Meeting is being recorded.

Okay, the time is now 1 30.

The Washoe County Open Space and Regional Parks Commission meeting is now in session.

Before we get started on roll call, I would like to congratulate uh Miles Kinsler on his reappointment.

Congratulations, Miles.

Mr.

Roman.

Chris Baker.

Present.

Timothy Dake is uh not able to attend.

He does have an excused absence.

Nicole uh Flangus.

Present.

Is it Flangus or Flingus?

That's my thought.

Okay, thank you.

Sean Hill cannot attend today.

He does have an excused absence.

Kevin Joel.

Present.

Neil Jones.

Present.

Miles Kinsler, present.

Tracy Kuzinski.

Present.

Jennifer Uvera.

Let me see if she's online.

Looks like Jenny's there.

Jenny, I'm gonna promote you to panelist.

Just go ahead and unmute.

Present, thank you.

All right.

And we have Amar Luz Garcia, our liaison from the Board of County Commissioners.

Here.

All right, we have a quorum.

Thank you.

All righty.

Um Commissioner Flanus, would you lead us in the pledge, please?

I pledge allegiance.

And to the republic program.

Which stands one nation under God and individual liberty and justice for help.

Thank you, Commissioner Flagus.

All righty.

Moving on to item three, public comment.

No public, no general public comment in chambers, no general public comment online.

Very well, thank you.

Moving on to item four, approval of the draft minutes for the open space and regional parks commission meeting of January 28th, 2026.

This is for possible action.

Take a moment.

I'll move to approve the minutes.

Very well.

We have a motion to approve the minutes as written.

Commissioner Kazanski, I'll second.

Motion has been made and seconded.

Do we have any public comment?

No public comment in chambers.

No public comment on Zoom.

Very well.

Motion has been made and seconded to approve the minutes as written.

All those in favor, say goodbye by saying aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed.

Motion carries.

Moving on to item five.

Presentation discussion recommendation to approve an authorized park operations superintendent to execute a three-year special event agreement 2026 to 2028 with two one-year extension options between Washoe County and Great Balloon Ray, Great Reno Balloon Race Incorporated for the event to be held at Rancho San Rafael Regional Park with compensation to the county in the amount of a $9,920 fee and annual in-kind park improvements of $10,000.

This is for possible action.

For the record, Aaron Smith, uh Community Services Division Director of Operations.

So first, thank you, Chair.

Uh did a real good job of synopsizing the item.

So the Great Reno Balloon Races is a signature regional event started in 1982.

It draws around 150,000 visitors to our parks uh in uh around four days.

Uh the event is well loved, and some are you uh become part of the community's identity.

So this item requests approval of a three-year special event agreement with the Great Regional Balloon Races, Inc.

Uh, with two optional one-year extensions.

Uh this agreement reflects a strategic shift in how Washoe County is partnering with large-scale community events, moving from a sponsorship model to a revenue and park and reinvestment model.

Uh, under the proposed item, the county will receive 900 or 9,920 annually in direct revenue, uh, as well as uh a minimum of 10,000 per year in park improvement projects in kind donation.

Uh and so with that, I'd like to introduce uh the Great Rune Balloon Races board members.

Hey everyone, my name is Shaila Morris.

I'm the new board president for the Great Reno Balloon Race, also born and raised right here in Reno, uh, raising my own kids here, alumni and faculty at the University of Nevada Reno and business uh local business owner.

Sorry, I asked for a steps tool because I'm kind of short.

Uh Elliot Mallon for the record, um, local business owner uh in the government of affairs for uh world with Nicole, sorry, commissioner.

Um really proud to represent the balloon races and what it does for our community.

Uh I moved here from Las Vegas.

I didn't know that community existed in Nevada until I got here, and part of that was because of the Great Reno balloon races.

Uh I remember walking across campus, my freshman year being like, what are all of these hot air balloons doing here?

Um was able to get involved and actually volunteered and then was asked to join the board.

And I'm honored to be on the board.

Before we get started, I actually want to draw your attention to the county's mission.

Uh, because I think this really works together with what we want to do.

Working together regionally to provide and sustain a safe, secure, and healthy community.

So yeah, there's a balloon up there.

Also that.

Yeah.

Um if we could pull the presentation up then, Jesus, okay.

So just wanna share with all of you.

Uh I'm we'll just go ahead and presume that all of you are familiar with the Great Reno Balloon Race, at least to some extent.

But let us just share with you a little bit of the history, uh, what it means to the community and what we plan for the years ahead.

So just to start off, the Great Reno Balloon Race.

Looks like our clicker might not be advancing slides.

I'm trying.

No, that would be step one.

It's okay, thank you.

Thank you.

There we go.

So the mission of the Great Reno Balloon Race is to provide a premier safe, family-oriented, tourist attractive, visually dramatic event that celebrates the joy of flight while remaining free to the public.

I'll start with the end there, which is the free to the public piece, is a very important cornerstone of our event that allows this to be something accessible to everyone in the community.

Being a local business owner, now I am in a different position than when I was when I was born.

Mom and dad run food stamps and welfare, and we lived right down by the university.

And something that we could do every year was walk to Rancho San Rafael and partake in the balloon event and feel like we were included in the community without having to pay a fee or have an entrance or anything like that.

So the free event is something that is a part of the fabric of this community and part of the fabric of our event, as well as the safety piece.

Uh, we're one of the largest hot air balloon events in the world, and we have never had a uh uh um a major accident or incident.

That's because we take safety incredibly seriously.

So we are one of the world, we are the world's largest free hot air balloon event.

We have almost 100 balloons in the sky every single uh morning.

We're considered a premier ballooning event by pilots, which they are invitation only.

Uh, and we do get extensive local and national media coverage.

What our timeline looks like in 1982, our first balloons launch uh with 20 balloons right out of Rancho San Rafael.

So 45 years this year we're celebrating.

Uh just nine years later, we introduced the tissue paper balloon launch.

You'll hear a little bit more about that.

That's our nonprofit arm that involves thousands of local fifth graders with a hands-on STEM project.

Then we started introducing the Glow Show, Don Patrol, these are beloved traditions in the community, been featured on ABC's Good Morning America and on CNN.

And this year we're excited to be celebrating the expansion into four days, and you'll get to hear a little bit more about what that means here in a moment.

So, sorry.

Um, we get covered in worldwide media.

It's not just local, it's not just national.

Uh, for example, we are recognized as one of the best hot air balloon festivals in the world by travel and leisure India and South Asia.

We are ranked in one of the top 14 hot air and balloon festivals by U.S.

News and World Report.

We are featured by cheapism, and we were just talking about how I don't like that word.

But it's important to understand who we are and what we do and how we are free to the public.

And so it is recommended for people to come to Reno to Washoe County and visit during the balloon races.

I uh, for example, got married the weekend of the balloon races, um, seven years ago this year.

And one of the events, the reasons why we did that was we had people come in and we said, go to the balloon races, go and participate.

Um and our photos are featured on National Geographic and worldwide.

The community impact of the balloon race, like 150,000 people's feet come through the park over the four days, but no one in this community is unimpacted by the event.

It's not September in Northern Nevada until you see the balloons fly.

So everyone in this community enjoys this event, whether or not they put their feet in Rancho San Rafael.

Again, that family-friendly piece, allowing us our community to have something that is not casino centric, not adult-centric, but really family-centric, allowing people to come and enjoy an activity in our region that the whole family can get involved in.

We have those local traditions, Don Patrol, Super Glow Show, tissue paper balloon launch.

No one can hear that banjo and not think of the light of balloons happening in the park.

Um we know there's a lot of pride in the balloon race here in our local community from being featured in the county logo and artwork to building uh walls on McCarran Boulevard to murals around town.

We know that the hot air balloons have become a part of the fabric and the DNA of this community.

