For 10s of silence. A scheduled meeting of the Maple Grove Parks and Recreation Board. Tonight is Thursday, August 20th, and we are convening at 7 p.m.. I would ask everybody to stand so we can share the Pledge of Allegiance.
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. I will note for the record, that all board members are present at the dais this evening. Our City Council liaison, Rochelle Johnson, is absent. She did provide prior notice of that. I have no public comments this evening.
So we’re going to move directly to two pieces of special. Oh, can I have a yes. Thank you John I appreciate that. That’s why we have a vice chairman. Pardon me I will. Yeah. Chuck, are there any I want to go back to the agenda and get approval. There’s any additions or corrections? No changes.
All right. Thank you. I have a motion on the agenda. Please move to approve. Second. I have a motion from Vice Chairman Ferm. A second from board Member Mielke to approve the agenda as distributed any discussion on the motion itself. Hearing none. All in favor say aye. Aye, aye. Opposed. Motion passes. Thanks again. John.
Let’s move on. We have two items for special business tonight. The first one we’re going to entertain is regarding a miracle fields proposal. And we welcome, um, Ben, are you going to be introducing I think. And then we’ll chuck first and then Ben and Mr. Adelson, thank you for being here tonight.
I’ll turn it over to Mr. Stifter. Well, we’ll keep this short. Gary, please come on up. Gary Adelson is, uh, contact me. Uh, probably six weeks ago, maybe to talk about the possibility of a miracle field. Um, we would like to hear his proposal.
I’ve asked him to prepare a presentation so that the board understands, uh, what this is all about. And, uh, there’s no action tonight. This is just informational and discussion. Maybe some feedback for for Mr. Elston and staff on, uh, if you have some direction for us. Very good. Thank you. And welcome, Gary. Thank you. Thank you. Um, about, uh, 18 years ago, I was introduced.
To the concept of Miracle League by Harmon Killebrew, who was a good friend of mine. Um, at that time, my wife and I were not in a financial position to be able to participate, but we are now, um, the Miracle League concept is an absolutely phenomenal, phenomenal concept.
It’s, um, kids who up to this point have only been able to watch their brothers and sisters play ball and they’ve never been able to participate. A miracle League is a specially designed baseball field. Um, designed for kids with physical, cognitive or emotional disabilities.
It’s a cement surface, artificial turf, wheelchair accessible, walker accessible, etc.. Um, I’ve seen there are three. There are 15 of these fields in the state of Minnesota, and I’ve asked drew to join me tonight. Drew built this. His field in Prior Lake is the most recent one in Minnesota. So you’ll be able to answer particular questions that you may have about costs.
ET cetera. On the miracle field, um, I’ve seen videos of fields all across the country and the kids who are participating. Their eyeballs are the size of grapefruits. They are just so excited to be able to participate on it.
And one of the really motivating things for us as well, is that part and parcel to the Miracle League concept is a buddy system. So every one of these disabled kids has a non-disabled buddy that helps them participate in the in the game, pushes their wheelchair, helps them feel the ball. Um, it’s just phenomenal. And these kids become lifelong friends, which is absolutely fabulous.
And I think about with all it’s going on in the world today, what wonderful lessons that we are sharing then with these kids, both the disabled kids and the non-disabled kids. Um, I think it’s it couldn’t be any better. So my wife and I are very, very excited to participate.
We’re going to donate $100,000 to building this field and committed to to make additional contributions in the future so that when ten years from now, 12 years from now, 15 years from now, when the artificial turf needs to be replaced, will have already had the money set aside so that they don’t need to then hunt to
try to get the funds. Um, I don’t think I’ve been this excited about anything in a long, long time. Um, my wife and I are 78 years old. We have an autistic, um, nephew that lives here in Maple Grove, which is one of the reasons why we like Maple Grove.
We had previously been to Decent Fields to watch our other nephew play ball, and is just a phenomenal complex. And the whole concept behind, um, well, let me say, just as we do in schools, when we have, uh, learning disabled kids, where we try to integrate them in the general classroom, that’s what the miracle field is all about
as well. You don’t want to stand alone, field off on its own. You want it in being part of the general complex so that they feel part of the part of the general complex.
So Gleason is just ideal for that with the, um, a playground with the, uh, restrooms, with a concession stand, with the other fields. They’re part of the general complex, which is absolutely phenomenal. So with that, I want to introduce drew, who built the field in Prior Lake. He has a presentation to present to you. And then feel free to ask specific questions or general questions, because you will be able to answer all of those for you. All right.
