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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2018-10-23 Parks & Recreation Summary MinutesAPPROVED Approved Minutes 1 1 2 3 4 MINUTES 5 PARKS & RECREATION COMMISSION 6 REGULAR MEETING 7 October 23, 2018 8 CITY HALL 9 250 Hamilton Avenue 10 Palo Alto, California 11 12 Commissioners Present: Jeff Greenfield, Don McDougall, Jeff LaMere, Ryan McCauley, 13 David Moss, and Keith Reckdahl 14 Commissioners Absent: Anne Cribbs 15 Others Present: 16 Staff Present: Daren Anderson, Natalie Khwaja 17 I. ROLL CALL 18 II. AGENDA CHANGES, REQUESTS, and DELETIONS 19 Chair McDougall: Agenda Changes, Requests, and Deletions is the next item. Because 20 we have so many visitors here, I'm going to change the agenda. I'm going to do Oral 21 Communications on subjects other than Item Number VI.2, which is the Rinconada Pool, 22 and I'm going to take Item Number IV and move that to the end. After the Oral 23 Communications, I'm going to ask to have a presentation on the Palo Alto to sea hike that 24 Commissioner Moss took. We've delayed that presentation several times. I think the 25 Commission would very much benefit from understanding that. I think we'll start with 26 that. Since we're changing the agenda, Commissioner Moss, we'll start with that. 27 [The Commission proceeded to Item V.1.] 28 III. ORAL COMMUNICATIONS 29 Chair McDougall: To go to the next agenda item, which is Oral Communications and 30 public letters. I have two speaker cards, one from Monica Williams, which I know is not 31 on the subject of Rinconada. I have one from Timothy Groves. Timothy has checked 32 non-agenda item. Are you speaking on Rinconada or … 33 Timothy Groves: (inaudible) 34 APPROVED Approved Minutes 2 Chair McDougall: You're speaking on Rinconada, so it's an agenda item. Several of the 1 speaker cards were marked with Item Number III. What we were looking for was the 2 item under the Business items. I'm assuming that anybody who said Item Number III is 3 really Item Number VI.2 on the agenda. If that's not true, you should speak up. With 4 that, I'm going to invite Monica Williams. Monica, you'll have three minutes. 5 Monica Williams: Good evening, Chair McDougall and Commissioners. I'm Monica 6 Williams, President of the Palo Alto Pickleball Club. I want to update you and tell you 7 how happy we are that the City Council approved the new court policy that you finalized 8 last month. It's good that we now have the same privilege that tennis players have always 9 had, to be able to reserve the courts for tournaments. We applaud the Recreation 10 Department for bringing this new court policy to fruition. Our club has now grown to 11 400 members including 160 Palo Alto residents. We play every day of the week. We're 12 looking forward to hosting the Encore Senior Games later this week. Last week, the Palo 13 Alto Girls Middle School reached out to us and asked if we could help teach them 14 pickleball during the week. New City of Palo Alto classes started this week, and both 15 classes are full. We're looking forward to the day when the City of Palo Alto will 16 provide pickleball for all. Tennis players have a choice to play anytime on any of Palo 17 Alto's 54 public tennis courts. Pickleball players have no courts on which to play. 18 Currently, unless our club members put up portable nets that our club has purchased, 19 there is nowhere in Palo Alto to play pickleball. We have to store the nets in lockers. If 20 club members are not at the courts with the locker combination, no one else can play 21 pickleball. We need access to pickleball for all. It's time for the City of Palo Alto to join 22 Santa Cruz and San Francisco, Foster City, and just recently Sunnyvale. Four pickleball 23 courts can fit on one tennis court, and all of these cities have converted a couple of tennis 24 courts to offer their communities a place to play pickleball. It will be nice when the two 25 paddle tennis courts at Mitchell are converted to pickleball courts, but they will only 26 accommodate eight players. We are appealing to the City to provide permanent 27 pickleball courts similar to permanent tennis courts so that anyone can drop in and play at 28 any time. Let's have pickleball for all. Thank you very much. 29 Chair McDougall: Thank you, Monica. Thank you for the extension of helping the 30 schools learn pickleball. That would move us to the first item. I'd like to keep that in the 31 proper order on the agenda. The approval of the draft minutes from September 25. 32 [The Commission proceeded to Agenda Item Number VI.1.] 33 IV. DEPARTMENT REPORT 34 Daren Anderson: Good evening. Daren Anderson with Community Services. I've got a 35 couple of items for you. First is the Cubberley Master Plan. The second of four 36 community meetings to reimagine Cubberley will occur on November 1 from 7:00 to 37 9:00 p.m. at the Cubberley Pavilion. The meeting is open to everyone, whether they 38 APPROVED Approved Minutes 3 attended the first meeting or not. At the meeting, we'll begin to hone in on a vision for 1 Cubberley based on the results of the first meeting. All the materials related to the 2 project including the summary of the first meeting can be found on the project website 3 which is pausd.org/cubberley-co-design. We discussed the Renzel Marsh project, and I 4 got a recent update from Public Works that I'd like to share with you. The new repaired 5 levee is 100-percent complete now. It's been seeded along the outside edge and mulched 6 with wood chips and coconut fiber matting. Base rock is currently being added to the top 7 of this new levee, which will give maintenance vehicle access all the way around the 8 pond. A berm has been placed between—this is hard without a visual. Imagine it as two 9 ponds, a north pond and a south pond. There's now a berm that separates the two, and 10 that's now in place with a spillway that has pipes carrying the water from the north pond, 11 where the water will be discharged from the treatment plant. It'll flow through that 12 spillway into the southern pond, which has just been excavated and cleaned out. The 13 pond on the north side has got a large pile of soil, which all came from the excavated 14 southern portion. It looks really large. They've seeded that. Interestingly, I walked it the 15 other day at a peak freeway time, and as you round the corner behind this pile the volume 16 of the traffic dies away completely, almost so much that staff with me were checking 17 their ears because it was so startlingly quiet. Looking forward to seeing the seeding that 18 they put on this take root. Hopefully, we'll get some rain soon because this obviously 19 can't be hand-watered because it is an island. Once vegetated, I think we'll have some 20 really good habitat benefits. It's significantly larger than all the other islands we had in 21 the pond previously combined. It'll be interesting to see what happens. Depending on 22 how the vegetation takes, the open space team may come in and plant that in the future 23 with plants from Save the Bay nursery or elsewhere. The remaining part, when will we 24 get water into this pond? The remaining part of the contract is to finish the influent pipe, 25 the pipe coming from the treatment plant to the north pond. They just entered into a 26 contract and have issued the notice to proceed. They anticipate—it's both the inlet pipe 27 and this outlet pipe that takes the water out of Renzel pond and into Matadero Creek. 28 Both those will be worked on and new. They anticipate that will be done in the spring of 29 2019, if not sooner. The Cubberley field and track project. We've talked about this 30 before. We've got a plan to replace the synthetic turf and to do something with the track 31 July 1 of this next year. We're doing the design process right now, which includes the 32 cost estimates for different options. It's a little more than we had anticipated on our 33 preliminary estimates, so we're still working on the cost estimate. The key thing we're 34 trying to figure out is also doing an all-weather track. We haven't done one in Palo Alto 35 before, at least in the City-maintained areas. This would be new to us. It'll be a 36 challenge to fund them both, but we're going to do our best and see what we can do. I'll 37 be reporting back on that soon. We'll probably have a community meeting in November 38 or December to say this is the funding we have, this is the options we're looking at for the 39 field and the track. The last report … 40 APPROVED Approved Minutes 4 Vice Chair Greenfield: Excuse me, Daren. I'm wondering if there's any opportunity for 1 outreach to any of the Friends groups to fill the gap if we're close to potentially getting 2 the all-weather track. Is there some outreach we can do to help make sure that happens? 3 Mr. Anderson: That's a great idea. We can. 4 Chair McDougall: I'll work with you on that, Daren. 5 Commissioner Reckdahl: Maybe another option is private schools that may want to use 6 this also. They may be willing to chip in a little if they see that they can use this track for 7 their own sports programs. 8 Chair McDougall: Good idea. 9 Commissioner Moss: There's a lot of interest from current users of the track. 10 Mr. Anderson: I'll keep you abreast of that public outreach meeting, and we can discuss 11 it. The opening of the 7.7 acres up at Foothills Park. The site is now ready for opening. 12 We're just waiting to set up the ribbon cutting, checking with the Mayor's schedule. 13 We're hoping for early November. As soon as I get confirmation on the Mayor's 14 schedule, I'll be announcing that to the Commission and to all our stakeholders and 15 publicizing it for the regular visitors of Foothills Park as well. Lastly, something you 16 heard via email from me is the Los Trancos Trail and the Costanoan Trail are now open 17 again and being enjoyed by park visitors. That's concludes the Department Report. 18 Chair McDougall: Does anybody have any questions for Daren? 19 Commissioner Reckdahl: I had a question about the Renzel Marsh. Right along the path 20 at Matadero Creek, there's a whole bunch of mulch that's been put in. That's permanent 21 or is that temporary? 22 Mr. Anderson: There's coconut husk and mulch, and that's been seeded. I anticipate 23 once the grass and plants mature and grow up, it'll replace the need for a lot of the mulch. 24 It'll breakaway; it doesn't last more than a season or so. It's only about 2 or 3 inches 25 because it's on a slope. 26 Commissioner Reckdahl: That would remain dry. That's not a marshy area. That's just a 27 … 28 Mr. Anderson: This is on the exterior of—yes, that's correct. The reason why the 29 previous one was wet and there were reeds and cattails growing is because there were so 30 many holes in that levee. Hence, the need to do the repair. 31 Chair McDougall: Any other questions? David. 32 APPROVED Approved Minutes 5 Commissioner Moss: In the last meeting, there was a lot of discussion about the 1 Baylands Comprehensive Plan and the ITT property. Do you have any update since 2 then? 3 Mr. Anderson: Thank you. There's going to be a community meeting on November 7. 4 I'll be sending out an email to the Commission and stakeholders. We're just waiting for 5 one last bit of information from the consultant before I send out the invite. The Reading 6 Room is reserved, and we'll be hosting that pretty soon. That meeting will include a 7 review of the Byxbee Park conceptual plan and an action plan for the BCCP. 8 Chair McDougall: You say they've put out the RFP or contract for the pipes in and out, 9 and that'll be in the spring. Does that mean that part of the pond sits empty in the 10 meantime? 11 Mr. Anderson: Correct. 12 Chair McDougall: Keith. 13 Commissioner Reckdahl: In one of the emails we received this last week, there was 14 something about the Magic Forest over at Rinconada. Did you see that email? 15 Mr. Anderson: I did. 16 Commissioner Reckdahl: Was that accurate or was it … 17 Mr. Anderson: Yeah, I think it is accurate. Staff noticed the same dilemma. There are 18 approximately 50 coast redwoods in the Magic Forest at Rinconada Park that have been 19 underperforming and looking really poor. We hired a well-respected arborist firm to do 20 an inspection and make recommendations. They came out in 2017, did their analysis of 21 the soil, the trees, and the root system, and came back with a series of recommendations 22 that varied from de-compacting the soil to irrigating more. Some trees were getting hit 23 with water and not enough for some of the others. Additional soil amendments of 24 compost and mulch should be added. We implemented all of those along with some 25 pruning recommendations and a couple of removals for trees that were too far gone. 26 Those have all been implemented and are being sustained. I was out there today looking 27 at the site. We're erring on the side—you might have seen an email. One of the concerns 28 was it's a little wet, poor drainage. That's actually in response to making sure we're 29 adequately watering it, probably to a fault, but we're erring on the side of not letting them 30 dry out, which we know was part of the problem. We'll dial that back and try to get a 31 little better. You're not going to see the effects of these remedies for about two to three 32 years. Trees are slow to respond, but they are resilient. As long as we stick with a 33 program of ensuring the soil is not compacted, irrigating properly, and keeping a layer of 34 mulch distant from the trunk but over the site, we anticipate the trees will come back. 35 APPROVED Approved Minutes 6 Commissioner Reckdahl: How about ferns? The letter mentioned that there are no ferns 1 there anymore. 2 Mr. Anderson: When I first started with the City, there were some ferns there. Over time 3 they just faded out and got out-competed either with foot traffic or by the invasive ivy 4 that's in there. We don't use herbicide in our parks. Ivy is incredibly resistant even if you 5 hand pull it and rake it and try to get the root system. Most of the effort we're putting 6 into the Magic Forest is tree-related and less so for the plants. We haven't tried to replant 7 the ferns. That may be possible, but right now the focus is for the trees. There was also a 8 report that there was bamboo in there. There is a little weird stand; I don't know why it 9 was planted or maybe it volunteered. There's a small stand back there, and it's in the 10 same boat as the ivy. It's difficult to remove once it's established without using 11 chemicals. If we try to remove it, I'm a little nervous about impacting the roots of the 12 redwoods. We're going to monitor that. My hope is eventually with the CIP to renovate 13 Rinconada Park and incorporate some improvements, maybe replanting. Right now, the 14 focus is on the tree remedies. 15 Chair McDougall: Thank you. We hope the Magical Forest is magic. 