Also, it encourages people to get out, use our open spaces and our parks and see really how much we have to offer here in our community.

Oh, my favorite.

So we're gonna talk a little bit about the tissue paper balloon launch.

Um this is a really unique event.

One of the reasons that we do this is to bring families together, but we also want to educate children.

We want to bring kids to the park and have them learn thermodynamics, for example, and have the practical skills going into it to learn what makes a balloon go up.

And so we are, I guess, announcing this now, expanding this to two days to bring more children to the park from the schools to do more, to service more kids.

There are a lot of kids in our community who haven't had the opportunity to do the tissue paper balloon launch, and we're really proud to be expanding that to two days this year as well.

Um, the some of the state legislators or local legislators are very interested in this and are partnering with us on that to make sure that we can service more children.

Um, one of the things, as we mentioned, is our nonprofit arm, and this is where this comes into play.

It's about teaching kids hand-on application of um thermodynamics and STEM, um, problem solving and teamwork.

If you haven't come, and I would invite all of you to come this year to one of the days of the tissue paper launch and just watch it with us.

Uh, I did that with uh Assembly Member Goulding this last year, and her face lighting up with the joy of watching these children launch these tissue paper balloons into the sky and really seeing and understanding and talking to them, right?

Seeing how this is impacting them, seeing how this is impacting the parents and the schools, and learning more about what we're doing for our children.

Um, there's no cost for the kids.

We cover those costs.

Um really, we're trying to connect the youth to science, to our parks, to aviation, and it's going directly into the enrichment of our schools with the school district.

Really cool.

This year we were also partnered with Khan Academy to do a thermodynamics lesson about the tissue paper launch and about hot air balloons and how they demonstrate these principles at play.

Now we are a nonprofit that supports other nonprofits.

So we are partnered with hundreds of other local organizations and nonprofits.

We have a humongous platform and we love to share it.

Um so we do that in a variety of different ways.

One of our favorites is our partnership with the children's cabinet, um, a very active local nonprofit here where we're helping underprivileged and underserved kids get to fly in a tethered balloon.

Uh, our balloon pilots will stay and fly these kids until they run out of propane or the wind gets too uh expansive for them.

We're also partnered with Teen Challenge, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts is coming back to us, Boys and Girls Club of Trucking Meadows, Donor Network.

Uh, we've got amazing ways that we help these local nonprofits share their message, share their mission, and ultimately gain more attention through our platform and our partnerships.

Public access and inclusivity.

Uh again, I want to reiterate we are the world's largest free to the public hot air balloon event.

Um if you haven't been in a balloon, one of the most magical experiences I've had was flying over our neighborhoods and watching families pull over, get their kids out of their car, and look up and watch the balloon go by.

If you haven't been in a balloon, one of the most magical experiences I've had was flying over our neighborhoods and watching families pull over, get their kids out of their car and look up and watch the balloon go by.

I was in a Paw Patrol balloon two years ago, and that was a very popular balloon with the children.

But it was it was magical, right?

One of the things that we do is we bring bring legislators and we bring people, community leaders of the balloon races, to see it, to experience it.

And one of the questions I always have for them is I want not really a question, it's more of a statement.

I want you to go out into the field during the mass ascension and look at the fame faces of the families of the children and see what this uh impact is because there's more than just coming to the balloon races, it's also the mental health impact for our community.

Uh it helps us retain a healthy community, and that's been a really important uh drive of mine.

We are open to all ages and abilities.

Uh, a little personal note my dad is visually impaired, 80% of his vision is gone.

Um, and so we actually have ADA accessible viewing areas for people like my dad who can come and participate.

And that's not something that we would normally be able to do, and it's been a big push for us with the balloon races to make sure that everybody in our community can participate.

Um we we strive to outreach to diverse and underserved communities.

Again, part of that was with a tissue paper launch.

Uh, we want to encourage people to volunteer with us uh and get engaged with us.

Um again, we're going into a four-day expansion, which provides more event access to our local fans.

Um, we're gonna talk about the four-day event uh in a second, but really what I want to mention here is this is a better opportunity for local residents to come in and have a little bit of a less crowded field.

Economic impact, that well, it's my it can be hard to measure, but the last time it was measured was in 2013 with a survey we partnered with the University of Nevada Reno, which helped us find out that we are having an estimated total economic impact annually of 6.6 million dollars, helping bring in new people and helping local people integrate more.

Pretty incredible that 100% of attendees would recommend the event to a friend.

Uh 40% of our attendees were non-local.

Uh a third of those said that the balloon race was their primary reason for visiting, and most of them stayed four to five days.

Now, anecdotally, I mentioned I'm a business owner.

Our family owns the local restaurant chain, the squeeze in.

And if you ask any breakfast and lunch restaurant around the country, they will tell you that their busiest weekend, hands down by far, is Mother's Day.

And that's true for all of our locations except the location on North McCarran that's closest to Rancho San Rafael every single year.

The weekend of the balloon race is our busiest weekend.

It knocks Mother's Day weekend out of the park.

So I can certainly tell you that a local business close to Rancho, we're extending hours, we're uh promoting it to our folks, and we're seeing that economic impact on the small scale there.

So we're seeing millions in tourism revenue.

We're seeing local lodging, dining, and transportation getting a boost during this weekend after Labor Day, and we're seeing that long-term positive impact on the tourism image.

Again, that's a family-friendly, all-inclusive event.

So it's time to talk about the four-day expansion because we know that there's been a lot of confusion in the community.

We're not actually adding a day.

We're utilizing a day that we're already launching balloons from the park, which is Thursday.

So it was kind of our pre-launch day where all the balloons go up.

Now we're um advertising a little bit more to the public that come, come participate.

This is a full event day.

The balloons are going up anyways.

So come and be with us, come spend your morning and engage with the balloon races.

Again, uh, this is going to increase fan accessibility, uh, just more opportunities to enjoy the event, spreads the attendance out during the four days.

We're actually expecting to see an increase in tourism from this as well.

Uh, we are, as mentions that right there is the SME estimated economic impact will increase with a midweek occupancy boost with our local resorts and hotels, uh, additional dining and retail revenue, uh, vendor opportunities, uh, tourism tax benefits, and it helps us spread the infrastructure load across an extra day where we were doing a little bit less that day.

It helps us uh kind of get ready for the busier days as well.

Uh, allows enhanced programming, uh, supports community county tourism goals, uh, enhances public access opportunities, and it demonstrates that our long-term plan is for sustainable growth with our community.

It is a race.

It's one of the probably one of the number one questions we get asked.

Why is it called the Great Reno Balloon Race?

It's a competition.

Um, so there are physical uh things that they're trying, targets are trying to hit, as well as digital targets.

So this is it's it's whimsical, it's fun, it's magical, and our pilots take it very seriously.

This is a competition.

Often it is the Nevada State title that is hosted at the balloon race.

We're partnered with other regional events as well, one in Minden, one in Lovelock.

But this is a competitive aviation event that is really the keystone for balloon pilots here, not just in Nevada, but on the West Coast at large.

And we have a leading edge digital presence that elevates Washoe County nationally within that community and among balloon pilots.

And we do bring pilots in from around the world for this event as well.

If you ever seen Darth Vader, he's actually from Belgium.

So they do come in and they ship their balloons here.

Umperational impact.

So this is a large scale event.

Um, it does take a lot of planning and staffing on our end.

Uh, we do strongly coordinate with the county and park staff.

I can say this firsthand.

We have we do enjoy a wonderful relationship with uh park staff.

And we've had plenty of meetings and conversations of how can we help benefit the park, uh, which we're gonna talk a little bit more as well.

But how do we give back?

How do we leave this park and our community in a better place than we found it?

Um we schedule our operations to reduce park disruptions.

