the full council.

Um it was adopted in part with the uh with the pool fees um returned for further consideration uh and to return um return back to council after the new year.

Um and while at some level I find that disappointing, um, you know, I reflect more generally that the process worked.

Um we had a robust conversation here uh at our commission and a well-organized um community group continue their advocacy um and were heard um were heard by the council, which is uh which is great to see.

Um the entire experience made me reflect whether it's in thinking through pool fees or the other fees that the department sets, just how intertwined um those expenses are with the downstream economics of various community groups, um, how uh rental fees are um related to other costs that groups might incur in providing their services and their programs, and which ultimately are reflected in the fees that they then charge their members.

At some point, I'm not sure this is possible, at some point that might be a fascinating study to undertake across a number of different um programs uh that take place uh across the city.

I think the conversation about pool fees over the last month has been a pretty fascinating, um, pretty fascinating example of how those uh how those elements um come together and ultimately are expressed in policy.

Um it's also a good a good reminder that each of us is free in our private capacities to uh advocate for um whatever interests we may have uh out in public, um certainly uh to represent uh the commission as a whole, please uh please come speak to me uh in in advance for something like that.

Um the last reflection uh is that ultimately all of those interactions uh come down to uh a fairly subjective um assessment of what is ultimately fair and and reasonable from a policy standpoint.

Um we rely in in large part on the work and the analysis of the professional staff to make their recommendations, which we combine with the prospectives in the community to make our own uh recommendations downstream.

We had a really great conversation uh here last month.

Um, and uh I think more than any particular outcome, um, the greater risk is that we get to a place where policy is set to serve individual groups as opposed to the system as a whole.

So, in reflecting on the conversation that we had, the thing that that I observed is that ultimately in our conversation, no uh no uh different motion was made at that time that may have improved the ultimate recommendation that was made um to the council, which may have benefited Director Long and his team, if by only by virtue of having more time to have refined um the recommendation before it uh before it ultimately uh went to the went to the council.

And so I hope through uh our continued conversation work together, um you know we might uh ultimately be able to get to more effective outcomes ourselves.

Um thank you okay.

Moving uh moving forward, uh the next item on our agenda is to approve the aminence from our November 13th, 2025 meeting.

Uh, do we have a motion to approve those minutes?

Uh motion to approve.

I'll second.

Thank you both.

May I have a roll call vote, please?

Commissioner Alexander.

Yes.

Commissioner Robbins.

Yes, Vice Chair Schwartz.

Yes.

Chair Meadies.

Yes, thanks very much.

The motion has been approved.

Uh moving forward to our regular agenda items.

The next item on our agenda is our regular agenda item 6a, which is to receive uh or really to conduct a workshop to review and provide comments on the banner policy update, new proposed policies for park amenity donations and park storage units.

Uh sorry, there's a mouthful.

We'll have a report and presentation, then the commissioners can ask clarifying questions.

We'll have an opportunity for public comment, and then the commissioners will discuss and offer their own comments.

Uh there's no motion to make on this item.

Director Long.

We have a second to load the presentation.

All right.

Uh good evening, Commissioners.

Again, Justin Long here, recreation parks director.

Um, as part of the commission's overall responsibility is to look at uh some of our policies, provide comment so the department can keep things up to date, and also provide us feedback and guidance as we start to look at how we'll implement them and uh overall how ARPD will implement these across our recreation programs.

Tonight we're here to talk about um three.

One is an existing policy.

We have some that are active procedures, and then we have some that haven't existed at all before.

Um we currently have a banner policy here within the city.

This is where we're able to allow community groups to display along our fence lines, um, usually advertising community events, uh programs that are available, and things like that.

Um, and then we have uh our storage unit and parks, and this can be everything from a small box that a uh baseball or softball team might need uh stored all the way up to a small storage shed, which we have, for example, at Godfried, or uh even at uh some of them where we allow for smaller storage containers, smaller shipping containers to be uh there temporarily while they're currently using our our fields.

Uh we also have a memorial bench donation procedure currently where people can donate a bench, but we really don't have any policy guidelines around it.

We don't have timelines, we don't have a whole, we just don't have a lot of information for people to utilize in order to do that, and so um we'll be here to discuss what some of those potentials could be to include in a policy to get your feedback, and then we can come back later in the spring with a finalized policy with the feedback that we've heard from you tonight.