16 [The Commission proceeded to Item VII.] 17 V. COMMENTS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS 18 1. Presentation on Palo Alto to the Sea Hike 19 Commissioner Moss: Last year we approved the 20-year Parks Master Plan. One of the 20 items on there is to enhance and expand our ability to make connections to other parks 21 and open spaces throughout the Bay Area. In that light my wife, Jane, and I hiked from 22 Palo Alto to the sea in three days on July 1-4. I wanted to show a quick presentation of 23 that hike. I have a couple of comments, and then we can talk about it. We started in 24 Arastradero Preserve, nine of us, went through Foothills Park to the very top of Foothills 25 Park and on into Los Trancos Open Space Preserve, always on open space public land. 26 The Franciscan Loop takes us to the parking lot at Monte Bello Ridge Open Space 27 Preserve where we lost some people and added two or three more people and donned 28 backpacks to hike up to the top of Black Mountain, where you can camp overnight in the 29 Midpeninsula Regional Open Space Preserve campground for $2 per person. Here we 30 are at the top of Black Mountain. You can see the sea tantalizingly close. The next 31 morning we started hiking back down to the parking lot and on into Skyline Open Space 32 Preserve and from there to the chestnut tree farm which is Long Ridge. From Long 33 Ridge, we ended up going on Ward Road, which takes you towards Portola State Park. 34 There's one small area that's private land, but we have an easement. You get into Slate 35 Creek, which takes you down into Portola State Park. That was Day 2. This is Portola 36 State Park. We added four or five more people, lost a couple of people. Now, we're on 37 APPROVED Approved Minutes 7 our way from Portola to Butano through Pescadero Creek County Park. We're heading 1 towards Big Basin State Park through a small one-mile section of Red Tree private tree 2 farm. Now, we're at the very top of Butano Ridge at 1,900 feet elevation. It started to 3 rain, more mist. Now, we're walking into Butano State Park, and several miles into 4 Butano State Park, very exhausting. We go from the Butano fire road to the Olmo fire 5 road, which heads down into Butano Park. We were looking out over Big Basin State 6 Park. We've now reached Butano State Park. We lost our last person, and now we're 7 walking down to Gazos Creek State Beach, where we dipped our toes into the ocean after 8 three days, 45 miles, ten parks, six agencies, 11 separate maps. As I mentioned, the goal 9 is to try to do this on as much public land or public easements as you can. This was also 10 in preparation for our hike on the Camino de Santiago, which was just three weeks ago. 11 Similar to this, you can do one-day chunks and still make it all the way. One thing I 12 wanted to mention is that in the Bay Area—in Spain there are many pilgrimage paths, but 13 here when Junipero Serra walked from mission to mission it was supposed to be about a 14 one-day walk or horseback ride between missions. We have many regional trails like the 15 San Francisco Bay Trail, the Bay Ridge Trail, and the 32-mile East Bay Regional Parks 16 Trail. We can get to all of them by walking from Palo Alto. The message is that a 17 pilgrimage is for many reasons. They all have one goal in common and that is you're 18 moving towards some goal. We in the Bay Area have many opportunities to walk or bike 19 through spectacular scenery to get to beautiful and meaningful destinations. We should 20 embrace these opportunities no matter what our age and station. Palo Alto has those 21 connections to so many of these pathways, and we should be enabling and encouraging 22 each other to take them. 23 Chair McDougall: Thank you, Commissioner Moss. We do have a discussion later on 24 the agenda, review of where we are relative to the Master Plan. One of the things that is 25 in the Master Plan is the importance of connecting parks within Palo Alto and connecting 26 Palo Alto to neighboring communities. Off the top of your head, can you repeat those 27 numbers again? That was 144 maps and 28 parks. 28 Commissioner Moss: Forty-five miles, 10 parks, six agencies, and 11 maps. 29 Chair McDougall: Except for the part that there was 11 maps, the rest of it is just 30 incredibly good news about the environment that we live in here in the Bay Area and in 31 Palo Alto. I thank you for bringing that to us. Congratulations on both walks. Keith or 32 Jeff, do you have any comments, questions? 33 Vice Chair Greenfield: It sounds like a great time and a great experience. Thank you for 34 showing us the way. 35 Commissioner Reckdahl: I have one question for Daren. With regard to maps, do we 36 coordinate with any app makers to put our maps in a Palo Alto-specific app or any 37 general app? 38 APPROVED Approved Minutes 8 Daren Anderson: No, but we're working on it. We got a good recommendation from 1 Commissioner Moss to do something with some online mapping, and we're already in 2 touch with our GIS people about trying to implement that. 3 Commissioner Moss: I did present to the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space Board in 4 August. They put me in touch with their mapping person. They're going to do something 5 very similar to what Palo Alto is going to do and try to connect maps where possible so 6 that it's all seamless, which is pretty good news. They've just started that now. 7 Chair McDougall: For anybody that's sitting there thinking, "I've got my iPhone, so I 8 should be able to get any maps," you probably experienced that a great deal of that walk 9 had no cell towers and no cell phone. The good old-fashioned map would have been 10 nice. Thank you. 11 [The Commission returned to Agenda Item III.] 12 VI. BUSINESS 13 1. Approval of Draft Minutes from the September 25, 2018 Parks and 14 Recreation Commission meeting. 15 Approval of the draft September 25, 2018 Minutes was moved by Commissioner 16 Reckdahl and seconded by Commissioner LaMere. Passed 5-0 with Commissioners 17 Cribbs and McCauley absent 18 2. Rinconada Pool Aquatics Contract Update 19 Chair McDougall: We'll move on to the Rinconada Pool Aquatics Contract Update. 20 Jazmin LeBlanc, welcome this evening. Daren, are you going to do an introduction or 21 Jazmin's on her own? Thank you. 22 Jazmin LeBlanc: Thank you. My name is Jazmin LeBlanc, and I am presenting an 23 update to the Palo Alto aquatics contract. As many of you know, Palo Alto has two 24 outdoor pools at the Rinconada Aquatics Complex. One is a 14-lane performance pool, 25 and the other is a large play pool with spray fountains, play equipment, and space for kids 26 to play and swim lessons to occur. We currently offer the following programs at the 27 Rinconada Pool: lap swim, open and recreational swim, swim lessons, a youth swim 28 team, and an adult Masters swim team. Several years ago, we started to have staffing 29 shortages in the learn-to-swim program and the open and lap swim programs. At the 30 same time, we were getting more and more customer feedback that we should expand our 31 open hours and offer more swim lessons. In the summers of 2015 and 2016, the City 32 partnered with an aquatics vendor, Team Sheeper, to provide summer swim lessons. 33 Those swim lesson contracts were very successful, so the City put out a request for 34 APPROVED Approved Minutes 9 proposals to do a full suite of pool operations in, I believe, 2015. At the time, Team 1 Sheeper won that bid. We put that into effect beginning in August 2017. Team Sheeper 2 has overseen the pool operations for about a year and several months at this point. It's 3 been quite a success from the staff's perspective. Some of the program enhancements 4 that Team Sheeper has been able to implement at the pool have been to respond to those 5 customer requests for increased swim lessons and increased swim open times for 6 recreation and lap swim. The swim lesson program has doubled year-over-year in 7 serving almost 900 community members. They also introduced a summer swim camp 8 program that served 350 children this summer. They've expanded the recreational swim 9 program to be a year-round recreational swim program. They've expanded lap swim 10 hours pretty significantly as well. Because of the successes in this short-term aquatics 11 management program, the City put out an RFP this summer seeking a longer-term 12 partner. Our goals have been to identify a partner who will collaborate with the City and 13 the community to provide high quality, accessible, and safe aquatics programming at the 14 Rinconada Pool Complex. We put this RFP out on July 19th. We had an optional pre-15 proposal meeting on August 7th. All proposals were due August 21st. Through 16 September and through now, we've been reviewing the contract proposals that came in 17 and developing a new contract. You can see tonight we're presenting to the Parks and 18 Rec Commission. It's our expectation that the contract will be presented to the City 19 Council on November 26th for their approval and to have a start date of January 1st. Our 20 evaluation criteria really reflects the goals that we had; safety of pool users and aquatics 21 employees, City and customer costs, quality of service and customer satisfaction, and 22 diversity of programming and accessibility. The City received one bid for this program 23 from Team Sheeper—that's the same operator that we currently have—to provide 24 comprehensive swim programming. The City was satisfied with the response after doing 25 a review and found that they would offer a flexible model that can handle increased 26 demand at multiple times throughout. They have the ability to change as needed 27 throughout seasons, throughout the week. They have a goal to continue to expand 28 services. Our customer feedback has been very positive in general. I apologize for 29 everyone in the audience trying to read this. This is the proposed scheduled for January. 30 The notable changes are lap swim continuously throughout the day on as many weekdays 31 as possible; Masters swim times at the same times of day as they're currently offered; 32 PASA at the same times of day they're currently offered; recreational swim at the same 33 times of day as they're currently offered. This is January, so this is probably the lowest 34 usage time of year for aquatics. This would look very different if we were looking at 35 July. Jumping ahead a little bit, one of the features that we've had in this current contract 36 and that we're developing in this next contract is that the City will have oversight over the 37 pool scheduling. Team Sheeper will propose a schedule, but City staff have to approve 38 any changes. This was something that we heard from many pool users. They wanted to 39 make sure that this treasured asset is still a City asset and that we're responding to our 40 customers' needs. The initial pricing for January that they've proposed is very similar to 41 the current pricing that's offered at the pool. It continues to have a 30-percent discount 42 APPROVED Approved Minutes 10 for seniors and youth who are purchasing the monthly or quarterly passes as well as 1 participating in drop-in programs. There's a slight increase for monthly fees for adults—I 2 should clarify that this is resident pricing that you're looking at—from $45 to $48 3 monthly for lap swim. That translates from about $31 to about $33 a month for senior 4 residents. There is an introduction of an annual fee to sign up for those monthly passes. 5 We're very cognizant that the swimming public—there are some very price-sensitive 6 folks, and we don't want to try to increase prices unless absolutely necessary, but it's very 7 expensive to operate a pool. This is an attempt to collect a little bit more revenue to 8 cover those costs that keep going up. Jumping back to some of the other basic contract 9 terms. This is a revenue-share agreement just as we have in the current contract. It has a 10 five-year term, comprehensive programming. The City will continue to provide facility 11 management, and we will expect to continue to have a high level of engagement and 12 collaboration with the City and swimming community. The scope of work will be the 13 same as what we have now, swim lessons for all ages and skill levels, summer swim 14 camps, year-round lap swim programs—we've requested seasonal recreational swim; 15 although, they propose to do it all year-round—an adult Masters swim team. This is a 16 change and why many people are in the audience. They have proposed to provide the 17 Masters swim team directly through their operations and a subcontract with PASA. 18 That's the youth swim team. That subcontract would continue. In addition, discounted 19 pricing for Palo Alto residents, collaboration with the City of Palo Alto for Palo Alto's 20 summer camp access, pool parties. They're hoping to add some additional aquatics 21 programming if possible. To summarize, there are some slight changes to the weekly 22 programming schedule. Notably, there will be continuous lap swim availability 23 throughout the day on weekdays, introduction of an annual administrative fee, some 24 slight changes to customer pricing, Masters programming operational changes, and some 25 slight changes to the revenue share terms. With that, I'm finished with my presentation. 26 Chair McDougall: Thank you, Jazmin. What I'm going to do now is move to public 27 comment. While we're doing public comment, I hope you can listen. At the same time, 28 if you have a look at your one slide that had a before and after, they're both the same. 29 Ms. LeBlanc: You're right. This is showing resident pricing. I apologize for that. It's 30 not showing non-resident pricing. I can get back with that. 31 Chair McDougall: If you'd get back to us. I just thought I'd clear up that now rather than 32 going through that 25 times as we go through. Thank you for that. I'm going to invite 33 speakers up in the order that I have the cards. I might have shuffled them a little bit from 34 exactly the order that they were handed in. We have 14 or 15 cards. We're going to be 35 doing two minutes for each speaker. You'll notice that there will be a green light. After 36 one minute, a one-minute warning will come on. There will be an orange light. After the 37 public has spoken, then we'll go to Commission comments. I'm going to start with 38 Lindsay Belden. 39 APPROVED Approved Minutes 11 Lindsay Belden: Good evening. My name is Lindsay Belden. I've been a Masters 1 swimmer at Rinconada for approximately 36 years. It is vital to my health and well-2 being, and I would be lost without it. I have made many friends as well as getting my 3 exercise needs met along with pickleball, which I've also been here for meetings, and 4 walking. Rinconada Masters is not broken. It does not need fixing or replacing. It 5 serves the needs of a portion of Palo Alto citizens and helps to create community within 6 our City. We don't need to replace the coaches. We don't need to add lap swimmers to 7 our scheduled times and lanes. We don't need to turn it into a club whose structure we 8 know nothing about. Rinconada Masters is a functioning program in and of itself with 9 dedicated coaches, lifeguards, workouts, social activities, and our own yearly swim meet, 10 which is well attended by many other Masters communities surrounding the Bay Area. 11 To allow Tim Sheeper to restructure this program would be a big mistake and very 12 disappointing to the many people who have supported this program for many years. He 13 already has a number of Masters programs in the surrounding area, I am told, and 14 controls all of the other swimming programs at Rinconada, so I don't understand his need 15 to want to take over this program. We like our program as evidenced by the number of 16 people who have supported it for many years. We hope that you will see fit to keep it the 17 way it is and continue to serve the needs of the Palo Altans who frequent it. Thank you. 18 Chair McDougall: Thank you. Shahe Krakirian, and the next speaker will be Don 19 Williams. 20 Shahe Krakirian: Hi. My name is Shahe Krakirian. I'll keep it brief. I'm a Palo Alto 21 resident, and I've been swimming with the Rinconada Masters for about eight years. It's 22 been a great experience and something I enjoy a lot. I would like to see the program 23 continue. Again, just like Lindsay said, I don't see the need to have the program replaced 24 by a different team, different structure. I like it the way it is, love it the way it is, would 25 like to see it continue. Thanks. 26 Chair McDougall: Thank you. Terri Baxter-Smith followed by Edie Gelles. 27 Don Williams: I apologize. Did you say Don Williams would be next? 28 Chair McDougall: I'm sorry. Yes. I was not deliberately trying to … 29 Mr. Williams: I'll try to (crosstalk). 30 Chair McDougall: As each of you speak, if you wouldn't mind saying if you're Palo Alto 31 residents. I think that's always important for the record. 