Um, this is something I do want to hit on very strongly.

We have a comprehensive safety protocol with the FAA.

Safety is a big priority again, going back to mission statement, mental health, community uh security and uh safety.

So, as mentioned previously, we are invite only.

We only invite the pilots who we feel comfortable uh flying in our community, meaning the safest pilots we can find.

So for our state championship, it is obviously invitational.

And if they are not a safe pilot, they do not come here.

Um, that is a very important part for us uh because of our community safety mechanisms and our outlook to make sure that this community is protected.

Um we work closely with uh our county partners and first responders, making sure that everything is uh taken care of ahead of the event.

And we have a proven history of leaving the park in excellent condition, and not just excellent condition.

We truly do want to partner and leave the park in a better place than we found it.

So Rancho San Rafael stewardship and park investment.

So this is the fun part.

Uh impact on the park.

We are a obviously event planning, which is we plan to try to minimize turf and infrastructure strain.

Uh we coordinate restoration plans post-event with the county and park staff.

We make sure that we mitigate waste and environmental impact, uh, improvement and advocacy, organizational support for park, infrastructure improvements.

Again, we want to make sure that the park is healthy.

We want to do what we can.

There are things that the park has told us, or the park staff has told us these are issues for the park.

Truthfully, they don't really matter for our use of the park, but we understand the importance for the park.

And because we want to make sure that we leave the park in a better place, we're interested and we're we're helping partner to mitigate what they're seeing and helping them improve the park.

Uh again, collaborating with county staff on site with the layout and park planning.

Uh, we have enhancements enjoyed by the public year-round that we invest into the park physical enhancements that we give.

Uh, operational coordination.

We have extensive coordination with the park staff.

We uh one thing that I notice for a long time is the traffic.

So we are always working with our county partners and our law enforcement partners, our public safety partners, to enhance our traffic patterns to make sure that people can get in and out of the park with ease, uh, parking and with emergency planning.

Um, and we do have uh a massive volunteer deployment that we bring in, we recruit for to reduce the staffing strain on the parks department with the county.

Many of you probably know that Albuquerque has the largest hot air balloon event.

It is a charged event.

You have to go to that.

Uh and we also started here in Reno at the Great Reno Balloon Race, a tabletop exercise with all of our county partners, uh, our first responders, our police, our sheriff, our firefighters, in order to run through a scenario every July.

Now, I tell you all of that to tell you that when Albuquerque heard what we were doing with our county partners, they started doing that too and running a tabletop exercise.

So, really leading in that safety and demonstration of taking it seriously.

Now, what does it mean when we say park improvements?

In the past, for us, that's meant really uh contributing as Elliot mentioned to the things that the park says they need, noticing that there's areas where uh the culvers are needed, where flattening is needed.

We've uh brought in 15 yards of garden soil from evergreen landscape in 2024.

We brought in those culvert pipes.

We were able to have 14 yards of fill material help for the drainage improvements.

The propane filling area, which is the parking lot at the top of the dog park, if you're not familiar with the propane filling area, uh, was uh brought forward with improvements there to allow it to make it easier, not just for our pilots, but for the other 361 days of the year the park is getting used.

In 2025, we brought in more culvert pipes, we brought in more road base, uh, we helped with the adjacent pasture corner, filling that with drain rock to eliminate holes, make it safer to walk on.

That's what it's meant in the past.

Now, when we look at what does this mean in the future and that commitment for us, you can take us to our next slide.

Uh, for the five year park improvement plan, uh, as Elliott mentioned, we've been working closely with our parks department, finding out what do they need, what is going to help us and the park long term.

And then always operating from a place.

If we take something out, we put two new ones in.

In fact, I have right here from the American Arborists an approved plan uh for $6,000 to remove two pussy willows and bring in four new trees into a different spot.

So what not just removing what we don't need, but adding an enhancing so that we're leaving a overall positive impact.

So where our stage area is set up, we've really been focusing on rehabbing that area, making it more flat, making it safer to walk and traverse there, which is also a major part uh of the dog park down there to help improve safety year round.

Some general pasture and turf improvements, the vegetation management.

We know that our parks friends really want that barbed wire uh to come down.

So we've been working with our partners and sponsors to find a way to help remove the barbed wire and make it a safer environment.

Uh the parking lot improvements and then roadway improvements at the McCarron Boulevard entrance.

That's all part of the five-year plan we've been working alongside the parks.

Um, but again, already moving forward with contracts and sponsorships to continue these improvements.

That's been part of our organization DNA even before the structure of this agreement came forward.

And really fast, I think it's important to note when we say we've partnered with somebody for six thousand dollars.

We actually got them down from about twelve thousand dollars.

11,760 to be precise.

Um, to make sure that we're doing what we can to benefit the park and trying to make sure we give back what we can.

Um, so again, this aligns with Washoe County Special Event Park criteria.

It promotes community enrichment and shared spaces, it encourages tourism, culture, and education.

It supports local workforce development through event staffing, nonprofit volunteer involvement, and more.

And it has a strong crack track record of responsible park use.

And again, I want to hit on the fact that this is a huge mental health event for our community.

And we do what we can every day to give back to the park and this community.

So thank you.

Thank you.

Well, I Sheila and Elliot, uh, thank you very much.

I was very informative.

Um, I'll open it up to uh the board to ask any questions.

Discussion.

I have a couple questions, Commissioner Jewel.

Um, so you guys are newer with management of the organization.

We're both new board members, yeah.

And I think the board president.

Perfect.

So you may be aware of a couple years ago, fall of 2024.

So, like just looking at this list here of actions in the last 10 years, Washoe County has waived fees or provided cash sponsorship over 200,000 to the organization to help put on this wonderful event, right?

And we all agree it's a wonderful event.

And you know, we did the park master plan, and at our meeting, there was no public comment against it.

We voted in favor of the master plan, and then the next day in the media, the balloon race is you know, bashing Washoe County Parks employees, bashing the commission for not listening for approving this plan.

Ironically, for one of the items was too many trees.

So when you're saying that you want more trees at the park, I I find some irony there.

So I would just like a and and at the next meeting, all I wanted was an apology to park staff and to Washoe County taxpayers for causing them to spend another $4,000 on their consultant to revise the plan after it was approved, especially when when you guys didn't come to the meeting or didn't even send an email to say, hey, please wait on that plan because we have some concerns and we're a major event at the park.

And so to me, that's that's not working together.

You know, like we have a lot of events that we sponsor and we you know want to facilitate and help with.

And all we ask is like that be a part of the process when we are looking at like changes to master plans and stuff.

So can you guys address like is it all new management in the organization?

And is and or is this why instead of coming for a fee waiver, um, you guys are now paying your fair share, which I appreciate, appreciate.

I'm glad that the money is coming back into parks rather than waiving the fees.

Um so if you can address that, please.

Uh sure, yeah, we both can first.

Uh Elliot Mallon for the record.

Um I think there's a reason I was actually brought on to the board, is to help with the relationships between our elected, our and our appointed, and the balloon races.

Um, so first off, we are sorry that that happened that way.

I think that there was a breakdown in communication.

Um, and that doesn't mean that the breakdown didn't happen on our end as well, right?

Um, so we do apologize for that.

And I think that one of the things that we want to do is be a partner, right?

We don't we don't want to say, come in and give us a sponsorship.

No, we want to partner.

And I want to make sure that we are clear that we are investing into the park.

This isn't a new thing.

Um, we've been doing this for years to invest back into the park, but we do want to make sure that we are a better partner and have a better line of communication with you all.

So that way that doesn't happen again.

And I think it's important that we have this open line of communication, that we participate in your conversations and you know who we are.

And I think that's one of the reasons why we as board members are here today, right?

The board really directs an organization.