So to start, the majority of our banner policy is staying the same, and we only have two recommended changes currently.

Um the current policy allows groups to display banners uh for 60 days.

Um many of the programs aren't open for 60 days, and what ends up happening is we end up having um limited capacity to add new displays because of the duration.

And then the other location uh thing we wanted to add is we want to add two new locations.

We don't allow it at every part because a lot of them don't get the visibility, plus we're also just trying to minimize where we're putting these because you know, uh, for lack of everything, too many banners also starts looking like advertising land, and so we need to try to like to to manage what this looks like.

But we're proposing adding some at Light Ecker along the tent back of the tennis courts, and then at Longfellow along Lincoln Avenue.

Um so uh what we'll do at the end of so I'm gonna walk through these and then open it up for discussion as a whole.

So we'll just won't be answering for questions at each one.

Um, our storage unit um policy.

So what we're doing here is the policies as that is attached is a draft policy it addresses like the location condition the duration and then potentially what the removal responsibilities are.

What we're really trying to do is come up with a clear methodology that if a group does this they'll know how much it costs what's the duration whose responsibility and then what is the responsibility if you don't remove it and how do we how do we address that when that occurs.

And so what you guys have attached in your your packets really is a detailed draft but we're we're proposing these different items we've had our legal team look at it to determine whether or not our removal practices but we're really here just to get some feedback on that detail in there.

So I think the the bulk of our presentation really will revolve around sort of our you know we're trying to change it a little bit we have a memorial bench policy currently but we also do picnic tables so we're trying to get into changing the name a little bit we're looking at calling it our memorial amenity donation policy so this will cover different park amenities could be a table could be a drinking fountain could be so we're just trying to get an idea of how we can increase sort of the ability for people to provide amenities or to the park system as part of that process but one of the things that this is going to do really is provide clarity because right now we have GIS to all of our current memorial benches and picnic tables so we'll be able to eventually put these on a map for people to see and then what we'd like to really be able to do is get you know the whole program it's really about being able to cover the cost of the installation cost of the plaque and then the maintenance and so we're gonna be proposing things that talk about duration the cost how do we address all of our existing facilities that we already currently have as donations.

And so we'll start to go over this for you.

Currently even our procedure allows for individuals, families and organizations to apply what we we do request that you submit a packet to us of what you'd like to do in advance staff will then look at it.

There's you know we that type of information we'll need is you know what is the inscription preferred location type what's your contact so that we can we can reach out and finally figure out where we can do this.

One of the things around that we're always going to be looking at is locations and availability we have a lot of parks that are kind of at capacity currently for our memorial benches and so we'll really want to be able to work with the donor to find an appropriate location that meets the needs of everyone.

We'll also consider you know safety accessibility you know future development really where we're trying to make sure that it fits within normal park use and then provide some alternatives to people if that's not available.

And then it's dealing with what happens at the end of life of these amenities.

So you know a lot of our new benches are very durable and will last a very long time but some of the old wooden type bench structures will deteriorate at around a 10 year time frame and then what do we do with that and so this policy is really to try to adjust what some of those recommendations are so we reviewed quite a few different city policies I developed a policy in Minneapolis the same way that looking at what is the duration and then you know what can you possibly do is a uh suggestion should the amenity continue to be in good condition.

So a lot of them have about a 10 year time frame and what your or the to the life of the amenity is what I'm saying as well.

What we're proposing is for all existing previously donated benches where they would be grandfathered in and they would their new timeline would start when the policy starts um uh and then what we would also do is be able to offer a renewal option if the facility is in really good condition and we and we want to continue a lot of times what we found is um donors are you know or at least some are toward end of life and then there's no longer a contact so this gives us the ability to try to reach out at the end of life and then see end of term of the asset um and figure out what to do um and then it's also looking at what happens with um our our benches that may need to be removed or relocated if they're vandalized and so what we're trying to do is set expations about what staff can provide you know we will do everything in our ability to keep uh all these facilities in good working order making normal minor repairs um if they're vandalized with graffiti or whatever we will do everything we can but if they become damaged or unsafe we may have to remove them and then how do we coordinate with said donor to find either an outcome or you know what does that look like for the amenity of whether it can be moved or not so part of the process that someone will have to do is you know we already currently have a request form staff will review it will agree to sort of like the the payment the location and then we'll work on getting the installation now a lot of these facilities or our amenities as you may know.