32 Mr. Williams: My name is Don Williams, a Palo Alto resident, Palo Alto High class of 33 1984. I learned to swim in Rinconada Pool in the early 1970s, swam with the old Palo 34 Alto Swim Club under John Williams through the mid-'70s into the '80s. I joined 35 APPROVED Approved Minutes 12 Rinconada Masters in 1989 and have been a member every since. I'm representative of 1 the strong existing community of folks who use the pool and who predated Mr. Sheeper. 2 Rinconada Masters with a 40-year history is obviously an important part of that strong 3 existing community of users. We have a long history, a strong team spirit, and again we 4 are a community. What I would ask is that rather than pushing out the Rinconada 5 Masters, Mr. Sheeper, who is a relative newcomer to the pool, work with us to try to 6 come up with a solution that continues the program, also accommodates his needs and the 7 City's needs. By collaborating, as I heard various people mention earlier, we can reach 8 an outcome that's favorable for everyone. Being pushed out doesn't feel like 9 collaboration at all to me. From our perspective, Rinconada Pool is here to serve the 10 community. Mr. Sheeper undoubtedly worries about revenue and profits and control and 11 issues like that. Those are all fair considerations. We understand the pool doesn't operate 12 for free. Again, there is a community. We are a bunch of Palo Altans. Please work to 13 preserve our program. Help us work collaboratively with Mr. Sheeper, who has not 14 shown a strong indication, as I understand it, to do so, and preserve our program and 15 accommodate his needs and the City's needs. Thank you. 16 Chair McDougall: Thank you. Terri Baxter-Smith followed by Edie Gelles. 17 Terri Baxter-Smith: I'm Terri Baxter-Smith, assistant swim coach of the Rinconada 18 Masters, graduate of Palo Alto High School 1982, and I do live in Palo Alto. Last week, 19 Rinconada Masters was totally blindsided when Tim Sheeper informed our head coach, 20 Carol MacPherson, and a couple of our advisory board members that our subcontract 21 with him was not going to be renewed for 2019, thus, ending Rinconada Masters' 45-year 22 relationship with the community. Last week, Tim gave Carol three reasons as to why he 23 is not renewing our contract. I'm going to speak right now as a former aquatic director 24 and not a swim coach. As a former aquatic director, I can say that all of these things can 25 be worked out, but Tim is not interested in doing so, and he told us that. At last year's 26 Parks and Rec meeting in May 2017, a member of your Community Services Department 27 spoke about Tim Sheeper's contract. This is part of what she said, "We would like to add 28 into the contract language that guarantees Rinconada Masters and PASA have the same 29 swimming pool access that they've had in the past. We want to make sure the terms work 30 for everyone. That is very important to us to maintain what has worked for so long at the 31 pool." Now, 16 months later, Tim has no interest in working with us, not collaborating 32 with us and, therefore, not renewing our contract. In the past, Rinconada Masters has had 33 a wonderful, productive, positive, and beneficial relationship with the Parks and 34 Recreation Department, the City of Palo Alto, and the previous aquatic directors. In 35 regards to the snack chats or outreaches, I don't know what they're formally called, but 36 there have been a few of them. They've been in March and in October. I think they are 37 put on by the Community Services Department. I would like to say that our Rinconada 38 Masters swim team has never been notified of any of these snack chats or outreaches. 39 APPROVED Approved Minutes 13 Chair McDougall: Thank you, Terri. 1 Ms. Baxter-Smith: Thank you. I can also say that our team in the last year has not felt 2 any support from Tim Sheeper or the Community Services Department. 3 Chair McDougall: Thank you, Terri. 4 Ms. Baxter-Smith: Thank you very much for listening. 5 Chair McDougall: Is it … 6 Edith Gelles: It's Edith Gelles. 7 Chair McDougall: Edith, okay. Thank you. 8 Ms. Gelles: Hi. I'm 81 years old. I've lived in Palo Alto for 35 years, and I have swum 9 with Rinconada Masters for 35 years. I'm a historian, and I want to address the history of 10 Rinconada and how our history has fit into the history of Palo Alto for 45 years. As you 11 know, we're a swim program for adults who wish to participate in a structured swim 12 program. We're part of a national Masters program. Some of our members compete; 13 many do not compete but opt for a rigorous training program for health and/or recreation 14 purposes. Our Rinconada Masters program was the first and the only Masters swim 15 program on the Peninsula for many decades, but we've always been more than a swim 16 team. We're a community of people of all ages and occupations. We're also a family, 17 and we've grown the way families do. When someone has a birthday, we celebrate. 18 When someone has a baby, we celebrate. When someone passes on, we grieve together. 19 There are Palo Altans in our program who went to grade school, high school, and college 20 together. They came back here. Our program has been in this City for 45 years, long 21 enough to service generations of Palo Altans. Palo Alto has changed in 45 years. The 22 point I want to make is with change one has to maintain roots with the past. Rinconada 23 Masters with its 45-year-old history is part of the past and part of the tradition of Palo 24 Alto. The City of Palo Alto has decided the public pool that has served generations of its 25 citizens should be farmed out, and the future of Rinconada Masters is threatened with 26 extermination. I ask you to save our Masters program as it currently exists within the 27 changes that will take place in the overall governance of Rinconada Pool. 28 Chair McDougall: Thank you very much. David Levinson followed by Ann Prater 29 [phonetic]. 30 David Levinson: My name is David Levinson, and I've been a continuous member of the 31 Rinconada Masters since I moved to Palo Alto more than 40 years ago. Carol 32 MacPherson has been our dedicated coach the entire time. Under her tutelage and that of 33 retired coach Cindy Baxter, I have been a national Masters champion eight times over the 34 APPROVED Approved Minutes 14 years. Now, I am 68 years old, have retired from competition, and suffer from several 1 age-related ailments. I rely heavily on Rinconada Masters' highly structured but low-2 pressure workouts to maintain my health. Once again, we swimmers find ourselves 3 compelled to take time out from our busy lives and attend a Parks and Rec Commission 4 meeting to speak out concerning this recurring issue of the survival of the Rinconada 5 Masters and lap swimming programs. Once again, our message is leave our programs 6 alone. Now, we find that Tim Sheeper, under his pseudonym of Palo Alto Swim and 7 Sport, is making his long-planned move to gain full control of the Rinconada Masters 8 swim program and terminate the program as we know it. Moreover, he has the 9 unmitigated gall to demand an administrative fee for this, which is reminiscent of the 10 days when a gangster would shoot a man's wife and then force him to pay for the bullet. 11 The Parks and Rec Commission needs to decide whether they hire Tim Sheeper to serve 12 the swimmers of our Palo Alto programs or whether the members of the Commission 13 believe that we swimmers exist to serve Tim Sheeper. I call on the Parks and Rec 14 Commission please do not abandon us swimmers and especially do not abandon us while 15 appealing to what President Reagan called the nine most terrifying words in the English 16 language, I'm from the government and I'm here to help. 17 Chair McDougall: Thank you. Ann Lemmens followed by Carol MacPherson. 18 Ann Prater: I'm Ann Prater. I've lived here since 1963. I am a Palo Alto resident. I'm 19 talking to you for a slightly different reason. I have a son with special needs. He has 20 mental health issues. I have tried for many decades—he's almost 18—to teach him how 21 to swim. I've tried private lessons. I've tried Rinconada swim lessons. I've tried lessons 22 at the Y. We have a lake house at Lake Almanor, and we have a sailboat. It's critical to 23 me that he learns how to swim. In August, I enrolled him in Carol's class after trying to 24 teach him at Rinconada again this summer. It's peers there teaching, and he couldn't be 25 taught by a girl that he's going to high school with. I put him in Carol's class, and this is 26 magic. He's been in there since the first of August, and he has learned four strokes. The 27 other day, I saw him learning how to do a kick turn. She has taught him when nobody 28 else has been able to teach him, and I've tried. I see her teaching other people how to 29 swim as well. There's, I think, six or seven people in her swim for fitness class. I don't 30 see this program on the schedule in the future. I think it's a life skill, and I want my son 31 to learn how to swim. He already has a goal of being on a swim team. He's excited 32 about the program. He tells me he's grown an inch; he wants to be taller. It's pretty 33 amazing. I don't see anybody else being able to do this besides Carol. I also want to say 34 I'm a lap swimmer. I've been swimming at Rinconada for decades. I'm not a part of the 35 Masters program because I have to do my own thing. I'm swimming there while he's 36 taking a lesson, and I'm watching her. She is pacing up and down the pool, telling these 37 people what to do stroke by stroke. I can't believe her dedication. I honestly can't believe 38 that we're even considering swapping her out just to make a couple more dollars. 39 APPROVED Approved Minutes 15 Chair McDougall: Thank you, Ann. 1 Ms. Prader: You're welcome. 2 Chair McDougall: I believe it's Ann Lemmens followed by Stan Weiss. 3 Carol MacPherson: I have some letters here that I'd like to give to the Commission. 4 They couldn't be here tonight, but they wanted to voice their opinions. This is also a 5 booklet that shows all of our lifeguards and swimmers who are CPR qualified and my 6 resume. I'm Carol MacPherson. I've lived in Palo Alto for over 46 years. I run the 7 Rinconada Masters team. I've been a coach for 46 years. Cindy Baxter and myself 8 founded this team under Tom Osborn, who had the vision of the future for our team. We 9 started with 15 swimmers in 1973 and graduated to 100 very shortly. We were the first 10 Masters team along with San Mateo and De Anza. If you look at my resume, you can see 11 that we have helped the community of swimming and also put Palo Alto City on the map 12 with all the swimming we have done worldwide. We have competed in different 13 countries all over the world. Our team asked the City when we first started also to put 14 heat in the dressing rooms, which there wasn't any when we first started the team. We 15 also paid for covers with the City. We also put lane lines in. We've had a swimmer that 16 put some knobs on the wheels to get the covers off and on because it was very hard. He 17 put a little knob on there, and now it's much easier for the lifeguards and our team. I 18 would like to see our team continue. I would like to see the contract continue that we've 19 had. We would prefer and would like to work with Team Sheeper over this. Thank you. 20 Chair McDougall: Thank you, Carol. Somehow Ann knew she was next. 21 Ann Lemmens: Hi. My name is Ann Lemmens, and I'm a Palo Alto resident and 22 homeowner. I've been lap swimming at Rinconada Pool for the last 20 years, and my 23 children learned how to swim there as well as spending many happy hours playing in the 24 pool. I now try to bring my granddaughter over there whenever she is visiting. That's 25 become harder to do because of the reduced recreational swim hours that the pool 26 employs. This summer, we went there, and we stood in a line waiting for people to exit 27 the pool so that we could go in. We eventually gave up because it was a hot day, and we 28 were probably going to wait an hour and a half or more to get in. I'd like to see the 29 recreational hours improved as well. I'm part of a large group of people who lap swim 30 multiple times a week at Rinconada Pool. I'm really hoping that you don't allow a change 31 or reduction of hours for this valuable community and personal benefit. In addition, 32 please be sure that the recreational swim hours are sufficient to cover all the members of 33 our community that desire to use this public pool. Please be sure that the new five-year 34 contract for Rinconada Pool maintains it as a community asset as it should be. Thank 35 you. 36 Chair McDougall: Thank you, Ann. Stan Weiss followed by David Kuo. 37 APPROVED Approved Minutes 16 Stan Weiss: Good evening. This is Stan Weiss. I've been swimming in this valley for 1 over 60 years with virtually every Masters program that's been around. The Rinconada 2 Masters program, which I've been swimming in for over ten years, is by far and away the 3 best. What I'd really like to see is it stay the same. The one-year contract that you had 4 with Mr. Sheeper—if you just continued that for the next five years, it would probably 5 eliminate a lot of the problems. The way it is structured now Rinconada Masters would 6 be eliminated, and Mr. Sheeper would take over. I don't think that's necessary. I think 7 we can just roll over the one-year contract into the five-year contract the way it is, and 8 everybody would be pretty happy about it. Thank you. 9 Chair McDougall: Thank you. David Kuo followed by Timothy Groves. 10 David Kuo: My name is David Kuo. I'm a resident and a homeowner of Palo Alto. I've 11 been jogging for many years, and two years ago my knees gave out. I switched to 12 swimming. Swimming is on my bucket list. I'm here because I'm very wary about the 13 future of Palo Alto, especially in terms of the lap swimming that has been available to us. 14 Two points. I noticed that the contract is a five-year contract; it's going to be a five-year 15 contract. I'm 75 years old. If we make a mistake, that mistake is going to be with us for 16 five years. That five years is a very long time for me; it could be the rest of my life. I'm 17 quite concerned about that. I'm also concerned in particular about, from the lack of 18 willingness to work with the Masters program, what we can anticipate in the future. How 19 accommodating is Mr. Sheeper going to be? This is our pool. We pay for it with our tax 20 dollars. We should control it's destiny. Thank you very much. 21 Chair McDougall: Thank you. Timothy Groves followed by Gwen Fisher. 22 Mr. Groves: My name is Timothy Groves. I'm currently a Palo Alto resident and a 23 member of Rinconada Masters swim club. We support the existing contract and 24 subcontract and abide by both of these willingly. Last week, Tim Sheeper informed us 25 that he intends to unilaterally cancel our subcontract after the new year and reallocate the 26 swim lanes to another "Masters" group of his own devising. This could effectively 27 prevent the Rinconada Masters from using the Rinconada Pool facility, which we have 28 done continuously and successfully since 1972. As one reason, he cites a lack of certified 29 lifeguards and individuals certified in CPR and AED. This is incorrect. We have three 30 lifeguards with valid and current Red Cross certification, and we have 14 swimmers with 31 valid and current CPR and AED certification. We meet our contractual obligation to 32 have qualified supervision present and on duty at the pool. He further cites that 33 Rinconada Masters failed to communicate with Team Sheeper. This is a 34 misrepresentation. We are perfectly willing to communicate and have done so. In fact, 35 no one in our group has ever seen Tim Sheeper at the pool during our designated hours. 36 We, therefore, have two requests: that the Parks and Rec Commission improve and 37 increase its oversight of contractor Team Sheeper to prevent what threatens to become a 38 APPROVED Approved Minutes 17 devastating and unfair situation for Rinconada Masters and that our existing subcontract 1 between Masters and Team Sheeper be renewable with appropriate modification for 2 allocation of swim lanes effective January 1st. Thank you for your attention. 