And so we want to make sure that we build a better partnership, a healthier relationship with this board and with our county staff who do a tremendous amount of work in our community and do deserve the that recognition and that respect.

And I'll just jump in, you know, from from my understanding of all of the interactions and the things that went down from the organization's perspective, they had been involved in conversations.

They had contributed to what they thought this is okay, everyone agrees, this is what that new plan looks like.

And then when the new one got presented, it wasn't the same that the executive director for the balloon race had seen.

And at that point, the organization felt like it was under attack and needed to use the only card it had, which was to employ the public and get public support.

So hate that it had to turn into that.

It's not nothing should be like that, especially when we're talking about hot air balloons.

Ultimately, we know that it got to the place where it needed to be, where there was understanding on both sides, apologies that it got in front of the public in that way.

It wasn't our intention as an organization, certainly to do anything that except add positive vibes.

Um, but from a place of protection and wanting to make sure that the event can continue to be free, be hosted at Rancho San Rafel.

I think there were some things that were out of alignment, some miscommunications.

Um, but we you know, we'd really like to move forward and and do our best to be good partners and and work together in a way that shows the public no bad blood, no issues.

This is what conflict and resolution looks like as we progress and grow together.

All right.

Well, thank you for that.

I appreciate that.

And just uh I completely assure you that there was no surprise at that meeting.

Like everything that we talk about and decide on is published, Jazz, five business days ahead of time.

Five business days ahead of time.

So there's there's there was no surprise.

I I guarantee you that.

Um, but I appreciate it, and I'm sure staff appreciates hearing somewhat uh uh of an apology there.

Um I I think most of the breakdown in communication was on your guys' team.

Um, because like I said, everything on our agenda and all that kind of stuff with the process um was uh distributed extensively.

Um I do have a question on the uh tissue paper balloons.

Um so I was kind of thinking like, well, they must be helium because you know, what who would light a fire under tissue paper and send it up into the air in the middle of the desert in the middle of fire season?

But you mentioned thermodynamics.

So what is the heat source for these tissue paper balloons?

Yeah, it's a burner just like what the hot air balloons use.

So the burners are set up, the kids build their tissue paper balloons based on a design at school, then they bring their tissue papers and they get to attach it to the burner, and then the burner fills up the tissue with hot air and launches off the burner.

So it's not launching with a fire source inside of it, it gets heated by the hot.

And then the competition among the children is which one goes the highest and which one goes the farthest.

So last year we had kids running almost all the way up to North McCarron chasing their balloon and cheering as they're dancing to uh the the songs that are being played.

But yeah, so there it does get heated by fire, but it doesn't fly with fire.

Okay, thank you for that.

Great question.

Yeah.

I have a question.

This is Commissioner Kinsler.

I mean, I guess it's um thank you guys for the presentation.

Um, it's great.

I love the event I live near there.

Um, I guess the questions are mostly for Mr.

Crump.

Um, so what's the change with the fees?

Um, why are we not doing fee waivers anymore?

I agree with Commissioner Joel.

I think um the fees seem appropriate, and it's just based on the rentals of all the different facilities, it looks like.

And then uh along with that, um no cost recovery, it looks like for your staff's time.

And then our events that do charge fees being charged with some kind of different fee schedule now.

I can address that.

Uh Aaron Smith, uh division director of operations.

Uh so the the way that the fee was calculated this year is the same way it's been calculated previously, which is essentially parks uh costs and opportunity cost.

Uh so what this event uh parks cost, direct costs is really low.

Rangers come in a little bit early, but we don't have extra hours that we're paying for rangers.

A lot of the cleanup and the programming and the traffic access and parking is on the responsibility of the promoter.

And um really our biggest cost is the opportunity cost of those reservations that we would have for those reservable facilities, picnic shelters, um, the other areas around the park that could be used, uh, and we would collect reservations for so those so that cost the 9,920 is that direct revenue that we would be getting from other sources.

Um, and then that the $10,000 is a partnership of a discussion of like the use and and the impact to the park and then improvements and reinvestment back into it.

Okay, and what about for other events that do charge fees?

Like I love that this is free and all the things you said I think are true.

Um, but not all events are.

So are we doing something different for them?

So events that charge fees.

So the Great Arena Balloon Races has existed before parks had a special uh event policy.

And and so we the the policy is matured over time.

So the board, this board recently approved the updates to that policy.

Uh and those fees are calculated when they're when when we're charging, and it's not a to the open to the public.

Uh parks is charging a per person fee for those events uh because this one's open to the event or sorry, open to the public.

Uh we we don't we aren't charging uh or basing the fee off of that.

Uh we're basing it off of other hard costs and opportunity costs.

Okay, that makes sense.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Um, I have a question as well, or I have two questions as well.

Um, I was wondering if you could touch on if there's any concerns about like revegetation, especially as we talk about an increase in potential tourist, expanding the volume to that Thursday day.

Um, because I know in other cities oftentimes they block off parks for region revegetation.

So I was just wondering what the growth of that's something that the Wash Up Parks is thinking about.

Uh for the record again, Aaron Smith.

Uh so in the agreement, we have stipulations on what the what the event promoter is responsible for.

Um a recycling program is part of that, uh as well as temporary fencing uh along sensitive areas like Herman's Pond.

Uh those are requirements within the agreement to protect those you know sensitive areas.

Um, there's also requirements for the uh event promoter to clean up after themselves with financial consequences if they exceed their time period after the event, um, and they're they're required to have 12 staff members to do that cleanup uh and making sure that the park is left in as good a shape, if not better shape before, or I guess after the events.

Just a follow-up on that.

So just to be clear, there's nothing in the agreement though, specifically if, for instance, there was like a big spot that where the grass just went out completely, um, about like what that would cost for the park to re-kind of implement the vegetation there.

There's nothing about like a contingent in the contract about that, and how the event organizer would take liability for that.

Uh so there are restrictions on the use of the turf uh to protect the turf areas, uh, but damage would be recovered through potentially insurance in our risk department.

Okay, perfect.

Um, and then my second question is about um just in terms of the and it's not for you, so don't worry.

Um, but it's for um in terms of the the increase in volume.

I'm wondering if y'all have talked to RTC about expanded times for transportation to try to take that load off of traffic, create safe ways for people to get to the event.

Just wondering if that's something that y'all have worked on.

Um I can't I can't tell you that we've directly worked on that, but I we should absolutely work on that.

And we we really cherish our partnerships with all kinds of different county uh organizations, and so RTC would be at top of the list to make sure we're providing transportation, especially for those underserved communities.

Yeah, awesome.

I know that they're offering free rides for students now, so when you talk about expanding that to students and families, just came to the top of my brain.

I love it.

Super smart.

Commissioner Baker with the comment.

Um you had a slide about a five-year park improvement plan.

How is that developed?

Is that in conjunction with county staff and identifying maybe things that are problematic or need improvement through the other, you know, 361 days, I guess is what you said.

Um, and just maybe expand upon that.

And then also uh you identify as a line item road improvements to the McCarron Boulevard entrance.

I'm assuming that is kind of that dirt pull-off area there that is under kind of the the pedestrian um bypass that goes under McCarran.

Can you kind of expand upon what maybe those improvements are identified as and what we're looking at?

So uh again, Elliot Mallon for the record.

I can get more information on the second question specifically, because I don't want to have conjecture on that.

But when it comes to the actual park improvements and how that works, we meet with the park regularly.

Uh we'll even walk the park with them and they will talk to us about what it is that they want to see, what the issues they're seeing.

Um, right now we had a conversation.

There's two things that come to mind.

Uh the barbed wire has been a big concern for the park.

Um, that's one.

Another is uh a drainage problem, and how do we fix that drainage problem so that way water can flow more naturally to other places?

Uh because that drainage is how we water and irrigate most of the park.

So, how do we help them with that?