We have lead time now it's gotten a lot longer than what our previous procedure was so we're trying to give at least a typical eight to 16 week timeline in order to get look you know the everything installed so that the uh amenity can be put in place and so um that this is really roughly the timeline that would it would take um and then you know again part of the process again is meeting with the applicant to determine location we can't always put an amenity in every beloved location that someone wants but we will do our best to try to find something and then there's the uh the process of approval of the inscription this is something that uh is briefly mentioned in our current procedure but um we just want to make sure that we're addressing it here um and then when we were talking about at the end of a 10-year term giving people an option to renew a lot of the fees that have been assessed over other departments have been the neighborhood of a thousand to 1500 depending on what that is again it has the ability if you want to continue you get to continue that as well.

If the donors are unavailable or we're not able to communicate with them the amenity may be redirected so that we can rededicate it or we won't likely remove it unless we have to from the condition of the amenity.

So with that those are the the major changes that we're we're talking about our current policy like I said especially around our memorial bench donation it's it's it's you don't you buy the bench it gets donated and then that's it's there's no real follow-up there's no ability to inform generally if there's something wrong with the bench to the right people so we really want to make sure that we're being able to communicate directly with all of our donors this is maybe I can provide a little bit of other overview this is not an income generating program for us.

What we do is try to allow people to minimize costs as much as possible by covering the cost of the amenity and a little bit of the installation cost and then a very small portion of ongoing maintenance.

So that's really the overall goal here is to provide an avenue the benefit to our park system is the fact that we get more amenities more picnic tables more benches throughout the whole system for everyone to enjoy so there's great value to the community for having this and so it's it's I just want to put that out there as part of the the overall goal of having this program available for individuals in the community.

So with that, I'll open it up for uh questions and comments.

Thank you for the presentation.

Um I'm just curious, how much does a typical bench cost?

So right now, the it's it's in the neighborhood, I believe, about $2,500, depending on.

Let me just see if I've got the cover.

It starts off at $2,000 and goes up to about $21, $2200, depending on the amenity currently.

Okay, and then I guess over the 10-year lifespan, how much maintenance cost do you think you put into them?

I would say depending on the selection.

The the wooden ones probably have the most maintenance where you'll have to either sand or occasionally coat.

The concrete ones really come down to um working on cleaning them.

Sometimes there's graffiti, sometimes food gets filled on them, things like that, but they're not particularly susceptible to a lot of damage.

Is something is an ongoing cost.

So I'm I appreciate you, you know, even thinking about this.

Because after that 10-year period, then you have another whatever cost associated with it.

Um, is there any thought of asking the donors for you know a 2x of the actual cost just to be able to cover the the ongoing maintenance of it?

I think what the department has done is tried to look at you know how do we balance out those ongoing costs of keeping something still a realistic and approachable donation.

I will say that my experience in uh managing large park systems, we probably have a higher donation rate of benches than say San Jose.

So especially across um particularly around bench donations because of the pricing level.

So it's actually a I was surprised when I talked to assistant director Nolan about it that well, we actually have quite a few of these.

So because it would just it just always seems so rare when I ran other systems.

Okay, thank you.

I would um I would say we have kept the price pretty low, also due to the fact that amenities get expensive to place within parks, and so um we utilize this quite heavily to kind of encourage um expanding upon those.

Okay.

So all of Shoreline Park, for instance, those benches have been donated, and otherwise we would have had to fund those through our department operations that gets quite costly as well.

I have a couple questions.

Um I personally have been with two groups that have donated two benches, and I donated a picnic table.

And the costs have gotten a lot more expensive from when I did that.

Um when we put in two benches at Cruzy Park, we work with ARPD to decide where we were gonna put them.

That was fine.

Um and we were told that ARPD would not stain them or do any maintenance on them.

So once or twice a year, a couple of excuse me, a couple of us would go out and re-stain the benches.

So is that still an option if someone wants to do that with their bench?