3 Chair McDougall: Thank you. Gwen Fisher followed by Jack Lourdan [phonetic]. 4 Gwen Fisher: Hi. My name is Gwen Fisher, and I'm a Palo Alto resident and taxpayer. 5 Thank you all for allowing us to come speak tonight. As a longtime taxpayer and 6 resident, I'm quite disturbed and quite angry at the handling and the management of our 7 town pool. Prior to Tim's 18-month trial contract, our community pool was a welcoming 8 place for all types of swimmers and all pool users. Lap swimmers, Masters swimmers, 9 family and recreation swimmers, and PASA all enjoyed our pool and the accessibility 10 that it offered. There was a place and space for everyone, everyone who wanted to use it. 11 Over the past year, Tim has quickly and systematically reduced the community's access 12 to the pool. He most recently denied a subcontract to the long-running, 40-plus years, 13 community Masters program by Carol MacPherson, most likely in favor of bringing in 14 his own Masters program to our town pool. For the past 18 months, Tim's privatized 15 operations have been conducted with a complete lack of transparency and 16 communication. The degree of secrecy and disregard for community involvement and 17 input between Parks and Rec and Team Sheeper is so high that most of us don't even 18 know who to go to or who to talk to regarding a maintenance or locker room issue. Over 19 the span of less than 18 months, Tim has completely removed the community from our 20 community pool. It is my belief and opinion that Tim has an agenda solely focused on 21 his own pursuits and goals without regard to the Palo Alto swimming community. If he 22 is granted the five-year contract that he has proposed, I believe he will turn our 23 community pool into a peak-performance aquatic center dedicated to the exclusive use of 24 high-level Masters swimmers and those training for triathlons as he has done with the 25 Burgess Park pool. I am asking you to examine Tim's proposal from the lap swimmers' 26 perspective or a common pool user like me, people who want to use the space of 14 lanes 27 and the freedom to swim according to our needs, the moms who want to come and enjoy 28 the pool during the weekday at any time with their kids. Tim has taken the community 29 out of our community pool. You need to put it back. Thank you. 30 Chair McDougall: Thank you. Jack Lourdan will be followed by Fran Dubose 31 [phonetic]. 32 Jack Lourdan: I am Jack Lourdan. I am not a resident of Palo Alto; they wouldn't let me 33 in. I can't help that. I don't know how long I've been swimming with Rinconada; it's 34 probably over 30 years. All I can tell you is when I started I had hair. Secondly, I was 35 good looking. You can decide on how long that's been. Once thing I want to bring up is 36 I've been swimming many years with Rinconada. Currently, I'm doing about 12,000 37 yards a week. That's not as much as other people do, but it's a lot for me. It helps with 38 APPROVED Approved Minutes 18 my health. I have a hip that's not as good as it used to be. It definitely helps with that. 1 It's a great group of people to be with. It always has been the Rinconada Masters in the 2 pool. Secondly, this is the most important thing. One of the problems that Tim seemed 3 to think was that we weren't communicating. It takes two. I think you gentlemen would 4 agree that it takes two parties to communicate. If you call this communication, never any 5 mention in the past months he was thinking of terminating our contract. He tells Carol on 6 the 16th of October. I don't know about you, but that infuriates me. He says "you're not 7 communicating with me." I say he did not communicate with us. One other thing. You 8 say he's going to bring a Masters team. Is it possible that the Masters team he brings over 9 will be his Masters team? The point being that he's not only making money running the 10 operation for you gentlemen, but he's also making money or he will be making money off 11 this team he's bringing to the Rinconada Pool. I just don't think that's a fair situation. I 12 can't say that's what is going to happen, but it has crossed my mind. Thank you very 13 much. 14 Chair McDougall: Thank you. Fran Dubose followed by Marilyn Bauriedel [phonetic]. 15 Fran Dubose: Good evening. My name is Fran Dubose, and I am a Palo Alto resident. 16 Unlike many of my teammates tonight, I'm a newbie in the team. I just joined the 17 Rinconada Masters program a year ago. I really want to tell you that I found an amazing 18 team. Actually, it was recommended by many people in Palo Alto, so this is a program 19 that's well known. I found a very united and welcoming team. I know that some of my 20 teammates are shy and won't talk, even if they don't have the accent I have. I would like 21 to ask them to all stand up so that you can see how important it is for all us swimmers. 22 We have two great coaches. It goes from very rigorous practices to progressive workout 23 that I need because I'm really starting. I've made tremendous progress. Terri and Carol 24 know everyone. I already made friends. This is a wonderful program, and it's really key 25 for the community. Please save our team. I'm really hopeful that we can solve the 26 situation. Everybody in the team is ready to work with Mr. Sheeper. I'm always 27 optimistic, and I really trust that we can find a solution for everyone. Thank you. 28 Chair McDougall: Thank you, Fran. Marilyn. Marilyn would be the last speaker of all 29 the speaker cards I have unless … 30 Marilyn Bauriedel: I'm Marilyn Bauriedel, and I've lived in Palo Alto since 1969. I've 31 been a lap swimmer at Rinconada about 46 years. I was a little while with the Masters in 32 the beginning. I loved it, but it didn't work out with my work schedule and so forth. 33 There's just a couple of things that I would like to add. The stakeholders were supposed 34 to be invited to participate in knowing at least about how this contract was being 35 developed. A lot of us went to the March 6th meeting where Stephanie Douglas said 36 we'll meet again and we will get the stakeholders' information and we'll have the lap 37 swimmers in and the Masters and different people in. She had our email addresses and so 38 APPROVED Approved Minutes 19 forth. Neither I nor any of my co-lap swimmers that I know ever received any kind of 1 invitation to attend any other meeting. The first thing we've known about the contract is 2 that it's come out and here's what it's about. We had input into the first year's contract, 3 and we were quite specific as the lap swimming community that our—I'm not speaking 4 for others, but I'm summarizing what I hear—reasonable needs were for the full pool of 5 the 14 lanes at least for the morning swims and at other lap swimming times when there's 6 a large number of lap swimmers that are expected. We originally objected to the Sheeper 7 schedule that was proposed because he wanted to have lap swimmers and Masters 8 swimmers divide the pool at the same time, especially during these busy hours. The 9 schedule of pool lanes is, for me and certainly for a lot of others, of utmost importance to 10 us. We heard tonight that maybe they are going to expand lap swim hours, but those 11 expanded hours don't work for an awful lot of the people in this program. Many of them 12 are working people that come at 6:30 in the morning, and then they're off to work. I 13 come later in the day. We retired people also do a lot of other things in the day, and we 14 want to get going with our aerobic exercise. The early morning is the only time a lot of 15 us have to devote to our swimming fitness. The fact that these other times have been 16 added are not going to be helpful to many of us. I'm thinking there are maybe 28 or more 17 lap swimmers in the pool many times. If it went to seven and seven between the two 18 groups, there'd be four people in a lane. It doesn't work out terribly well. Lap swimmers 19 are not casual swimmers. They're mostly people that are doing this for fitness, but we 20 don't all have the same styles or we don't have the same needs. Sometimes people are 21 recovering from injury. It's good that our community has a place that people can go to 22 walk laps and do that kind of thing. I hope you can work this out. Thank you. 23 Chair McDougall: Thank you, Marilyn. The two last cards that were just turned in, John 24 Beeley followed by Kuble Dimish [phonetic]. 25 John Beeley: Thank you. I'm John Beeley. I used to be a resident of Palo Alto. My two 26 kids graduated from Palo Alto High School. I live in the area, Mountain View. I've 27 continued to stay with Rinconada Masters since I joined it in the late '90s. My point is 28 that you need to understand that not all Masters swimmer clubs are the same. That's 29 really what we are. We're not a team per se; we're a club. We're a collection of people 30 that have different goals, different requirements, but we have a common coach, and we 31 have a common sport, swimming, that we all participate in. There are some clubs that are 32 very competitive oriented. There are a lot of people that have come to Rinconada and left 33 to go to Stanford because they have a different outlook there. They have a different 34 expectation. We are an everyman, person club. This is how Rinconada is constituted. 35 Sheeper may have other goals. He may have a performance or higher requirements for 36 either entering the Masters program or to participate in it. I prefer the low-key attitude of 37 Rinconada Masters. I hope that you continue to allow it to participate the way it has 38 before. Thank you. 39 APPROVED Approved Minutes 20 Chair McDougall: Thank you, John. Kuble. 1 Kuble Dimish: Good evening. My name is Kuble Dimish. I'm a Palo Alto resident. I 2 have been a Palo Alto resident since five years, and I have been swimming as a lap 3 swimmer at Rinconada Pool since nine months. I just want to stress the availability of 4 the pool lanes for the lap swimmers. If you look at the Menlo Park swimming pool 5 schedule for the primetime hours, very few of the lanes are allocated for lap swimming. 6 The proposed schedule halves it will be in the future. There should be enough lanes 7 allocated for the lap swimmers. Thank you. 8 Chair McDougall: Thank you. Absolutely the last card would be Shawn Sasse. 9 Shawn Sasse: Hi. My name is Shawn Sasse. I am not a Palo Alto resident; I'm a Menlo 10 Park resident. I am a Masters swimmer at Rinconada by my own choosing. What's been 11 presented tonight by the Community Services Department differs significantly from what 12 the current contract is that we have. It has negative implications for our swimming 13 community, and we're concerned. The community Masters team of 40-plus years has 14 been denied a renewed contract by Tim Sheeper. A new Masters team is supposed to be 15 administered by Tim Sheeper, and it's to be the replacement. Lap swimmers have no 16 assurance of their dedicated pool time during prime morning and evening hours. In fact, 17 we saw only one schedule for January, and it was tentative. I'm not entirely sure what I 18 saw, but I didn't notice that there were many lap swimming hours in the evening. It was 19 given over to some other discipline. We've watched Menlo Park privatize their 20 community pool to Tim Sheeper. It's no longer a community pool. It looks like Tim 21 Sheeper's pool. On weekdays, prime morning, noon, and evening hours are given to Tim 22 Sheeper and his youth swim team. Lap swimmers are allotted anywhere from 0 to 20 23 percent of lane space during these prime times. Weekends, the pool closes early, and 24 prime morning hours are again primarily for Team Sheeper. This is not what the 25 Rinconada Pool community is about. We're a community of independent groups that 26 have coexisted for decades. We value designated prime pool time for lap swimmers. We 27 value a Masters team that serves a unique segment of Masters swimmers in a way that 28 other local teams do not. We have PASA, a prized youth swimming team. We have an 29 incredible recreational facility that is for the community for long summer weekdays and 30 weekends. 31 Chair McDougall: Thank you very much. Mark Sloan. 32 Mark Sloan: I'm a Palo Alto resident, homeowner. I graduated from Palo Alto High 33 School, and I did not swim in high school. I learned how to swim, and I started Masters 34 at Rinconada. It's been really rewarding. It's an excellent program. I don't think it's fair 35 to privatize and say you're going to bring in a different Masters program when it's been 36 here for 45 years. It's important to make that known. Thanks. 37 APPROVED Approved Minutes 21 Chair McDougall: Thank you. We've now had all of the public comments. I'd like to 1 turn it over to the Commission to comment and ask questions. We'll just do one round 2 that basically you can comment and question at the same time. Before we start that, I 3 believe and I'd like to understand from the group. Carol clearly is your head coach. 4 There are some other people here that are sub-coaches or assistant coaches. I heard 5 several times that this is a club. Is there any other structure to the club? Is there a 6 treasurer, a president, a social convener, or anything like that? Can somebody speak to 7 that? 8 Ms. MacPherson: We have an advisory board. We have a president of the club who has 9 been the president for 20 years. We have a treasurer who is here tonight. We all decide 10 what's best for the team. I'm not the only one that decides. I go to my board, and we talk 11 about things and decide together. 12 Chair McDougall: Thank you for that clarification. I'll start with you, Keith. 13 Commissioner Reckdahl: I guess this is for Jazmin. I'm confused here. This seems like 14 a really bad idea. Why are we doing it? 15 Ms. LeBlanc: That's a good question since we've had so many comments. As I said—I'll 16 put this slide back here—we actually have had quite a lot of positive comments come 17 back about the use of the pool. There's 10,000 more lap swim and open swim visitors 18 that we had year over year. We doubled the number of swim lessons. We had 350 19 families participating in summer swim camps. We have heard feedback from members 20 of PASA, lap swimmers, and recreational swim users that they've been happy with this 21 program. Administratively, we've also been very happy to work with Team Sheeper over 22 the last year. They've been very easy to communicate with. We're having daily check-23 ins, very flexible around the City's needs. Sometimes the City can be difficult to work 24 with, and they've been willing to partner with us. They were the only respondent to our 25 RFP, and we reviewed them looking at safety, which is absolutely essential to all of our 26 programs, City and customer costs, quality of service and customer satisfaction, diversity 27 of programming, and accessibility. We feel strongly that they are going to be able to 28 deliver on all of these elements. It is our goal to have a long-term partner that we feel is 29 going to be collaborative, willing to give and take with the City. One of the elements that 30 made this somewhat unattractive to other potential aquatics vendors—I can't say for 31 certain—is that we have insisted that the City can retain that oversight of the pool 32 schedule and the pool pricing. This will not be the same as what Menlo Park offers. This 33 will be very much the same as what the City of Palo Alto offers. The biggest drawback is 34 that there is a change in oversight of the Masters program. The Masters programming is 35 not going away. Everyone who is a Masters swimmer is absolutely welcome to continue 36 to be a Masters swimmer. I know that it doesn't necessarily feel the same to every 37 APPROVED Approved Minutes 22 participant, but there is still Masters programming at the same times and at almost exactly 1 the same prices. 2 Commissioner Reckdahl: As a City, I don't see our incentive for getting rid of the current 3 Masters program. It doesn't seem to be broken. Why are we trying to replace the 4 Masters program? 