And um that kind of goes to the previous question about re-vegetation a little bit as well.

Um, how do we improve that for them, right?

And so it's whatever we can identify with the park, and the park brings to us saying these are the priorities we have, and it's not necessarily what we're bringing to them.

There are things that we we care deeply about.

Sometimes it is going to be as Commissioner Troll mentioned, moving a tree.

I think it was Commissioner Joel mentioned moving a tree, right?

Um we're not anti-trees per se, but we want to make sure that the park is safe for the use of hot air balloons.

So if we can put that vegetation somewhere else, those trees somewhere else, um, where we can increase the trees over there.

Um, we're gonna do that, and we're gonna work with the park on that.

Um again for the record, Aaron Smith.

Uh to add on to that.

So parks has parks has oversight of over all of the improvements that happen within the park.

Uh, we review and we'll approve those.

Uh so within the agreement, there's the specific language, which is you know, these these improvements need to be for uh the benefit of the park, uh they need to be approved by park.

Um we haven't quite got there because we don't have an agreement uh for but those five-year uh recommendations are something that we'll review in walking the park and discussing those things.

Um I would like to mention that parks has done a uh a lot of work to remove barbed wire.

Um, and so you know, if that's a continued concern and as well as drainage, like we will address that and and figure out what's that look that looks like.

Yeah, together.

Yep.

Uh I don't know that anyone touched on those improvements.

Aaron, is there it's listed, but is there sorry, even any preliminary plan?

Or what are we talking about?

Are these I'm guessing most of those improvements would really be in the right-of-way, which wouldn't really be the parks purvy, but what are we talking about?

Is it are these pedestrian improvements?

Are they access to the park?

Are they vehicular improvements?

Sorry, Elliot Mallon for the record again.

Uh, I mentioned that I'm gonna go get more information for that for you, because I think that's important for you to have.

One of the things that we do have concerns on is ingress egress at times, right?

And that's can be a safety concern with that many people.

So improving that uh ingress and egress is always kind of top of mind, so we can get more concrete information on that, exactly what that looks like and get it to you.

I'm happy to do that.

Thank you.

Yeah.

All right.

Um, I guess I have one one more question.

I'm sorry.

This is Commissioner Kinsler again.

Um I just want to so looking at the possible motion, maybe this is a question for you.

Um, but we're not approving and authorizing the fees or the acceptance of the in-kind donation.

Doesn't the county commission have to do that?

Okay, so we're recommending it to the county commission.

Okay.

Real quick for a point of clarity, uh Aaron Smith, for the record.

Uh the Board of County Commissioners uh under chapter 95 has authorized this board to uh approve the uh special uh events uh agreements.

So you so you would be as through approving the agreement, you'd be approving those fees.

Very good.

Uh good discussion.

And I am very appreciative um of a new era of communication uh between the balloon race and the board and park staff.

I appreciate that a lot.

And I'm sure the board members, uh especially those of us who were here a few years ago, uh and everything that interacted.

All right.

With that, if there's no other questions, comments, uh I will entertain a motion.

This is Commissioner Jewel.

I will move to approve an authorized park operations superintendent to execute a three-year special event agreement, 2026 through 2028, with two one-year extension options between Washoe County and Great Reno Balloon Race Incorporated for the event to be held at Rancho San Rafael Regional Park with compensation to the county and the amount of a $9,920 fee and annual in-kind park improvements of $10,000.

Mr.

Chair, I have a just a quick question, uh, more clarification on the motion.

Are those two one-year extensions administrative or will those come back to the for the record, Aaron Smith, those are administrative, they will not come back.

Okay.

All second, this is Commissioner Kinsler.

Very well.

Motion has been made and seconded.

Um to accept uh this contract.

Uh, do we have any public comment?

Excuse me.

I have no public comment in chambers.

I have no hands raised in Zoom.

Very well.

Motion has been made and seconded.

Um, no public comment.

All those in favor, say goodbye by saying aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed.

Motion carries.

Thank you.

Okay, moving on.

Park program of the month presentation on 2026 come in from the cold by Jason Alberry, recreation coordinator.

Good afternoon, sir.

Hello, for the record, Jason Alberry, uh recreation coordinator of Washoe County.

And I'm here to present the park program of the month.

Um get the presentation up.

Hi, so just a quick update on the um uh the coming from the cold series.

This is my second winter putting this series on.

It's a little music series.

Um we do, it's becoming a bit of a winter winter tradition.

It's been running since at least 2015.

Uh, that's as far back as my records go.

It might have been going for longer than that, um, but at least so over 10 years.

It runs for 10 consecutive weeks over the winter from January to March, and we have quite a diverse mix of acts.

We have some bluegrass, rock and roll, jazz, and even some cowboy poetry in there.

It's hosted at the Western Heritage Interpretive Center at Bartley Ranch, providing a warm, free gathering space during the winter months.

And uh, that's our building that we have it in there.

It's a pretty cool building.

It's got some local artwork in there and some uh little artifacts from when it was a ranch.

So the attendance this year was pretty good.

We had 773 people join us across the 10 weeks of the 2026 season.

That's averaging 77 people per show.

Um, that's a pretty good number to have in that little building.

Around 80 is kind of my ideal number to have in there.

Once you start getting up over 100, it does feel pretty crowded in there.

Our peak nights with Sage Creek, which is a local bluegrass band with 107, and the Reno Youth Jazz Orchestra, which is a bunch of school kids.

Um, I think that's about 20 or 30 of them that get up there.

We had 108 there.

And it is a free event.

However, we put a donation box out and suggest a five dollar donation.

And this year we uh totaled 3,700 701 in donations, which uh worked out to be a $4.79 average.

Uh that covers things like paying the musicians and buying supplies for the show.

So, yeah, we did have really good um attendance this year.

It was up 18% from last year.

Uh, we had 655 last year.

We did get really lucky with the weather this year, though, and didn't have any snow days on the weekends.

So to reach the community and let them know about the event.

Uh, we had a multi-channel outreach where we put the shows on the the schedule on the Washoe County events calendar, and we posted them on the Facebook page.

We also had the communications department make some really nice flyers, and we put some of them up at the local libraries and community notice boards around town.

We also put a few Facebook ads out as well to reach some music lovers who might not know about the series.

As well as this year, we appeared on Colo 8 News, which was fun.

They invited us to uh head to the studio uh for their morning show with Rebecca Kitchen.

And uh, yeah, we just chatted about the show, showed a few clips of the musicians.

It went really well.

And that's still available to view on the Color 8 website if you just search for Coming from the Cold.

It's the first one that comes up.

Uh so I mentioned the donations, uh, helping to supply some supplies.

So this year, uh the donations helped us to provide 1,137 cookies, 373 muffins, brownies, and tarts, and 470 hot drinks like tea, hot chocolate, and spice cider to help the guests come in from the cold.

And uh the regulars really do appreciate that, and they always come up to me before the show and ask what traits I've got them that week.

So uh yeah, that was a short little wrap-up of our season.

Um, I just want to thank all of the performers who come out to play, and also the Puck Spa for the continued support.

Does anyone have any questions?

Uh thank you, Jason.

That was excellent.

And uh I really appreciate the fact that this is a free event, but yet uh the donations are $3,700.

Um that is fantastic.

And so you're paying, if I understand this correctly, you're paying some of these uh musicians to come in.

So they're charging a fee to come in.

Uh we pay the musicians to play in past years.

It's been 75% of donations, um, whatever that may be.

This year we introduced a floor, so they get paid at least 250.

And then if donations go above that, then they get uh higher of 75% or 250 dollars.

Uh this year we were lucky that the donations completely paid for that with money left over to pay for the traits.

So we actually came out a little bit on top um with um the amount to the performance we paid out 2,985.

Okay, all right.