I would say that we would make that available to that individual if that's what they wanted to do.

Uh, it just comes down to the question of perpetuity and how long they can do that.

And so, but we would make it available to them if they would like to do that.

So then in perpetuity, the two benches that we have installed in 10 years, you're gonna ask for a thousand dollars for each bench to keep that bench there for another 10 years.

Am I understanding that correctly?

I think what we can do with, and this is what we're seeking a recommendation on, is you know, what should we include for those that already exist?

It doesn't have to, I mean, we're proposing a thousand dollar renewal for another ten years instead of the overall price that they're doing, but we can we can modify that.

We can figure out what we want to do for our grandfathered donors, and again, we uh what I'm trying to do is to figure out a appropriate lifespan for the amenities because should your wooden bench not get treated for 10 years, it may end up being need to be removed at that point.

And so we want to give people the option, and that's what we're trying to figure out based on the condition of the asset, like how or the amenity, what is the appropriate time frame?

If it's not 10 years, maybe it's longer.

Again, we're trying to be fair here, and because you know, right now, there's since there wasn't a policy, there we we can start to make that, and that's why we're really here for your your comments.

So I guess you're gonna want to go to all the benches that were donated and try to find out who the person was that bought that bench and contact them so you can like get a uh a list of all these people.

Is that the thought?

Well, we will do our best to do that of with the information that we have available to us.

Um and I know at one time um I believe the Boy Scouts, I could be wrong, restained all the benches at Sweeney Park.

So maybe there's a community group or project that may be willing to you know go do that.

Could we look into that possibility too?

That's those possibilities are available, yes.

Okay.

Quick clarification.

So it sounds like this is the old form.

Is that right?

That's correct.

So the old form, it sounds like the plaque had to be done separately, but now it's getting included.

Is that correct or no?

No, though the plaque will still be provided by the the donor.

Got it.

All we're doing is a again, we are currently approve the language.

This just establishes the policy about it shouldn't have corporate logos, it shouldn't have advertising and that type of stuff.

Got it, okay.

That was my question.

So I I definitely feel the the push and the pull of of wanting to get community groups involved either as stewards or as funders, I mean it's great, but it's the sustaining of that commitment involvement.

Um Oakland um has a whole network of friends groups that look after individual parks, and they'll do things like uh my colleagues are suggesting in terms of going on painting the benches, conducting light maintenance on whatever the amenity might be.

But then the question becomes what if the the president of that friends group moves away and there's no one to to pick up the um pick up the mantle.

I I wonder just from a philosophical standpoint.

I mean, if these if these amenities have hard costs, why not just charge for them?

You know, put put the put the real cost out there because at the end of the day, if the cost isn't covered, it's gonna come it's gonna come back to you to maintain.

So why not if something truly costs five thousand dollars to install and maintain, why not put it out there as uh as a something of an annuity to to provide for both the installation and the care, and then like you're suggesting, if it if it falls short, then it can be effectively relicensed to someone else, yeah.

Is there is there a reason not to go down that road?

No, I mean I think um I think what staff have always tried to do is to mitigate as much as they could to make it an approachable program.

And again, like I say, this is why we're getting this feedback that um if we want to still make it a reasonable donation for being able to cover the actual cost of installation uh and purchase, but still giving folks that opportunity because we we do realize that our parks are important to our community, and but again, this is why we're getting this feedback from might might it be more perhaps more to offer a more affordable option to work with uh of course if you're making a donation you may want to place the amenity in a specific location, but could we reverse engineer it and have someone effectively sponsor an existing, an existing amenity, so it's already installed, and then the the sponsorship goes to its ongoing care, and that might bring the cost down.

Again, that's that's a definitely a possibility.

We've done that a few times in the past where we've had available benches that are able to adopt.

Um, and again, we've we've used some of those funds in that sense of because there wasn't a different price set for that.

We've used those sometimes to offset the costs of the departments had overall.

So, but it's essentially you getting a memorial bench that's there.

So, I guess the thing that I Matt was just mentioning that there's somewhere in the neighborhood of 500 of these benches, potentially, and if there's 500 of these benches and they're uh just the initial cost is two thousand,000.

Um, what does that work out to a lot of bench money?