5 Ms. LeBlanc: We received on RFP response, and that was from Team Sheeper. Team 6 Sheeper has already developed a subcontract with PASA. We don't have the ability to 7 require Team Sheeper to subcontract with any particular vendors. We really can't force 8 something like that. The other element is we felt satisfied with the response. There were 9 enough positives here. We did hear from Team Sheeper what their concerns were around 10 continuing with the subcontract, but we felt comfortable moving forward with this. 11 Commissioner Reckdahl: We have no ability to require him to continue? Last year, we 12 did that. 13 Chair McDougall: We have the ability to ask him to continue a Masters program. We 14 don't have the ability to insist that he subcontract with this particular group. That's the 15 issue. 16 Commissioner LaMere: When we do an RFP, do we have the ability to structure an RFP 17 to make requirements of what we think are important? For example, could we say part of 18 this RFP is we're going to keep certain existing groups as part of the pool? As we go 19 forward with our community, I do foresee even more public-private partnerships with 20 City budgets and staffing problems. That's actually what led to this public-private 21 partnership with the pool. As we do RFPs, are there ways to figure out what are 22 important community assets and make those part of an RFP? If so, was there anything 23 within this RFP that talked about different community assets that were existing? 24 Ms. LeBlanc: In terms of making sure we have all the programming that we think is 25 important, yes, we can put that in an RFP, and we did. We also invited all of our pool 26 users, PASA, Rinconada Masters, and Team Sheeper along with any other aquatics 27 vendors that we could reach out to respond to the RFP to make sure that any group that 28 wants to be in the pool knows that this is the process to take to put their bid in to 29 continue. 30 Commissioner LaMere: Was that to put a bid in to manage the entire pool or to put a bid 31 in to carve out three hours a morning for an existing Masters group? 32 Ms. LeBlanc: We asked for total aquatics oversight. When we had discussions with 33 different vendors, we made it clear that the response can be anything, but the ideal is total 34 APPROVED Approved Minutes 23 aquatics oversight. Combining programs is an option that we encouraged as well, a 1 partnership (crosstalk). 2 Commissioner LaMere: What do you mean by combining programs? 3 Ms. LeBlanc: For example, there could be two vendors that come together with one 4 response so that one vendor provides this service and another for that service. 5 Commissioner Reckdahl: Right now, we have one RFP response. Do we have to accept 6 that? Can we put another RFP out? Can we structure it differently to allow us to contract 7 directly with PASA and with a Masters program so the City makes the decision instead of 8 a private company? 9 Ms. LeBlanc: We do have the option not to proceed. As I said, staff feels strongly that 10 this is a good choice to proceed. As was indicated, we're really focused on these 11 elements around safety and quality of service and customer satisfaction. We're very 12 confident that this is what Team Sheeper will be able to provide moving forward. The 13 option would be to throw this out. We may have to suspend all aquatics programming if 14 we don't have any oversight of the pool and try to come up with a new plan. It's not ideal 15 to walk away from this. We would certainly do that if it seemed like this was going to 16 cause problems because our goal is to improve aquatics programming. 17 Commissioner Reckdahl: Have you talked to Sheeper about this? What's his rationale 18 for changing the Masters program? 19 Ms. LeBlanc: Sheeper provided several concerns around the way the Masters program 20 oversight currently is, which he did express to the Rinconada Masters earlier this month. 21 The one that caused the most—the issue that we are especially focused on is pool safety. 22 Our goal is that every program at the pool is as safe as can possibly be. They had 23 concerns that we felt were valid. 24 Commissioner Reckdahl: This is the lifeguard issue? 25 Ms. LeBlanc: The lifeguard issue being the main one. 26 Chair McDougall: I'm going to pass it to Ryan. 27 Commissioner McCauley: Could you say a little more about that? I'm sorry that I'm not 28 up to speed on the lifeguard issue. I appreciate the concern is they may not have enough 29 lifeguards. Is that the City's rationale? 30 Ms. LeBlanc: That's their rationale for not wanting to partner. They are liable for 31 anything that happens at the pool. They're the contractor. Any subcontractor—if 32 something goes wrong, Team Sheeper is liable as well as the City. They're focused on 33 APPROVED Approved Minutes 24 safety as is the City. The City went through a complete safety review by an independent 1 aquatics professional earlier this year to make sure that we were doing everything we 2 could in best practices. They identified the requirement to have two lifeguards around 3 the pool, at least one of them being on the deck—it's possible to have one in the pool as 4 well—as something we need to do in all of our programs. We have that requirement in 5 Team Sheeper's contract and also in the subcontracts with PASA and the Rinconada 6 Masters. That has not always occurred during the Rinconada Masters programs. It's 7 serious enough that we felt this was justified, for Team Sheeper to move forward with 8 overseeing the Masters program. 9 Commissioner McCauley: It seems like a fixable problem. You could even contract with 10 Team Sheeper to have lifeguards there. That's largely why he's there in the first place. 11 Let me just raise a couple of practical concerns that I have. One, I don't believe, given 12 the community feedback tonight and that's been received via writing as well, this will 13 have a chance before the City Council. I think something has to change; otherwise, this 14 is not going to move forward in the way that staff has proposed it. That's going to be 15 problematic because you're going to be a month farther behind the ball. I would really 16 hope that there'd be some solution between Team Sheeper, Rinconada Masters, and the 17 City. I hope the City could broker that solution. I'm going to make one other comment. 18 I have a broader concern about the lack of competitive bidding. I know that you probably 19 share that concern. We're in a difficult position where we are entirely reliant upon Team 20 Sheeper to keep our town pool open. That's a difficult position to be in. We need to find 21 some way—I don't know if it goes back to the RFP process or something else—that we're 22 not so entirely reliant upon one organization that we have little control over, frankly. 23 Relatedly, I'm wondering whether or not a five-year contract under those circumstances is 24 the right way to go or whether we should have a shorter-term contract, two or three years 25 perhaps. Do you have thoughts on any of those questions? 26 Ms. LeBlanc: I do share your concerns about vendors and making sure we're getting 27 competitive bids. This is an area where there are not a ton of vendors in general. That 28 makes it a little bit hard. We did our best to reach out to every vendor we could think of 29 to try to solicit more than one bid. With regard to the five-year contract, we did think a 30 lot about that, and we've put a termination clause in for no reason. For no reason, we can 31 terminate with 90 days. The thinking is if things are going right, it's a very time-32 consuming process to do a whole RFP and new contract every couple of years. It would 33 be nice to have some continuity. It also allows the vendor to feel more like they are a 34 part of the community, and they want to get to know all of the customers and want to 35 make sure they're satisfying the existing pool customers more because they know they're 36 going to be in it for a long term. I do feel like a five-year term is a good idea in this case. 37 Was there more? I'm sorry. 38 APPROVED Approved Minutes 25 Commissioner McCauley: That was essentially it. I know there are probably others that 1 want to ask a few questions as well, so I'll pass the baton. Let me say also thank you. I 2 know this is largely a thankless job that you have. Appreciate the fact that you are so 3 committed to this. I know you are a Palo Alto resident, so these are all your neighbors 4 who are speaking tonight. I know you probably bear that in a different way than perhaps 5 others who may not be Palo Alto residents. Thank you. 6 Chair McDougall: Jeff, do you have anything else you want to add? 7 Commissioner LaMere: I want to get a little clarification on the administrative fee and 8 the thoughts behind that. Did he do the administrative fee last year when he first took 9 over? 10 Ms. LeBlanc: No, he had proposed it, but we requested not to do that. 11 Commissioner LaMere: That administrative fee is counted as part of total revenue? 12 Ms. LeBlanc: Yes. 13 Commissioner LaMere: There's not something that he would add to additional costs? I 14 was just curious about why he needs an administrative fee as opposed to whether it's a 15 dollar or two more for each service. 16 Ms. LeBlanc: Their costs continue to grow. Luckily, they have the ability to quickly 17 change the rates that they're paying lifeguards, unlike the City, so they can maintain 18 adequate staffing levels. Their costs are growing, but they don't have a lot of flexibility 19 to raise monthly fees without upsetting people. This is effectively a way to try to 20 increase … 21 Commissioner LaMere: It's still an increase in monthly fees essentially. 22 Ms. LeBlanc: If you average it over 12 months, it is. I recognize that. 23 Chair McDougall: David. 24 Commissioner Moss: I agree 100 percent with what Ryan said about if one of the only 25 things Team Sheeper is worried about is lifeguards, they should get some lifeguards and 26 move on. Using the golf course as an example, OB runs the golf course. There are many 27 clubs that have regular use of the golf course. OB's responsibility is to maintain the golf 28 course for them to use. I don't see any reason why—this swim club is a City treasure. It 29 has a national reputation. It has a long history. Why does it go away just because 30 somebody's managing the pool, especially if it's a great group of people with a lot of 31 camaraderie and they do great events together? I don't understand that. It's a layer on top 32 of the running of the pool. If you need a couple of lifeguards, get a couple of lifeguards 33 APPROVED Approved Minutes 26 and move on. They're not going to turn away anybody from that pool, so everybody here 1 can join it, and they can still be their club. This RFP process really has some issues. Put 2 up the schedule real quickly. What you're telling me is that the proposals were due 3 August 21st. On that day, did Team Sheeper have in there about Masters swim? What is 4 this about October 16th? Why did we wait two months from August 21st to find out this 5 stuff? Why isn't there an RFP from—did they know that there needed to be an RFP just 6 for Masters swim or that it had to be part of an overall structure, going back to what Ryan 7 said? I don't understand that part of the RFP process. I don't want to negate the RFP 8 process, but it seems fishy. When you go to the City Council, it's going to look fishy. 9 What do we do? 10 Ms. LeBlanc: When we first recognized that the Masters program operations were likely 11 to be different, that was not August 21st because we didn't get it released from the 12 Purchasing Division for several days. It was in the beginning of September, 13 September 11th, when we started to do our review of the response and tried to look 14 through all the elements that Team Sheeper had proposed. As soon as we saw that 15 Rinconada Masters was not mentioned as a subcontractor, we had a suspicion that there 16 could be something we needed to understand. At the same time, it was not the City who 17 could tell Rinconada Masters anything about their contract with Team Sheeper. The RFP 18 does not say Rinconada Masters will not be in the pool. It just proposes the same 19 schedule and pricing. We reached out to Carol, the head coach, to try to set up a meeting 20 as soon as possible. The meeting was actually towards the end of September, but we 21 asked—we didn't see a Rinconada Masters RFP response—what was going on. We 22 urged them to reach out to Tim Sheeper, the only RFP respondent, to find out what was 23 going on. It's my understanding that that meeting did take place on October 16th. I'm not 24 sure why there was such a long delay from the 28th. That is our understanding. 25 Commissioner Moss: It doesn't seem like they're allowed to do that so late in the process, 26 to say that. I'd like you to revisit that. You have a very strict process, and that doesn't 27 seem like it's part of the strict process. It's the blindsiding that I find disturbing. 28 Ms. LeBlanc: We reached out to all of our pool users to participate in this RFP. I would 29 really hope that every pool user would be in communication as early as possible. It's 30 unfortunate that that didn't happen in this case. You said this is like the golf course. I 31 think that's very apt. Team Sheeper is providing administrative oversight, but he doesn't 32 have a group of Masters swimmers that are waiting somewhere to take over. 33 Commissioner Moss: That's exactly my point. There's no reason why the name Palo 34 Alto Rinconada Masters swim club team has to go away. There doesn't seem to be a 35 reason why these members can't swim in that pool. Because the City has oversight on 36 running the pool, if they need some more lifeguards or some other safety issues, they 37 should deal with it. I know this club has had a long history. Regulations change, and 38 APPROVED Approved Minutes 27 they need to change with it. It doesn't mean that the club has to go away. I can't accept 1 that. If you have stricter safety requirements, then you have to meet them. Every other 2 sport that's played in our City has the same restrictions. That's all. 3 Vice Chair Greenfield: I'm certainly hearing lots of concerns from Rinconada Masters 4 about their program going away. It's been certainly a valued program within the 5 community for many years. I'm also hearing from lap swimmers issues regarding access 6 hours. I don't think the Commission has addressed that. I want to spend some time on 7 that as well. I'm also hearing from staff, who I have a lot of respect for as well, that even 8 considering the longstanding history of Rinconada Masters they're recommending an 9 option which effectively doesn't include them. I'm trying to understand how did we get 10 here and what are we missing. I have a number of questions that will maybe shed some 11 light. Regarding the RFP, there's been discussion about the preference for a complete 12 package versus a partial RFP. Could you elaborate more on that? You said it is possible 13 to respond in a partial manner. Is that acceptable? 14 Ms. LeBlanc: It is, but it's not going to be as attractive of a response when it's being 15 evaluated. 16 Vice Chair Greenfield: Was Rinconada Masters engaged? Did you have 17 communications with them to encourage them to make a response? 18 Ms. LeBlanc: Yes. During the RFP process, we cannot do that. Beforehand, in the 19 spring, we met with Rinconada Masters, PASA, and Team Sheeper individually to talk 20 about the RFP process and encourage all of them to respond. 21 Vice Chair Greenfield: If I understand it correctly, the ideal arrangement would be the 22 primary contractor working with the subcontractors and coming together with a single 23 unified response to the RFP. Effectively, that's what Team Sheeper has done with PASA, 24 but Rinconada Masters was not included. I understand the City is limited to the role they 25 can play to pursue that. Speculatively, if Rinconada Masters had made a partial RFP 26 response, would we potentially be in a different position now? 27 Ms. LeBlanc: I haven't asked our City Attorney's Office, but it is possible. 