And um participation is up 18%.

That's a wonderful thing.

Um, I'm glad to see that you're you're out there and getting on TV and really getting the the word out.

Thank you.

Um any comments, questions from the board.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Park reports, item seven.

Good afternoon again, Aaron Smith, uh, division director of operations for Stephanie DRC.

Uh so the first update I have for you is uh on park attendance.

So we collect quarterly uh car counter information at our regional parks.

Uh we consolidate and count it.

So uh our parks are highly utilized and beloved.

Uh so if we're perspective, uh over the last 10 years, our regional parks are our regional population has grown 16%, but our park attendance has grown 82%.

Uh so the people that are moving here, the people here already like are utilizing our parks, are loving our parks, um, and and we love it too.

Um, so for last year, uh the number of people who visited our regional parks where we had car counters uh was 8.2 million.

Uh that aligns with the same trajectory that we've seen in in history with increased attendance uh on a on a 10x-fold basis of population growth.

Uh so providing open, clean and safe parks to 8.2 million visitors doesn't happen by accident.

Uh and this is the best part of my role is being able to brag about all the cool stuff that we're doing.

Um, and I get to do it this this uh commission meeting for you.

So uh parks uh is experiencing just like everybody else, uh a historically early spring, some might say even summer.

And we are preparing with uh turning on irrigation water, uh preparing for the growing season operations, preparing and permitting sports fields and getting ready for all of the usage that's happening.

It's just happening sooner than we have experienced in the past.

So we're expecting uh experiencing a very busy, busy season.

Uh at the same time as maintenance, uh parks rangers not only protect visitors uh and maintain order, they also educate and lead programming that improves our community's quality of life.

Uh so recently, uh Park Ranger Chris uh Smidchak has hosted a ranger walk at Bartley Ranch and a junior junior ranger day.

Uh park ranger Celia Walker hosted a ranger walk at Swan Lake Natural Study Area.

Uh and Ranger, Brandon Paber and Lauren Hay uh hosted a safety theme junior ranger adventure day at Lazy Five, uh, as well as a Wildlife Wednesdays at Lazy Five.

Upcoming events uh hosted by our Rangers.

Uh Park Ranger Brett Hartman is hosting a junior ranger adventure day at Crystal Peak Park on April 18th.

Uh Park Ranger Nick Stwyer is hosting a Ranger Walk at Davis Creek Regional Park on May 9th.

Uh so if you're interested in seeing you know what that park looks like since we you know experienced the damage and and and our rebuilding uh that'd be a good time.

Uh park ranger Gabe uh Barbado is hosting a ranger walk at Sugar Loaf uh Peak Trail in Spanish Springs.

This is a four-mile hike, uh so less of a walk.

It's it's a real hike, and that's April 18th.

Uh the North Region staff is going to be leading a several volunteer projects uh in part with KTMB uh Great Community Cleanup.

So Saturday, May 2nd from 8 till 12.

Uh the parks will be Rancho Center Fell, Swan Lake, uh, North Valleys Regional Park, and Lockwood Trailhead.

So volunteers are a critical force, and they they they multiply the the work we're able to do and directly improve our parks conditions.

Uh we're seeing uh an increase in our our parks uh volunteers.

Uh we saw almost 350 volunteers, volunteer hours over the last two months, um which is a good good trend uh of getting people in and uh giving back to our parks and our community.

Um at the Washoe County May Arboretum, uh almost 13,000 visitors were seeing just in one month, and I think that aligns with what we're seeing with the the you know nice temperatures.

Um at the same time, Arboretum staff is proactively uh pruning trees, doing landscape maintenance, uh hazard tree removal and and reusing material uh for uh around that same area, so we we don't have more waste.

Um, the greenhouse at that location, it the production is underway of seedlings for future plants.

Um, and at the museum, we saw 3,500 and some change of intendees in just a six-week period.

So Toy Toy Topia is uh right there, is there right now.

Um and uh our our museum it attracts families and and new audiences all the time.

If you haven't seen the collection, uh please please go do so.

So that programming around parks at the same time, infrastructure and asset management is a key piece of the work we do.

Uh we are running with the lazy five regional park master plan.

Uh that's where we're going to the community, hearing about what they want this park to look like in the next five, 10, 30 years, uh, and uh and putting that on paper so that when money becomes available, we can do those things and um and that the community's input is is heard.

The Canopa Ranch Trailhead design is complete.

It's moving for construction bidding next month.

Uh trail improvements have been completed both at Bowers Mansion and at Hidden Valley.

Uh our trails are a huge amenity that people coming to the area and and and everyone uh really values.

Uh if you don't know, Washer County is the only jurisdiction with a dedicated trails coordinator.

Uh so it's a it's a busy role and dynamic.

Uh 39.5 acres of fuel reduction is is uh currently happening near Bowers Mansion, so in the park, around the park.

Um, and and all this work is uh done by our dedicated uh incredibly dedicated and wonderful parks staff.

Um and with that, I'll take any questions that you may have.

Thank you, Director Smith.

That's that's very good.

Uh just quick question here.

Did I hear this correctly?

8.2 million park visits.

What was the time frame on that?

Uh that was annually.

Annually.

Yep.

And and those were the car count, those are from car counters.

Um so not including smaller neighborhood parks, pocket parks, even our trails.

Okay.

Yeah, and you did briefly mention uh a tour, uh, ranger tour on Davis Creek.

Do you have any information, any updates on the Davis Creek rehabilitation?

Recently, our Capital Projects team for Washoe County uh consulted with uh a firm that did an inspection of the uh electrical infrastructure and we found that uh it is failing.

Uh so that electrical infrastructure can't be reused.

Um so that's gonna be the next big hurdle to get that park open, at least just the campground area.

So to be clear right now, the day use area and the pond uh and the trailhead, those are all open.

Uh what's not open is the campground.

It's on the northern side of the park.

Um because of the utilities uh damage, um, we were not able to open it.

Um but we're we're working on a plan um and figuring out what that looks like and with all of our stakeholders.

Thank you.

Okay.

Any questions, comments from the board?

Yeah, Mr.

Chair.

Um it looks like uh the lazy five regional park master plan update.

Um it looks like there was a kickoff with a consultant, I'm assuming.

Do you have a schedule of the public meetings for input on this?

I I don't have a schedule.

We are expecting them spring and summer of of going out.

We're gonna we're gonna listen to the public in a lot of different ways.

So in person, there's gonna be you know, surveys, uh, but the in-person meetings, it's it's gonna be spring and and summer.

Okay.

Uh we're we're expecting to have the project complete by late fall.

Okay, perfect.

Thank you.

Uh Commissioner Joel, uh comment on the trail coordinator.

So there are other agencies in the region that have a trails coordinator, but Washoe County is the only one only agency within Washoe County that has a trails dedicated trails coordinator.

So correct, yeah.

There are other very hardworking people in some of our neighboring jurisdictions.

Yeah, tracking regional planning, I think is looking at uh oh but yeah, I take that back.

There is another trails coordinator in Washoe County.

Right.

I believe a job offer has been made.

So yes, but um but it but it takes a lot of different people, and there are a lot of people working on trails.

I don't want to take credit for all of them, but yeah.

Right.

But we just we we have the only government trails coordinator currently in Washoe County, but Carson City has one, Truckee has one, some other neighboring jurisdictions also have a dedicated paid government employee trails coordinator.

Right.

Um question on the um uh well, actually first Davis Creek.

Uh so what about getting some port a potties, of which I I might go as far as to say that we might be able to get donated or some of that donated um and partially reopening the campground.

So we're looking at all of our options uh right now.

Uh one of those includes a dry camping, so opening without any services.

Uh so the the electricity, the electrical utility is is the biggest uh hurdle because it serves the the well and the the water system.