Yeah, a heck of a lot of money, and then if we have to do the ongoing, and that's not even factored into it, that it then goes back to our bottom line, where as um we we know there's just so many maintenance costs already that we aren't we don't have the money to have covered, so I'm I'm more of the opinion of put it out there and say this is the you know suggested cost, and then if somebody wants to come back and say I don't have that kind of money, I would rather do XYZ than you know, potentially work with them.

But I I think the idea of saying hey, it's it's five, I'm just rounding number five five grand.

Um, and then at least that way you have a fund to work from, and then that will then help us with the reconditioning of the older ones as well.

But if we're not reconditioning those benches, because I said when I put my benches in, I was told there'd be no maintenance.

So if we wanted to go clean the bench or stain it, we had to do it ourselves.

So I don't think that we are going around and doing all these benches, so there's that cost is not there right now.

So maybe I would I would say that when we come back with a draft policy, we'll have staff look at past maintenance costs and try to figure out what that is when we look at the pricing.

If we need to bring back some variation that is different than what is existing in our pricing structure, and then we can look at that and see what that would look like.

Um, and then you know, if if it comes to the point where we look at past maintenance costs and we can approach the original donor and say, is that something that you're wanting to cover?

Then maybe we can reach out and come to some sort of agreement around that, and and but a realistic idea of what we can actually provide as a service.

So I think that's the other thing is to look at is you know, looking at our our not reduced, but our minimal maintenance staff and what they can continue to provide as a service level, that's where we have to look at that option as well.

Well, and and also just thinking about it like when you originally donated yours, the costs were much less, and now they're more, and in another 10 years, there's gonna be an incremental cost, and then another 10 years after that, it's gonna be another incremental cost.

So the costs are gonna continue to go up, and if we don't take that future cost into consideration, we're behind the eight ball again.

So that that's where I'm thinking we should be looking at a more proactive approach to cover our long-term costs.

Yeah, I think I think ideally what we would end up doing is bringing our this donation component into our annual fee schedule, so that it can be addressed as costs go up, so that we're not in that situation where we're not evaluating it on a regular basis, and that's just fixed in time.

So I think we would want to do something like that as we move forward.

Yeah, that's smart.

Do we have a count of how many benches and picnic cables get donated in a year?

On average, I would say we um I'm not exactly sure when we started it, but in our system we have about 500 total in the system.

But that's not in one year, no, correct.

Since we've started this program, you know, I think her question is like in 2024, do we know was it six?

I'm just curious.

We can bring those numbers back to you when we bring you back to policy.

I'd just be curious to know that.

Yep, we can do that.

Can conceptually, I I might uh set aside bench call it a call it a tree.

Planting a tree, putting a plaque on a tree.

Um obviously parks have trees in them that need to be maintained, um, and maintaining a tree is different than planting a whole new tree and then maintaining a tree.

Um I might approach the the challenge the same way conceptually, which is to say that if we're talking about an existing bench that's part of an existing maintenance budget, then yeah, then the sponsorship is to cover, you know, recover the cost of the maintenance of that bench fully, and that that would be a wonderful memorial and a wonderful sponsorship.

And then were we to talk about installing something new that that it would be both for the investment of the installation, the planting of the tree, so to speak, as well as as for the ongoing um maintenance.

I I think uh that's kind of where I come to agreement with Commissioner Robbins.

Yeah.

My only concern with that too is, you know, we tell someone, well, in 10 years it'll be a thousand dollars, and then all of a sudden, 10 years later, it's $2,000, right?

Like so I I don't know if we can maybe make, you know, like somehow make it so it's like if in 2024, if that's when you got your bench, this is your rate for the next 10 years.

And then maybe it can then the next 10 years after that's whatever that when they renew, I would just be worried about something like that.

Um if we put that in front, and then all of a sudden that 10 years is a long time, that price is gonna significantly change probably in 10 years.

Um so I would be concerned with that, and maybe we you know, grandfather in whatever the renewal the next 10 year renewal rate is, um, so there's no surprises when those when those come up.

Uh, like to consider that.

Um I'm also a little bit this this tug and pull on, you know, like when you do a bench and now there's just now there's a ten year limit where there possibly wasn't before, but we also have finite space.