28 Vice Chair Greenfield: I appreciate what Ryan has said. We're in a difficult position 29 with a single response to the RFP. I appreciate that you did outreach and would have 30 loved to get more bids. This is what we have. One option is we can accept the RFP as it 31 is. We can reject it outright, and then the City must resume management of Rinconada 32 Pool. That sounds problematic and a timing issue as well. Is it possible to reopen the 33 RFP? 34 Ms. LeBlanc: I believe it's done. 35 APPROVED Approved Minutes 28 Vice Chair Greenfield: That is not an option. What type of negotiation is possible? It 1 sounds like we cannot specifically require Team Sheeper to have a contract with 2 Rinconada Masters. 3 Ms. LeBlanc: Just like a construction contract that the City enters into, there are lots of 4 subcontractors and maybe even sub-subcontractors. This contract actually doesn't say 5 anything about whether or not a Masters program must be or could be in the future 6 subcontracted. All this requires them to do is provide a Masters program; whether it's 7 through their own service or a subcontract is up to them. 8 Vice Chair Greenfield: We're basically somewhere between a rock and a hard place. We 9 have one contract option. For whatever reason, the primary contractor doesn't want to 10 work with the subcontractor. We have an adoring community that loves this program and 11 desperately wants to maintain it. We have a City that has to manage a pool. For reasons 12 well stated, we're not in a position to manage it ourselves, so we're looking for third-party 13 management. We're trying to figure out how we meet. Can you clarify more the three 14 reasons? Can you elaborate on the three reasons that Team Sheeper expressed why they 15 did not want to proceed with Rinconada Masters? It would be helpful for the 16 Commission to understand that better. I'm hearing safety is one. Lifeguards are part of 17 the safety issue. Are there other components of the safety issue? 18 Ms. LeBlanc: There have been some other issues that they've brought to our attention 19 over the course of—I think someone said 15 months. Some of those have been 20 addressed. The lifeguarding is the main safety issue that continues. One of the 21 hesitations that Team Sheeper has with entering a new contract that says we will have 22 lifeguards is this is already in the contract, and it's not being met. If there's a new 23 contract with a mandate for lifeguards, Tim Sheeper doesn't have confidence that that 24 element will be met. It's been in place, and he's attempted to address it for several 25 months. 26 Vice Chair Greenfield: Can you quantify the transgressions which have occurred in the 27 past so we can better understand the magnitude of this? On the surface, this sounds like a 28 solvable problem, but I'm hearing maybe it's not. 29 Ms. LeBlanc: All of our programs are required to have two lifeguards at all times. My 30 understanding is the Rinconada Masters have asked if they could certify their own 31 participants as lifeguards in order to not pay for lifeguards. It is a relatively small 32 program, and this puts a cost burden them on to pay for outside lifeguards. This was 33 something the City and Team Sheeper believed was workable. Since we have pressed the 34 request to make sure we can see all the lifeguard certifications and see the schedule that 35 there are, in fact, volunteer lifeguards in every single hour of programming, we haven't 36 seen that. That's been a request that the City and Team Sheeper has made. It's been 37 outstanding since July. We've indicated just how important it is for the pool to be safe at 38 APPROVED Approved Minutes 29 all times. We need to know that there are lifeguards there at all times when Rinconada 1 Masters is swimming. This is actually for their own safety. The other elements that 2 Team Sheeper provided were service to the community and respect for all the programs 3 that are onsite. 4 Vice Chair Greenfield: Service and community? 5 Ms. LeBlanc: Service to the community and respect for all programs that are onsite. 6 Vice Chair Greenfield: What does service to the community mean? 7 Ms. LeBlanc: Over time, the Rinconada Masters program has dropped in size. They've 8 been much larger in the past. It's been an issue that the City has encouraged that we get 9 more. We really want to see this pool getting used as much as possible. When we see 10 10 or 12 kids in a lane during PASA's practices, it makes me smile that there's so many 11 people, so many kids in the pool at that time. That's something that we want to see with 12 the Masters, and something Tim wants to see with the Masters program as well. That 13 was … 14 Vice Chair Greenfield: Essentially, this is enrollment and usage. What is the typical lane 15 usage for Rinconada Masters, how many people per lane? 16 Ms. LeBlanc: I'm sure the Rinconada Masters would probably want to speak to that. I 17 only know anecdotes from Team Sheeper or when I pop over occasionally to look. In the 18 past, it's been often one person in a lane at a time, which is very nice for one person but 19 not a lot of usage. 20 Vice Chair Greenfield: Can you go back to the schedule slide? When Rinconada 21 Masters has the pool, it is exclusive use of the pool or shared? I thought there was some 22 lap swimming along with the Masters. 23 Ms. LeBlanc: I actually have a few slides that I added just in case we wanted to talk 24 about the current schedule. 25 Vice Chair Greenfield: There is exclusive use right now. I was trying to understand it. 26 In these time periods, Rinconada Masters has exclusive responsibility for lifeguards? 27 Ms. LeBlanc: Ignore those. Those are not the current rate. I was just trying to pull 28 things together. This is Rinconada Masters' pool schedule now. I'm sorry that it's not a 29 grid like the others. There are shared times. The exclusive use for the Masters is in the 30 morning, Monday, Wednesday, Friday. I think Saturday and Sunday might also be 31 exclusive use. Tuesday and Thursday is shared. 32 APPROVED Approved Minutes 30 Vice Chair Greenfield: Getting back to the lifeguards, the City requirements to Team 1 Sheeper are two lifeguards must be on duty for—is this for the main pool or for both 2 pools? 3 Ms. LeBlanc: It's for each pool. If both pools are open, four. 4 Vice Chair Greenfield: Two lifeguards per pool. The compromise with Rinconada 5 Masters is they can have certified lifeguards who are actually swimming but not 6 monitoring the pool. They're considered the lifeguard for the pool? 7 Ms. LeBlanc: You have to have at least one on deck. One of the two could be in the 8 water. 9 Vice Chair Greenfield: Their requirement is one on deck. The compromise is for the 10 second person to be someone in the pool. The issue that the City and Team Sheeper have 11 is there are times when there's only one lifeguard and not two. 12 Ms. LeBlanc: Yes, or no lifeguards, just certified coaches. 13 Vice Chair Greenfield: Are there times when there is no on-the-deck lifeguard? 14 Ms. LeBlanc: That's my understanding. 15 Vice Chair Greenfield: How often has this happened? 16 Ms. LeBlanc: Perhaps I'm wrong. Enough that it's been brought to our attention multiple 17 times, and we have tried to rectify this by calling meetings and sending emails to push for 18 these schedules so that the City and Team Sheeper has assurance that there are always 19 two lifeguards. 20 Vice Chair Greenfield: Dozens of times? I'm trying to understand the magnitude of the 21 problem. 22 Ms. LeBlanc: So far, we have not seen a schedule that gives assurance that any of the 23 exclusive-usage times have two lifeguards. I can't say that we have seen anything. 24 Chair McDougall: Carol, why don't you comment? 25 Ms. MacPherson: We just handed in a yellow booklet to you that has all the lifeguards 26 that we have. We have always had at least one lifeguard on the deck, sometimes one in 27 the water, not on the deck. The only time she is talking about is the morning, Monday, 28 Wednesday, Friday, Saturday sometimes, and Sunday. All the other ones are covered 29 with two lifeguards. The lap swimming does not always have two lifeguards. They have 30 APPROVED Approved Minutes 31 one. He's a lap swimmer; he just told me that. They do not always have them either. To 1 say that we never had any lifeguard on the deck is incorrect, very incorrect. 2 Chair McDougall: Thank you. 3 Female: I'm a lap swimmer too. I have never seen more than one lifeguard on the deck 4 except for during the summer. 5 Chair McDougall: Thank you. I'm sorry. This is not an open forum. Everybody had the 6 chance to … 7 Male: (crosstalk) address that lifeguard issue. I have personal experience. 8 Chair McDougall: I think we've had an answer. I respect Carol's answer. 9 Male: I'll say it real quick. A year and a half ago, I had a cardiac arrest in the pool, and I 10 was saved by the lifeguard on deck and the people who took care of me. Between that 11 year and a half, I went back, and I took the lifeguard training. I've been there. Never in a 12 year and a half (inaudible) not had at least one person on deck and one person in the pool. 13 I know what I'm talking about. I'm alive today because Carol did a good job, and 14 everybody did a good job. 15 Chair McDougall: Thank you. 16 Ms. LeBlanc: The City has not seen a schedule that provides that assurance that there are 17 two lifeguards. That cardiac arrest, the lifeguard that joined in to help was a Team 18 Sheeper lifeguard that was performing a swim lesson in the other pool. They were able 19 to come over and help save someone's life. 20 Vice Chair Greenfield: Has there been any kind of spot-check audit or has someone gone 21 out to the pool and checked to see if there's lifeguards? Have there been cases where 22 there haven't been sufficient lifeguards? 23 Ms. LeBlanc: We've asked Team Sheeper to do that. It was in the safety review that we 24 paid for earlier this year. 25 Vice Chair Greenfield: The third issue that Team Sheeper raised was respect? 26 Ms. LeBlanc: Yes. It's our understanding that there has not been an always respectful 27 environment created between the different groups. I really don't want this to be a 28 negative focus. We have a great opportunity to have a wonderful pool that is going to 29 meet the needs of our different pool users. We have only one lap swimming pool in the 30 City, and I know that is why there are so many concerned residents coming out to make 31 sure the pool is not degraded. That is our goal, to have a community-serving pool that 32 APPROVED Approved Minutes 32 meets the needs of all of our users and does so in a way that's safe, that's financially 1 sustainable. What we're getting is the ability to greatly expand programming, expand 2 hours at a lower cost than when we did it in-house. We have a lot of assurance that we 3 get that moving forward in this contract. Everyone who's in the pool gets to stay in the 4 pool. 5 Vice Chair Greenfield: Thank you for the extra insights. I wanted to touch base on the 6 lap swimmer hours as well. What I'm hearing from the community is in the transition to 7 Team Sheeper there was a reduction in primetime lap swim hours for the community. 8 Ms. LeBlanc: No. There was a strong concern when we initially were developing the 9 contract with Team Sheeper to make sure we did not go into a strongly shared-usage pool 10 schedule. Team Sheeper's program at Burgess has a lot more shared times so that there's 11 overlap. 12 Vice Chair Greenfield: I remember those discussions coming before the Commission in 13 the past. It sounded like the general consensus was folks prefer to have their own block 14 where they had all the lanes and they could spread out and make do. In the January 15 schedule that you put up, it looked like there were no exclusive mornings. Masters and 16 lap swimming would be sharing time every morning? 17 Ms. LeBlanc: No. Right now, the Masters have exclusive use Monday, Wednesday, 18 Friday until 8:30, I think. There's no lap swimming on Monday, Wednesday, Friday until 19 after that. Their proposal was to continue to offer the block of lap swim from 6:00—it's 20 starting at 6:00 a.m. Tuesday, Thursday when they have had exclusive use for lap swim, 21 and to offer additional lap swim hours on Monday, Wednesday, Friday that don't 22 currently exist. 23 Vice Chair Greenfield: If I'm reading this correctly, there are 14 lanes at the pool. From 24 6:00-8:00 a.m. on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Masters has half the pool, and lap swim 25 has half the pool. 26 Ms. LeBlanc: Right. That's the proposal. Exclusively used by Masters during those 27 hours. 28 Vice Chair Greenfield: Currently, it's exclusive use for Masters. This would get cut back 29 to half the pool. Do you understand the concerns raised by the lap swimmers about lack 30 of primetime slots? Is primetime morning and evening, before work and after work? 31 Ms. LeBlanc: This January schedule does have—I believe there were three evenings that 32 were open until 8:00 p.m. last January. This is two. It is something that we discussed 33 with Team Sheeper when they sent this. We would like to get back to where we were 34 offering evening hours lap swim on at least three week nights. That is their goal as well. 35 APPROVED Approved Minutes 33 In the morning, there's no rejection for lap swim. If you look at the rest of the schedule, 1 it's all additions. 2 Vice Chair Greenfield: The City does maintain ultimate control of the schedule. Even 3 with the constraints with the RFP, we can control that. 4 Chair McDougall: I'm going to try to wrap this up. Obviously, we're dealing with a very 5 scarce and very valuable resource. This is the same as the scarce resource for pickleball, 6 soccer. In the City, with the energy our citizens have, it ends up being a scarce resource 7 issue in every case, including scarce resource relative to funding. Many of these 8 problems could be solved if we had the $60 million that we need in the parks and rec area 9 for the various things we have. This is continuing to be a learning process. Some of the 10 Commissioners brought up very good points relative to the RFP process and the RFP 11 status. I am sympathetic to the fact that you reached out to everybody and reached out 12 again. We only ended up with one. In terms of the status, we understand stopping it now 13 or starting over again is not possible. There was also an issue of how much outreach and 14 transparency there was. If I had to pick on something, the transparency was probably the 15 issue. You are in a negotiation process now. I am going to be confident that, based on all 16 of the input that we received tonight and the conversations we have here, our negotiation 17 might be different than it might have been 24 hours ago. We'll see what we can do with 18 that. The discussion point tonight, the agenda item, was about the pricing. I don't know 19 that you got approval or disapproval. This was a discussion. We are not here to vote. 20 The questions we asked constitute recommendations. I don't think there was major 21 objection to the pricing structure that you were talking about. Bottom line, an issue that 22 we have that's associated with the scarce and valuable resource is trust. Somehow we've 23 broken the trust. I don't know that the Commission's in a point to do anything about that 24 except to use that word with all capital letters and say that's what I would ask the 25 community to focus on as well as staff. We have to find a way together. It can't be just 26 simply staff fix it. That doesn't work. That message of trust needs to be passed on to our 27 contractor. That's the issue that needs to be built here in some way. In terms of the 28 contract, it's a five-year contract, but the way we would manage that contract is going to 29 be a one-year contract renewable five times. Every year, we will have the opportunity as 30 a Commission to ask you to give us a status report. We can then have conversations 31 about whether that contract should be continued. In the short term, I doubt that this is 32 going to make everybody in the audience happy. Everybody should know that this has 33 been recorded tonight, number one. Everybody should know that there will be a 34 transcript of this. This isn't just hearsay that will be presented to any other staff members 35 and negotiators that might be involved in this process. It won't be hearsay that there was 36 52 people at the meeting. Sheeper will be able to see the total transcript and view this. 37 That's important. At this point, on behalf of my fellow Commissioners, I thank 38 everybody who came and presented and for the civility of the process. This is the kind of 39 democracy that is important. It's the kind of civility that's important. I thank you very 40 APPROVED Approved Minutes 34 much for attending, for spending your time. Somebody commented about spending your 1 time at night here and it's not a lot of fun. Thank you again. 