Um so the that is very important to a lot of campers uh and also for you know wildfire mitigation uh it's it's it's the biggest hurdle to really truly opening the way it was before, but we're looking at potentially doing dry camping um and and looking at all creative opportunities.

Okay.

Um and then I have a question on the um the park attendance that you talked about.

So uh I was looking through the is that in one of the reports somewhere because I didn't I missed it if it was in one of the documents that was provided.

So it's not, but it is a public dashboard.

If uh the commission is interested, it's just a link that's accessible publicly.

Okay.

So the numbers, the park attendance numbers, that is that that's only vehicles then, correct?

Because you mentioned car counters.

Yep.

So it's it's car counters, and then it applies a factor per each vehicle of what we would expect coming into the park.

Uh so based on based on some, you know, some people smarter than I am coming up with a number of what each car means.

Like I think the factor is three point something to where that includes people walking in from the entrance, someone biking in.

So that one car equates to three point something people in our parks.

Sure.

Um, but so that's so basically that doesn't include any of the Washoe County Park facilities that don't necessarily have like a vehicle parking area.

Correct, yeah.

Absolutely, yeah.

Neighborhood, but yeah, if you if there's curb parking and not a parking lot, um, absolutely, yeah.

This this is just the regional the the regional parks where we can count cars.

Okay, thank you.

Uh because Commissioner Kazanski, I have sort of a follow-up on the I I'm very curious about the car counters.

Um what are they?

What do they look like?

Where are they?

And do you put them in every park that has a vehicle parking area or just select ones?

Uh so the if you guys if you've seen those tubes going across the the pavement, that's what those are.

Uh it there's better technology out there too.

I'm not sure exactly the technology, but but that has what it's been historically is just counting number of axles going by uh and then doing that that math.

Uh we are only doing it in the the large well, the larger regional parks, and and I can get a full list if if that's helpful.

And I really think uh pointing you to that dashboard to where you can see individually which park is getting what attendance.

Um yeah, it's really interesting to see what COVID did to park attendance because we have that information.

Uh South Valleys took a huge dive, but then came back up.

Ranch of Channel Fell stayed pretty much the same.

Um so but I can get you a full list if that's helpful.

Okay.

I have an additional question.

Um I probably should know this, but how many staff do we have in uh the parks district?

And do we and uh I don't need an exact number, but also do we use seasonal staff and on years like this, do you try and bring on seasonals early to help deal with you know increased maintenance costs and things like that?

So I I can get you an exact number.

It's about five minutes away.

But if I'm gonna guess, if I'm gonna guess, uh so I'm gonna I'm gonna say it's gonna be Eric has more experience on I'm gonna say 50 uh full-time employees, and then I'm gonna say probably 20 seasonal, and that ranges from maintenance uh ranger, and then also our aquatics.

Our aquatics has the highest number of of seasonal employees, but but um yeah, that's kind of what our operations look like.

Okay, and I guess budgets are rough, so it's probably hard to bring on staff early, but you know, yeah, we we have we have to work within our budget.

Yeah.

Thanks.

Uh appears to be it.

Um thank you, Director Smith.

Moving on, uh item eight update and possible discussion on pros consulting work to develop a service plan for the possible creation of a park district.

Uh Director Crump.

Uh good afternoon.

For the record, Eric Crump with Washoe County's community services department.

So um uh this might be your first time hearing it.

We are scheduling a joint or concurrent park commission meeting with both City of Reno and City of Sparks.

Uh the date is April 30th.

The meeting, uh, tentatively, the meeting is at six o'clock.

It'll be here.

It looks like it's our turn to host.

Uh the primary kind of business item or function of that meeting will actually be a presentation from our consultant, pros consulting.

Uh they will be they plan to be in town that week um conducting a variety of interviews and meeting with staff.

And uh so we decided to do a concurrent meeting.

Uh we'll be talking about the survey results.

Uh we've uh we're just coming through those.

There were uh let's see here, uh 748 um survey results collected as part of the statistically valid survey.

Uh and ETC uh was the fern that was subcontracted to uh to do that survey.

So they're uh finalizing that report, and we'll be over uh looking that over during the joint park commission.

Uh we've also been uh providing levels of service.

So City of Bruno, City Sparks, Washoe County, Sun Valley GID, uh providing, you know, basically how many acres, how many ball fields, how many playgrounds, how many restrooms, all of those type of park amenities.

Uh, and then they're creating kind of a levels of service across each of the agencies to kind of see where we are in terms of consistency in that level of service.

So uh they'll be presenting on that as well, and then obviously next step.

So that'll be the big business item again, April 30th.

Um, and we'll we'll send that out.

I believe it just got confirmed this afternoon, if I'm not mistaken.

So and that is it on the PROS Consulting update.

Other than uh the community-wide survey, uh, we received a little over 500 responses on that one, and it is now closed.

Uh, I'll remind everybody we still have that parks landing page uh that we'll be using uh once the survey results are finalized and the final report and you all have reviewed it, we'll get it up on that website and continue to drive folks to that area as we move through this journey.

So that's all very well.

Thank you, Director Crump.

Do we have any questions, comments on the pros consulting?

I just have a quick question on the pros consulting.

Was the survey number 753 or so?

Was that a good number?

Was that expected?

Was that higher, lower?

That is slightly over what they targeted based on they were uh they are statistically valid.

Uh they've, you know, whatever statistician statisticians do, uh, but they have confirmed that it is statistically valid and it meets kind of the demography uh and the representation of Washoe County uh in terms of uh ethnicity um, you know, home ownership versus home renting, age, median price, uh, median income, that type of thing.

So it's it's confirmed plus or minus three per 3.9%.

I guess I have an additional question.

Um just being like in management, you guys, how are staff feeling about all of this?

You know, because there's been a lot of talk of like efficiency and yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Uh that's a great question.

Uh I was here, uh, I was kind of on the periphery, wasn't directly involved, but certainly uh felt the impacts.

Um when uh we basically merged the Washoe County water department uh with Tumwa uh and had some of the obviously the same challenges where some of the staff went to Salma, some of the staff stayed here.

That was a that was a big piece and somewhat of a blind spot, I think.

So we know going in uh that kind of consistent communication with our staff.

I can tell you one thing about park staff, like they just want good parks for our community, regardless of how it's delivered.

Um, you know, I I don't think we need more resources, not less.

So even when you're talking about efficiency, they're still gonna take bodies and equipment to maintain those parks.

And I don't see any of that going away.

It's just gonna live under a different agency if this goes forward.

So Commissioner Jewel, I mean, I would presume that let's just say that this works and we combine, you know, knock on wood that that'll happen in our lifetimes.

Uh I think we'd still combine all the employees, we'd probably still be under what each agency had in pre 2008.

Absolutely.

So like there's there's room to go up and do more programs and you know, have better turf and you know, better irrigation and all that kind of stuff.

Um and that's I I think the point of establishing this district so that there can be dedicated funding for that.

Yeah, yeah.

And I I think I'm glad you mentioned that.

You know, the real opportunity here, and I'll continue to say it, is that dedicated funding right now?

All three agencies largely depend on general fund.

Uh and general fund is volatile.

Uh, it is, you know, it's it's competitive uh with things like mental health and public safety and those types of things, uh, and often takes a back seat.

Um, and so I think this public survey and engaging the public, the public will ultimately tell us how they value our parks.

So excellent.

Thank you uh for that update.

And you can stay right there.

Uh director's report.

Uh I would like to take this opportunity real quick uh about the park counters.

Um, so interestingly enough, over the years I've heard lots of folks, you know, you can easily challenge kind of the methodology about using uh using car counters.

Uh there's definitely new technology.

The beauty about what we have is I remember coming to the county over 20 years ago and part of the park closing.

I'd open a box and look at the counter and write it down and do the math.