And at some point we're gonna hit a capacity if we don't put a limit on it and then no one else gets any memorial bench.

So I I do I'm kind of having this this, you know, I think the 10 year or having at least some time frame makes sense because it just allows for longer stability of the program because at some point someone's gonna not pay the renewal that opens up a bench to either be replaced or somebody else's sponsorship, and it kind of just keeps the cycle going because we're at some point we would run out of space if we've done 500 and um, you know, in a in a time span.

I know we're building new parks, but at some point, how we to point's gonna be done.

Um, and and I would just hate for it's like this program ends because we just or we have to have put a picnic, you have put a bench every you know, two feet.

Um so that's my feedback, but um love that we're we're looking into this and and making it a little bit more clear.

Um, and some more better process around it.

My only other comment is you know, reading through here that you've just cleaned up the language basically on these.

Not on everything, no, but while the red is all new.

Yeah, yeah, I was just showing what we edited.

My only question is is five days enough time for staff to process an application.

It seemed like a short amount of time to me.

Um for the banner policy or for the for the yeah, the banner.

So do you know you have to do it five days in advance?

It seems like that's not allowed a time for staff to take care of that.

I took the recommendation from our recreation supervisor.

Okay.

Um, and uh he seems to believe that staff have the capacity to do that within the five days based on historical submissions.

Okay, that was just my only question looking at that.

Thank you for moving to other parts of the presentation.

Um we'll continue in that direction.

Are there any comments before we do uh further comments on the the bench policy?

Or we no exhaust.

I just I love your recommendation of maybe including it in the incremental cost increase with the rest of it, and that would take care of future.

That's that's a smart idea.

And my my only final comment on this on this piece is just where I've seen uh memorial benches lead is towards a bigger uh naming rights policy.

And I I just wonder whether there's any thinking about bigger picture naming rights.

Um, well, what I would the reason why we're changing to park amenity uh as a memorial is that we would have the uh ability to amend beyond picnic tables and benches.

Should we run out, you know, potentially you'd have the ability to adopt a dugout or something.

We're trying to give people options um, you know, in a variety of different scales of of donation level.

Um, ideally, you know, if if someone wants to come up with a few million dollars, I can name an aquatic center.

I'd be I would be happy if folks are listening for that.

Very good, very good.

Okay, happy to ask the question.

Um, okay.

Uh shall we move uh to the banner policy?

Yeah.

Um please.

No, I I love the idea of shortening the the time frame because Rittler Park, um there it's just one big long stream of advertisement uh along there.

So I like the idea of shortening it to a 30 day.

Uh my my general reflection on the banner policy and and all three of these actually is that they they all all of these in my view should be positive margin efforts, um, positive contributions to the bottom line.

Um the the flip side to that is where Commissioner Alexander was going with on the cost side.

Um I just wonder from a processing standpoint, are you envisioning that all of these would be conducted online and that workflow would be not on physical pieces of pieces of paper?

Ideally, it would be great to have everything into a at least a bare minimum of fillable PDF on our website so that you can email that to the appropriate staff member.

Um the ideal would be is to eventually get a system in place where donations can come right through and into that process.

It will still take staff review time, but you know, uh anything that we can do more digitally is something the department is being a proponent of.

Excellent.

I would second that.

Um other comments on the banner policy.

Um I'll just add, was it considered instead of having a flat fee for failure to remove by date, maybe making it like uh per day per week?

So the the removal date is actually from our office.

We will remove your for you, um, and then you'll have 30 days to pick it up from the office, and then there's a disposal fee.

Got it.

So we do have we do our best to make sure everyone comes and gets their banners.

Okay.

Um, you know, we just we'll just have staff remove them.

Got it.

Okay, thank you.

Okay.

Uh moving forward uh to the storage lockers.

So I from the last month's meeting, I thought there was um a fee for storage lockers even at Washington Park for the softball um people.

Is that correct?

That's correct.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Uh we have we have a a small, medium, and a large fee, it ranges from 50 to uh 150 dollars a year.

This again is uh it was a that was approved in the fee schedule, but this is the actual policy that identifies the terms, the conditions, the renewals, just so that individuals um we've had instances where we have a storage container, they're unresponsive, it's full of equipment, and it's in the middle of a park that's getting constructed.