2 3. Parks, Trails, Natural Open Space and Recreation Master Plan–Fiscal Year 3 2018 Accomplishments and Fiscal Year 2019 Projects 4 Chair McDougall: It's 9:00 at night. I know that you've waited this long. I'm going to 5 preempt some conversation and ask my fellow Commission members if they would go 6 along with me. I appreciate very much the fact that we've put this on the list. I 7 appreciate very much the detail that somebody has gone through. I don't know whether 8 that's you, Peter, or somebody else. It's an incredible amount of detail. I am a little 9 confused by some of the detail, particularly when I look at anticipated FY '19 results. It's 10 all in the past tense. I would find more interesting, having spent the time to go through a 11 lot of it, is turning this into a very simple dashboard. I took 1A and 1A1-1A7—because 12 it was a PDF, I had to cut and paste a bit. I put 1A1, which was periodically evaluate the 13 use of effectiveness and evaluate a fee reduction. I said that sounds like an orange or 14 something. It doesn't really sound like a red. We didn't do it at all. It doesn't sound like 15 a green as in we've accomplished it. 1A2, which is develop fees for low-cost team 16 programs, I'm not sure why I put it green since there's nothing in FY '18 17 accomplishments. When I was done with even those seven things, I had a pretty good 18 image of what I thought we'd accomplished. I also knew that if I had that, I could filter 19 this into the greens, the reds, and I could make a pretty quick presentation that didn't have 20 to go through it all. I don't know if it's reasonable or unreasonable, particularly because 21 of the time constraint that we have and the fact that you've sat here all night and had all 22 this fun listening about swimming, to suggest that that might be a more effective way and 23 to invite that for the next meeting. I'll ask my fellow Commissioners if they have 24 comments on that or if they'd like to hear the whole presentation tonight. David. 25 Commissioner Moss: The page in your report that gave us all of the things that were 26 accomplished, that's enough. There's a ton of stuff, and the City Council is not going to 27 go into the details. They just want to know that one page that has goal one and the five 28 things that were done, goal two and the five things that were done. If we just said yea or 29 nay to that list, that's what the City Council could wrap their arms around. You don't 30 really have to go much more detailed than that. 31 Vice Chair Greenfield: I'm going to take a contrary opinion. For City Council, a high-32 level executive summary approach is appropriate. This is an incredible amount of 33 detailed work, and this is very useful tracking for us as a Commission to look at and 34 useful for staff as well. It's a method of setting your north star and looking at are we 35 headed in the right direction. I do like the red/yellow/green idea. That would be helpful 36 since the information is so dense. 37 APPROVED Approved Minutes 35 Peter Jensen: Because this is the first time that we've done this, the charts, the goals, the 1 programs, the policies set in this way is valuable for the Commission and staff. It can be 2 refined. The goal for me at this meeting was to have a discussion about this thing and the 3 best way to set it up and how to talk about it and track successes and failures. What we 4 as staff would like to do, if the Commission agrees, is do this at least once a year so we 5 have an understanding of what we have accomplished and all the things we want to 6 achieve. We can discuss what time of year do we do that, at the beginning of the year 7 when you have a retreat. Like the Master Plan, it's in the early stages. This is the first 8 time we've talked about how we're using it and accomplishing things. If there's feedback, 9 as Don started to give, of how we look at this thing to better understand it, mostly for us 10 that's what we're looking at to develop this over the next few months. 11 Chair McDougall: I view this as being for you and me. If a summary of that is valuable 12 for us to present to Council or Council's awareness at some point, that's an interesting 13 outcome of it. 14 Commissioner Moss: This is perfect for the offsite every January or February, not May, 15 to plot what we want to do for the next year. 16 Vice Chair Greenfield: Could you say a little bit more about how you envision staff 17 using this document? That would be helpful for us to understand. 18 Mr. Jensen: Mainly for the process that we're going into, the capital improvement and 19 recommending future projects. This is a valuable tool for how we're going to do that and 20 what we are going to prioritize or present to the Finance Committee. We have our 21 priority projects, which are key things, we want to look at and make sure we're working 22 on. All six goals have multiple programs and projects associated with them. If we had 23 more staff, we could probably accomplish more. With the staff we have, we have to be 24 realistic about what we have, the budget we have. This allows us to see where we are 25 achieving or failing and to address those issues. 26 Commissioner Reckdahl: I love it. I thought it was very good. The only thing I didn't 27 like was on page 2. You listed the goals and all the different items that fit in that goal. It 28 would be really nice if you also did that going forward. This is like driving in the 29 rearview mirror. If you want to help this driving—like you said, it's very useful for staff. 30 It'd be nice to summarize what we plan to go forward with in each of the goals. I thought 31 it was very well done. 32 Vice Chair Greenfield: Anything else, Ryan or Jeff? 33 Commissioner LaMere: I appreciate your taking the time to put this together. 34 APPROVED Approved Minutes 36 Mr. Jensen: We're at that point in the process of the Master Plan. From staff's point of 1 view, we want to follow this thing as the roadmap it's supposed to be. This is one of the 2 ways to do that, by making sure we are doing that so we can have this open dialog and be 3 transparent about what we're doing. It's nice to have it now in this format even though 4 we may simplify it or change it a little bit. You can see them all right in front of you, 5 what they are. You don't have to search through the Master Plan. That makes it easier 6 for us to communicate what has taken place with it. 7 Commissioner Moss: I have three things to add to those. When you say the dog park, 8 you should say it's the first dog park in ten years. Second, the Los Trancos Trail 9 renovation is a big deal. It's not just maintenance; it's also redesign for the next 25 years. 10 Third, the Cubberley bleachers. 11 Mr. Jensen: There is a process that we're trying to refine because the scope of the 12 projects and programs involve multiple departments. We did our best to circulate it to 13 everyone so we could add as much information as possible. I'm hoping that we did our 14 due diligence and most staff were able to add to it. There could be accomplishments that 15 are missing. 16 Chair McDougall: I heard Keith say that he liked it. I'm sure he liked all the detail. My 17 experience with something like this is 90 percent of the value is in the preparation of it. 18 It causes introspection about what we really do. For this audience, we should also be 19 interested in the detail. Our predecessors and some of the people here were involved in 20 the details of making the Master Plan and what 1A1 was. We should care about that and 21 not just be at the level of the six goals and what are we doing. Continually trying to go 22 with all the details as opposed to turning it into a dashboard that could be easily filtered, 23 then it becomes a device for celebration or for whipping. 24 Vice Chair Greenfield: I think the word's reflection. 25 Mr. Jensen: It was valuable as a staff goal to fill this out because staff had to read all of 26 them. That refresher is a big help. Putting it together in the future, we should talk about 27 the PRC's role. Maybe we should send this to the Commission as well to look through it 28 and add things. It's mostly about refreshing the mind about what we have. We have a lot 29 of stuff here. Unless you're looking at it all the time, you could lose some of it. 30 Commissioner Moss: It should also be a useful tool for seeing what we didn't do. For 31 instance, I see a lot of things here and not many programs or new processes or teen 32 programs or things like that. It may cause us to reflect that we should have a better mix. 33 We're supposed to do this over 25 years, but we should have a mix of things. 34 Mr. Jensen: For this first year, staff wasn't overly focused on achieving the goals of the 35 Master Plan. The Master Plan has come out, and a lot of the staff weren't in the 36 APPROVED Approved Minutes 37 development of all the details. This is a good way to refresh and educate all the staff that 1 there are specific goals we want to work on. They can see what those are. That will start 2 to push forward the Master Plan. In the future, there will be more accomplishments 3 because it'll focus more on specific things. 4 Vice Chair Greenfield: I agree with that. You've elucidated the role of an aspirational 5 document. 6 Chair McDougall: I totally agree. Is it unfair to ask—it's not unfair to ask you to look 7 into whether it could be made into a dashboard and brought back in a useful way that 8 would be interesting to you and us, fully understanding that we weren't supposed to do 9 everything this year. The fact that some of these things we haven't even started is okay. 10 These could be marked green because it's still on course to be done in five years. 11 Mr. Jensen: I was excited to see that we have started to make strides on our top priority 12 projects. Because they will go on for multiple years, we've started the steps to achieve 13 them. That keeps us on course. 14 Chair McDougall: The ones that I picked to look at, I'm incredibly impressed. Maybe 15 we should end this with one more thing. This was an extremely well-done Master Plan. 16 It was useful as an example when the Comprehensive Plan was being done. This is a 17 better document in terms of being able to do what you just did. Evaluating and 18 discussing it properly in detail may be a really good example for how to use the 19 Comprehensive Plan. Anybody else want to add or have I ranted enough? Thank you, 20 Peter. Thank you for staying through the … Thank you for going to Cubberley the other 21 day—not Cubberley, the Girl Scouts building. 22 4. Cubberley Fields Seasonal Lighting Proposal 23 Chair McDougall: Good evening, Mr. Howard. 24 Adam Howard: Good evening. How is everybody? 25 Chair McDougall: Our only mistake was to tell your buddy that he should be here at 26 8:30, not 9:30. 27 Mr. Howard: I am going to get started in hopes that Natalie returns. There's a couple of 28 pictures that might be useful for all of you to see. Adam Howard, Senior Recreation 29 Manager for the City of Palo Alto. We are here today to get some feedback about the 30 seasonal lighting proposal on Cubberley's turf field and recommend a path forward. 31 When Daylight Savings Time is over, there is a high demand for athletic fields in Palo 32 Alto. The City has three lit turf fields, two at Mayfield and one at El Camino Complex. 33 Those three fields are booked heavily seven days a week until 10:00 p.m. with peak times 34 APPROVED Approved Minutes 38 being Monday through Friday 4:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. During those times, everyone 1 crunches and puts as many teams on those spaces as possible, but it's never enough. In 2 late 2017, the City of Palo Alto was approached by the Palo Alto Soccer Club with a 3 proposal to try out a temporary trial on the Cubberley synthetic field, where we would 4 bring in temporary lights to see if we could run a trial Monday through Thursday sunset 5 to 8:30. That proposal was brought to the Parks and Rec Commission January 23. With 6 feedback from this Commission, we moved forward with a trial. The proposal brought 7 forward six temporary light stations to cover the field. The lights were solar powered 8 with generators as backups. The lights would be used Monday through Thursday sunset 9 to 8:30 p.m. with a hard cut off. They actually ended practice at 8:15 so that the lights 10 were off at 8:30. All additional activity for those times would be sent through Cubberley 11 Community Center, so no pick-up or drop-off on Nelson. That additional time would be 12 used for practice only, limiting the crowds that come and the noise levels. Those lights 13 were secured and had 24/7 tech support. The lights were placed in a way that provided as 14 little impact to the track as possible. We did run the trial. Some of the output from 15 that—the trial ended up being about four weeks in duration. We had roughly 60-80 16 participants a day, so it was about 4-6 teams using those time slots. We did end up using 17 the full six light stations because with just four the middle of the field was extremely dark 18 and unusable. The solar-powered lights provided everything; the generators never kicked 19 on. The schedule of Monday through Thursday was stuck to with no reported incidents. 20 There was some minor congestion on Nelson, but that issue seemed to be quickly 21 resolved. The light stations had minimal impact on the track, but we didn't think they 22 were the best locations for full field use. During that trial, my contact information was 23 provided before, during, and after. We had one contact during the trial about Nelson, 24 which we quickly resolved. We provided a survey after to see how the neighbors felt it 25 went. We did it to the 18 residences that border the field; we gave them self-addressed, 26 stamped envelopes so they could send it back. They could also take it online. What you 27 will see are the responses from last year's trial. It may be very difficult to see. 28 Ultimately, we felt it was successful. There was one person of the people that responded 29 that felt the lights had a negative impact, and that was not so much that the light was 30 coming into their house. If they looked out towards the field, they could see it. Not a lot 31 we could do about that. That particular residence was directly in front of a tree that was 32 not very healthy. That tree did not provide as much coverage as all the other trees. That 33 tree has since done better, so that problem might be resolved. The other person that had 34 negative feelings really talked about not having enough participants setting precedent. 35 They didn't feel it was essential, which doesn't reflect on the trial itself. We are here 36 today because, with Daylight Savings coming to an end, Palo Alto Soccer has approached 37 again and would like to continue the seasonal lighting plan at Cubberley for the winter of 38 2018-2019. This would run two different periods, November 5, which is the end of 39 Daylight Savings, through December 14 and then January 7 through March 8. They 40 would actually remove the lights between that period, December 15 through January 5. 