We've been using the same methodology for over 20 years.

So we have some really good data.

So although the data might be skewed, plus or minus whatever, it shows a trend, right?

You know, when I was started, it was three million visitors.

Now we have eight million.

Whether or not that's accurate, that difference is is true growth.

And so that same methodology has been used for a long, long time.

Um, and uh we do have it, I believe, in every single regional park, but trailheads, that type of thing.

We don't.

Um, in terms of uh, and then I also wanted to hit on seasonal employees.

Yeah, we do hire a bunch of seasonal employees from park maintenance workers, uh range raids, our uh concession attendees, uh lifeguards, that type of thing.

It is always a challenge to hire seasonal employees.

Uh our seasonal employee announcements went out.

We were ahead of the game.

I think they went out last month or maybe even a month and a half ago.

So if you know anybody, you have any kids, you have friends, nieces, nephews, or whatever, uh, and they're looking for great summer jobs.

We have them.

Go to our website, Washoe County.

So um, I encourage them to apply.

So uh with that, just some uh some uh some board items that went to our board of county commissioners in February.

Uh they approved amendment number one to uh Dow Engineering.

There, our consultant that are is designing uh South Valley's regional park.

We added about 150,000 to their nearly one million dollar design contract for South Valleys.

Uh that was to address some additional permitting and design requirements associated with this next bit of expansion.

We have obviously there's an arm of Whites Creek that goes through South Valley, so lots of drainage.

Uh, we have an entrance uh or uh ingress egress that's going to be um triggered as part of this expansion that's going to go out on South Virginia.

So there's a whole host of new requirements with this next phase of permitting.

Um let's see.

Uh during the February 17th uh meeting, unfortunately, we had to reject.

Uh we put out the Glenus Creek Schoolhouse Restoration phase two.

So this was kind of interior rehabilitation.

We put that out to bid.

Uh all of the bids came in substantially over uh our engineered estimates.

Uh so we had to reject all the bids and kind of go back to the drawing board and we'll be phasing that approach.

Um so it should be going out here again pretty soon.

Uh and then in March 17th, we actually uh approved another professional services agreement with Dow uh for design of the amphitheater and kind of program area out at Rancho San Rafael.

Um that uh that contract is $866,000.

Uh, and that'll include civil, mechanical, electrical, landscape architecture, uh, all the permitting with City of Reno, uh additional um traffic loading and safety uh and parking associated with that program, and then that that full design piece, uh, there's there's some pretty good momentum on the fundraising side of things, and so we're hopeful this will really help uh in that fundraising piece.

Uh and then also during that same meeting, uh the reappointment of uh Commissioner Miles Kinsler.

So congratulations.

So with that, I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, Director Crump.

Uh I really appreciate the uh update on the uh amphitheater at Rancho San Rafael.

And that's good news for uh to really rehabilitate and the construction costs, if I remember correctly, somewhere around one to two million in construction.

Uh I think we're up to with stage, the restrooms uh kind of uh enhancing some of the program areas and then the parking.

Um I don't think parking was original in those, so we're probably at three and a half million somewhere around there now.

Yeah, parking's a big one.

Nobody wants to pay for it, but it's kind of important.

Thank you.

Any questions, comments from the board?

Uh Commissioner Jewel, uh, when you're talking about South Valleys Park, um, if you said what this next phase is going to get field-wise, I missed it.

Yeah, so this next phase is largely the uh grant that we received from the Pendington Foundation.

So it'll be uh it's gonna be one restroom concession building and then two uh basically girls' softball fields.

That's the minimum.

But once we do that, that triggers, we're not gonna be able to provide uh access and additional access off of Wedge Parkway.

City of Reno is going to prohibit that just based on traffic loading in the area and what's going on.

We already have one entrance on no, we have two entrances on Wedge already.

This would be a third.

So that's gonna drive us to create that entrance to uh South Valley or to South Virginia.

So it'll be the entrance road to South Virginia, whatever improvements are included at that intersection of South Virginia, along with the concession in the restrooms.

Okay, so primarily infrastructure related to the original master plan.

Yep, plus two girls' softball fields.

And a restroom concession.

And a restroom, yes.

Which was an infrastructure in the original master plan.

I just want to clarify just in case anybody sees sure gets interested or thinking that absolutely certain projects are coming back for some reason or another.

So I heard they have a home.

I heard that as well.

Looks like a great place.

Yeah.

All right.

Any more questions or comments for the director.

Thank you.

Hearing none.

Thank you, Director Crump.

Moving on to item 10.

Commissioner request for a future agenda items.

Hearing none, moving on.

Public comments.

Mr.

Roman.

I have no public comment in chambers.

No hand.

Oh, I do have one hand raised on Zoom.

Valerie Anderson, please unmute.

State your person that's name for the record.

Thank you.

Hi, I'm Valerie Anderson.

I'm hoping you can see me.

I don't know if you can, but uh I'm president of the Northwest Nevada Bird Alliance, and we have about 500 members in this area.

And we love our Washer County parks, and we offer free bird watching trips, field trips every week, and a lot of the parks, and we keep documentation records through eBird.

We do monthly trips at Rancho San Rafael.

We do uh May programs with the schools at Washoe Lake State Park, and we continue to work with park people about getting programs and stuff like at uh Bowers Mansion.

Uh we're going to be doing something there.

But um actually my main comment is uh when you're doing the fuel reduction programs and logging in some of the parks.

Uh I I've noticed in uh Galena last summer and a little bit now too.

Uh and also I know you're planning on doing something in the Bowers uh ranch area, uh Galena.

Um that it's really uh important to remember that the prime bird nesting season is now you know March through June, and actually owls and eagles, large raptors nest in January, February.

So really the best time for uh removing vegetation and logging is August through December.

And the debat actually and Dow actually put out a flyer to that effect uh that they're going to be distributing to HOAs, but I also was wondering, yeah, with uh the parks, if you're taking that into consideration.

I know it's difficult trying to figure out timing with different work groups and stuff, but uh uh you know, if at all possible in the future, you know, when you're thinking about that, uh please really look at August through December for those fuel reduction programs and and uh you know uh all the logging.

That's it.

I don't know if you, you know, I I think a lot of things are happening now, which you know that does concern us.

So thank you.

Appreciate that comment.

Chair, this is uh Commissioner Joel.

Just uh to address that comment, like and correct me if I'm wrong, Steph.

But the parks staff doesn't actually really do any fuels projects, correct?

Go ahead.

Um we just there's no comment on public comment.

It's just kind of like a one-way thing, and there should be no discussion.

Okay, if we want to have further discussion on it, we should agendize it for next meeting.

Thank you, counselor.

How do we do that?

No further public comment in chambers or on Zoom.

How do how do you agenda something?

Would we would have had to do that the last step then?

The previous step.

I'm sorry.

What was the sorry?

Okay, so um item 10 was commissioner request for future agenda items.

So that's passed.

So now do can we request a future?

You can always take items out of order.

So yeah, if you want to if we want to go back to a previous item to request something for future agenda items, that's that's fine to do.

Okay.

Sure.

I would be curious to to ask that that be addressed at a future meeting, is how the um habitat is addressed, cleared during breeding season.

Okay, very well.

Um Mr.

Roman, if we could agendize um basically fuels reduction and put that on the agenda for a future meeting.

This is recording secretary robot.

We will put that on the agenda.

That's also uh typically directed to staff, but I'll make a note to make sure that they'll want to do the wording and all.

That's that's all I'm saying.

So we'll make sure it gets all there.

Thank you.

Very well.

Uh there's no more public comment.

So I will entertain a motion to adjourn.

This is Commissioner Kinzel.

I'll move to adjourn.

Second.

Second.

Motion been made and seconded to adjourn.

Uh we are adjourned.

Thank you.