So we had it relocated, we tried to notify them, no response.

So now we are the owners of the container and all the contents.

So it's that type of communication that we're trying to make sure that all of our user groups stay connected with us.

If if you bring something like a storage shed and the roof is rotting, that is on you to repair, and so how do we communicate with you to be able to do this?

So it's it's really trying to create that communication and responsibilities roles in this policy, and so to give our department some ability to handle what happens when people just bring X and now we're stuck with it.

So we really want to make sure we get down into that process.

I think the policy has a segment in there that talks about the cost of removal, and if we have to do it, it's at the it's the organizers' expense.

So it's just really getting into those types of of uh requests and formality.

Um and so what we'll do again is if there's any feedback from you all about it, we will incorporate that into the policy and we'll bring it back to you again in the spring for adoption, and then there'll be a time frame for it to go into effect.

Uh is is uh so it's uh the on this on the part about missing the deadline to renew but can still do 10 days after is the late fee uh that set it's set in there, is that in the fee schedule?

I'm not sure the late fee is in there.

I'll have to do a double check.

Okay, cool.

It'd be great to have um, I would say it'd be great to have even if it's just in here versus in the fee schedule, what like an actual late fee.

I get the removal is just gonna be whatever the cost was to remove it, um, but maybe an actual number of what the fee is for the uh late late application removal would be uh a good thing to add.

Okay, noted.

Uh I'm curious uh the storage containers themselves, whether uh you have the view of trying to standardize those just from uh an aesthetic standpoint to make sure that you don't have a mishmash of different storage facilities out there.

So I think that's gonna come down to staff, because we request that staff have the time to approve the application, and so at that point, we can we can actually add a component in there where it talks about the aesthetics.

Um we we try to make sure that they're clean and painted, not rusting uniform, but we can actually, if we want to, we can request a certain color, you know, and that make sure that it fits in with other park amenities.

So you don't get a yellow or blue one just because they have that.

And then I wonder whether um there's any uh any thought or value into considering um the management of keys and codes and and that type of thing, access, whether that's something that you all want to have a view into or whether you're gonna leave it to the groups to manage that themselves.

So typically these are private use facilities, so we generally don't request access into some you know into those.

Um if it were our facility and you were renting it from us, we would then coordinate that whole key access lock issue.

Um, but I think as part of this, we may request that we get a copy that have on file just in case you abandon the element so we're not cutting the lock off.

And so we can probably include that in the policy bill.

We need you to provide us a key for your facility just to make sure.

Yeah, that makes sense.

Well, in the spirit of uh a workshop uh environment, we we blurred questions and and comments.

Um, do we have any public comment on this item?

No public comment.

Thank you.

Any further comments from commissioners?

I still say that our fees for the units are really um too reasonable when you consider what a self-storage unit uh fee would be for these types of things.

And um I know that the fees that these organizations bring in should more than be able to cover a a higher uh price uh for the fact that we are actually storing their stuff for them.

Okay, thank you all.

Thank you.

Moving forward, the next item.

Excuse me, the next item on the agenda is our next meeting on January 8th, 2026.

Um do we have any agenda items that anyone would like to put on that meeting?

No.

Uh director Long.

Just as a clearing fact, uh question about the uh open speaker tonight.

Is that something the commission is interested in uh having an agendized item, or do you just would you rather staff reach out to the uh speaker and see if we can figure out um, I'll coordinate with our uh athletics individual staff member and see if something can be worked out.

Um I personally have gotten requests for outdoor facilities, but the staff member sounds like they've gotten requests for inside the gym.

So it'd be interesting.

I'll get their feedback and I can give you guys an update in the staff report next time if that's acceptable.

It feels like something that can be managed with an existing policy, yeah.

Okay, okay.

Okay.

In that case, uh the next item of the agenda is the adjournment.

Do we have an emotion to adjourn, please?

I'll motion to adjourn.

I'll second that.

And a roll call vote, please.

Commissioner Alexander?

Yes.

Commissioner Robbins.

Yes.

Vice Chair Schwartz?

Yes.

Chair ADs.

Yes, thank you.

The meeting is now adjourned.

We'll see everyone in January.

Thank you.