41 Because it is a longer time, we're going to focus on safety, which includes orange safety 42 APPROVED Approved Minutes 39 fencing, high-density foam to any area that we feel is exposed. We think it's important to 1 note that there were no safety concerns at the end of the last trial. We just figured the 2 extra precaution would be wise to take. During the November through December 3 timeframe, the field is used a little bit heavier for full games, so we thought better 4 locations for the lights would be appropriate. There are two lights in each endzone, 5 which is the same that we did last year. We would put the two sideline lights off the field 6 and on the other side of the track. In the pictures, you can see one is this empty dirt area 7 beside the bleachers. This would be out of the way, wouldn't get in the way of people 8 watching if there was a game, and clearly wouldn't interfere with the track or the field, 9 which we thought would be a good use of space. The other one is on the other side 10 adjacent to where we store the goals when not in use. Staff prefers this option as it 11 doesn't have any impact on the track or the field but provides the lighting for the middle 12 of the field. That was the tweak that made us feel better about the extended amount of 13 time. Really that extended amount of time is why we felt it necessary to come here 14 today. It was a little unclear when we did it whether we were just talking January 15 through March or from the end of Daylight Savings. Because we didn't feel we had a 16 clear answer, we wanted to be sure that we gave the public the opportunity to respond. 17 We have emailed the neighborhood associations and hand delivered information to the 18 neighbors surrounding the field, inviting them to this meeting and to email me directly. 19 I've only had one email response at this time, and it was pro soccer, please let them 20 continue as they did last year. That's the information I have for you. We wanted your 21 feedback. There are no speakers here to provide additional concerns. As before, if we 22 move forward, we will have all of our information out there to make sure that any 23 concerns can be addressed immediately. I'll open it up for questions or comments. 24 Commissioner McCauley: This is great, Adam. Thank you. If I understand correctly, 25 based on what you just said about the new location of the lighting stations in the middle 26 of the field, you won't have anything on the track any longer. There will be no intrusion 27 onto the track, is that right? 28 Mr. Howard: There would be no intrusion. This location right here, although I measured 29 it, it might stick out 6 inches. I don't think it will, but I want to—it should have very little 30 if any effect on the track or the field. 31 Commissioner McCauley: Is there a long-term plan either for permanent lighting or to do 32 this year after year? 33 Mr. Howard: The long-term lighting is a different conversation. If the Commission 34 wanted to address it, we could, but that hasn't been discussed. This is going to be a 35 seasonal lighting plan, which would only be in effect year after year during the time that 36 Daylight Savings Time is over. However, if this field is replaced with a brand new all-37 weather track, that could change our feelings about putting these lights out there. If this 38 APPROVED Approved Minutes 40 works, that's another option. We might not feel the same way about putting these on 1 brand new turf fields or brand new all-weather tracks. Barring the changes, this would be 2 the seasonal lighting plan moving forward. 3 Commissioner Reckdahl: When we put them down on the turf, we would put plywood 4 over the top? 5 Mr. Howard: Yeah. They were put on the turf, and there was no damage to the turf last 6 year. 7 Commissioner Reckdahl: If we had new turf, you'd be hesitant to do that? 8 Mr. Howard: The hesitancy is more about the track and driving out and back. They're 9 big, and they come out on a truck and have to be towed onto the field. There's additional 10 concerns about the wear and tear of that. I'm not saying that we would say no, but we 11 would want to re-address the conversation based on whatever changes were made out 12 there. 13 Commissioner Reckdahl: High schools have the all-weather track, and I assume 14 maintenance vehicles drive on that track. It might be worth a call to Gunn or Paly to see 15 how they handle their tracks and how careful they have to be. 16 Mr. Howard: I think that would definitely be a conversation we'd have based on 17 whatever changes occur out there. 18 Commissioner Reckdahl: These lighting units, are they the only type or are there other 19 competitors that might have smaller ones that would be easier to get on? 20 Mr. Howard: We did look for ones with smaller footprints, but they typically are more 21 generator-operated rather than solar-powered. When we last checked, which was about 22 six months ago, we didn't find any with a smaller footprint. I'm sure they're coming 23 though. 24 Commissioner Reckdahl: Just give it time. Overall, this is a good use. We have this 25 field; we have the demand. It's a good idea. It ends at 8:30, which is a very reasonable 26 time. The fact that we had all these surveys, there was only one, 1 1/2 people that 27 complained, and half of them weren't even returned suggests that they were happy with it. 28 I say go for it. 29 Commissioner LaMere: Adam, thanks for putting this together. Obviously, we have 30 need for field use and lighting. What are the other uses of the field? 31 Mr. Howard: Outside of soccer? 32 APPROVED Approved Minutes 41 Commissioner LaMere: Yeah. 1 Mr. Howard: Those are the primary permitted users because they're the priority groups 2 during this season. It does sometimes get lacrosse or ultimate frisbee. Soccer is probably 3 99 percent of the use. 4 Commissioner LaMere: What's the process—I'm not on this committee at all. In terms 5 of how field users are decided, this would seem to make that Cubberley field a very 6 coveted asset for groups to use if they know it could be lit. How do we determine that 7 Palo Alto Soccer Club has first priority use to that year-over-year and what can other 8 groups do if they were to determine they'd be interested in this field because it can be lit 9 at night during the winter? 10 Mr. Howard: The field would be brokered as it is for any other space. We look at 11 residents, priority sport, and so forth. This has actually been offered to all the clubs. 12 Because Palo Alto is footing the bill—it's basically if you're willing to pony up for some 13 of the lighting prices, then we'll broker slots to you just like we would any other field. 14 Commissioner LaMere: I understand that. This is the only field that would—have we 15 determined that there are other fields available for usage of lights? 16 Mr. Howard: This would be the only one that could house temporary lights because it's 17 turf. Grass couldn't handle the additional play. 18 Commissioner LaMere: If another group came in and wanted to put in lights, they would 19 have an opportunity to, but they would first have to have the opportunity for field use. 20 Correct? 21 Mr. Howard: Right. They'd have to be a priority group in order to even have the 22 opportunity first. The priority groups have had the offer to them. 23 Commissioner LaMere: Appreciate the outreach to the community. I may have asked 24 this before. What would it take—we need to have a turf field in order to have lighting. Is 25 that what we're determining? 26 Mr. Howard: Yeah, turf is key so it can handle the additional play. The grass really 27 wouldn't handle the extra play that would come with lighting it. 28 Chair McDougall: David. 29 Commissioner Moss: Thank you very much. Being a near neighbor, I really appreciate 30 your going the extra mile to get feedback from everybody and reacting to it. The only 31 concern I still have is I want to see the number of participants increased. Going back to 32 what Commissioner LaMere said, if Palo Alto Soccer doesn't come up with enough 33 APPROVED Approved Minutes 42 people, the other teams should be allowed to use it. If we have all of this resource and 1 only 30 or 40 kids show up, that's not good long term. It was okay for the trial, but I 2 want to see more participants. They've got plenty of time to deal with that. 3 Mr. Howard: I appreciate that. Palo Alto Soccer's addressed that, and they feel they'll 4 probably be closer to 100, which is actually quite a bit. Even 50 kids on a field for 5 practice, they are very well-organized to pull that off. They are anticipating more now 6 that they have planned for it and see it coming. 7 Chair McDougall: Jeff. 8 Vice Chair Greenfield: Thank you, Adam, for pulling this together on short notice. This 9 was an effort on your part to act quickly, particularly after a week off. We all appreciate 10 that. I agree that the peak demand for fields is evenings in the time when Daylight 11 Savings is off. The weekends, the fields are open. I'm out there, and there are open slots. 12 One other point I'd like to add. The ad hoc discussed with staff the compromised 13 timeframe, which we're permitting this seasonal lighting. Palo Alto Soccer Club had 14 actually asked to start the seasonal lights a week early. Staff reasonably articulated 15 concerns that when we did the trial initially it was a trial. We don't want to open 16 ourselves to concerns about excessive expansion of a program. The general guideline 17 that we're working with is this program would be permitted during Pacific Standard Time 18 when Daylight Savings Time is off. That puts a clear guardrail and bracketing of when 19 the program would be permissible. That's a great compromise. I do know for a fact that 20 the cars do run on the artificial track at Gunn. This weekend is homecoming, and they 21 will be out pulling the floats around. I'm sure that's a consideration when we get into a 22 study to spec out the project. We're not turning over new ground in this one. Palo Alto 23 Soccer Club is going to fill up the field with probably more people than we recommend. 24 I don't think that's a concern. Thank you very much. 25 Chair McDougall: Adam, thank you. This is an action item. An action item implies that 26 we should have a motion. The motion should be to support the Cubberley Field Seasonal 27 Lighting proposal. Do you need anything more than what I just said? 28 Mr. Howard: No, that will do it. 29 Chair McDougall: Is there … 30 Vice Chair Greenfield: I do have one question before we move. In the January to March 31 timeframe, will the lights be off the track or on the track? 32 Mr. Howard: Our ideal situation would be to leave them where this priority is. If that 33 absolutely didn't work, we would probably go back to the 50/50, but I don't foresee that 34 being a problem. 35 APPROVED Approved Minutes 43 Vice Chair Greenfield: That's something we talked about. I agree it would be great to 1 keep them off the track and particularly … 2 Mr. Howard: This is the ideal, and Palo Alto Soccer agrees to that. Because they can be 3 pointed, it shouldn't cause any additional problems. 4 Vice Chair Greenfield: Particularly as we're looking to redo the track and the turf field, 5 this sets the precedent for where the lights would be located. I'm supportive of that. I'd 6 be happy to make a motion. 7 Vice Chair Greenfield: Please. 8 MOTION 9 Vice Chair Greenfield: I'll move that we adopt the Cubberley Seasonal Lighting Plan as 10 proposed. 11 Chair McDougall: Do I have a second? 12 Commissioner Reckdahl: I second it. 13 Chair McDougall: Thank you. All in favor? Any opposed? It passes unanimously. 14 MOTION PASSES UNANIMOUSLY with Commissioner Cribbs absent 15 Chair McDougall: Adam, thank you very much. 16 Mr. Howard: Thank you. 17 Chair McDougall: Once again, looking after our scarce and valuable resources. The 18 final item is to go back to what should have been the first item and have the Department 19 Report with Daren. Thank you for being here so late, Daren. 20 [The Commission returned to Item IV.] 21 5. Other Ad Hoc Committee and Liaison Updates 22 Commissioner Reckdahl: We had our School/City Liaison Committee meeting last week. 23 Very calm, no ranting and raving by any Commissioners. The only thing that influenced 24 us was the Cubberley update. The School Board Members had a suggestion that we need 25 more outreach to high schoolers to get their input on Cubberley. That was the only 26 comment. It was pretty much the same update that we've seen from Cubberley before. 27 Also, we had the Fry's site, that North Ventura site. I'm the liaison for that for the 28 committee for the CAP. I'm not sure what CAP stands for. Comprehensive Area Plan. 29 The first one was just the icebreaker to get to know everybody. Next month we will start 30 APPROVED Approved Minutes 44 doing the real stuff. What's strange is it's all privately owned. If we want to do 1 something with Cubberley, we do it. Here, if you want to do something, you have to 2 convince the private owners to do it. I'm not sure exactly how well that's going to work. 3 The area is now from El Camino to the train tracks and from Page Mill to Lambert, which 4 runs by Boulware Park. Boulware Park is not part of it; it's right next to it. Some of the 5 people from the neighborhood were really insistent that Boulware be thought about as we 6 make these plans. We'll see. 7 Commissioner Moss: Any update about the solar panels and JLS? 8 Commissioner Reckdahl: They're still there. That's the update. 9 Commissioner Moss: I meant with other schools. 10 Commissioner Reckdahl: That's a good question. Did you ever get your … 11 Chair McDougall: There are no other schools. That was their commitment. 12 Vice Chair Greenfield: There seemed to be some question about plans that may have 13 already been approved but haven't been implemented, such as solar panels at JLS on the 14 roofs of buildings. It would be good to get some clarification on that. 15 Commissioner Reckdahl: When we were at the City Council meeting a month and a half 16 ago, they said there's nothing else in work. I think that was misleading. I think they 17 meant no new ones would be approved. They're still doing some construction, but I don't 18 think there's any more construction on open fields. They're doing some rooftop solar 19 panels. 20 Commissioner Moss: They put a ton of them in Terman and one other place. They were 21 over parking lots; I'm concerned about the open space. 22 Chair McDougall: Keith made a lot of friends with that. Doing it when we did it, there 23 was some question about urgency. It made a difference, to your question of there are no 24 more going on, if we had not acted when we did—it provided a platform for Kristen to 25 work with the School Board representative as well. It was a great outcome and 26 appreciated. I appreciate Keith and Jeff pushing that forward. That was well done on 27 their part. Anything else? 28 VII. TENTATIVE AGENDA FOR NOVEMBER 27, 2018 MEETING 29 Chair McDougall: In terms of identifying topics, I would suggest that rather going 30 through a list right now, I'll meet with Kristen and arrange a topic. Jeff is always good at 31 identifying what we need to do. He and I and Kristen will get together and do that unless 32 anybody has anything in particular. 33 APPROVED Approved Minutes 45 Commissioner Moss: (inaudible) 1 Chair McDougall: I have the Bol Park and the AT&T … 2 Commissioner Moss: Not Bol Park (inaudible). 3 Chair McDougall: Including Bol Park, we need an update on the … 4 Commissioner Moss: (inaudible) 5 Chair McDougall: Anybody else have anything they're desperate to hear about? 6 Commissioner Reckdahl: We skipped over ad hoc. 7 [The Commission returned to Item VI.5.] 8 VIII. ADJOURNMENT 9 Meeting adjourned on motion by Commissioner Reckdahl and second by Commissioner 10 Moss at 9:55 p.m. Motion passed unanimously. 11