Mr. chair, do you need to understand that your presentation isn’t on here? All right. What we did was we modified it as best we could for our Maple Grove situation. So if you want to just tell your story, there’s a few slides in here that might relate to general things.
But the prior Lake presentation didn’t fit our needs study. All right. Um, well, he did a pretty good intro of what the Miracle League field is. So let me back up. Drew Koenig, Prior Lake. In fact, it was, uh, four years ago this month where I started my initiative to get a miracle League in Prior Lake.
My daughter special needs. We would play in the Lakeville field, which was the closest to our lived, was about ten miles away. And for years I’m like, why does Prior Lake not have one? Why doesn’t every community have one of these? And so I was director of travel baseball for my son.
He aged into high school. And when that ten year ended, I went to my athletic association and I had the plan all laid out and said, I want to bring a miracle League program to play equivalent to the Maple Grove Association. And that was the start.
And then a month later, I was in the prior Lake chambers laying out saying, hey, will you let me, this private citizen, rip up $300,000 slot of land and put this Miracle League field here? And here’s why. Um, and so that process started and it took for me, uh, we, to make it happen on the timetable that I wanted.
It was still a little longer than I wanted it. Uh, we had grass routed all of the funds. We didn’t ask for any taxpayer dollars other than ripping up the park or the section of the park where we put it. Uh, but put a team together. Rosa took us.
It took us about two and a half years to get the half million. We broke ground in 2024. We opened last fall, and we just wrapped up our summer season. And our fall season starts here on September 5th. We’ll run through October. Um, and had a great time.
In fact, we had a little our rotary had a, uh, event barbecue out there last night. Um, so it’s community field. So the presentation and what I’m getting into is more of the business side of it. I can go on for hours. I’ll try to keep it to 15 minutes on the Miracle League and the the benefits it has, but really, it’s the why, right? The.
So what? So when you look at the school districts and I believe this is, um, this might be prior lakes, but it’s, it’s comparable to most communities in the Twin Cities. Is that when you think about special needs kids, it’s it’s not one specific characteristic, right? It’s a broad spectrum.
And we have a broad spectrum of athletes, over 100 athletes in the last year from full wheelchair ventilators to, uh, significant emotional problems. Basically any kids and adults. We had a 58 year old play on our league.
Unfortunately, he passed away this spring, but he, um, sorry, the the the point of the what this field provides is an opportunity for the kids that can’t participate in quote unquote, normal sports in a way that it’s safe, it’s controlled, it’s secure.
The facilities are secure, the facilities are safe, and it’s and it’s it’s not competitive per se, but it makes them look forward to something to come out and just have something to do. Right. And when I went, um, when the kids leave, what I want to hear is, you know. You know, that’s my field. So when you look at these numbers we have, I don’t know if you can see the slides that I can’t believe.
So we have physically impaired, hearing impaired, visually impaired learning disabilities, autism, deaf and blind cognitive disabilities, significant motor autism spectrums, and so on and so forth. There is really is no limit to, uh, no categories. Say, do you want to play here? The answer is always yes. We will make it work out. We’ll make it fit.
And the buddy system and the buddy partnership, and what the buddy system is, is the we talk about the buddies, but really every Miracle League game, this kind of comes from Miracle League corporate is that every game we try to have a 1 to 1 buddy.
So every player is not out in the field without a, um, teen or adult supervisor or a buddy. So no players out there by themselves. That’s for the safety, engagement, making relationships, making contacts. Sometimes it’s the parents, sometimes it’s the siblings. Most of the time it’s volunteers within the community.
And for us, the majority of it is our 12 up and up sports athletes 12 year olds, 13 or 14 year olds, high school sports. Our Junior Optimist Club was a is a huge supporter of us as well as a we have a group called the Unified Club Prior Lake High School, which focuses on the special needs at the high school level.
They come out and do those types of things for the buddy to be buddies out there for every game. In addition to our rotary, our Lions Clubs, local businesses, big businesses, um, you know, target hormonal UnitedHealthCare, a lot of these big organizations have volunteer opportunities through their companies.
And so we reach out to them and say, hey, come on down here, bring some swag, bring some t shirts, bring some, you know, make it an event. You want to cook some hot dogs for your game? Great. You want to bring balloons and ice cream for, you know, it’s an event and that’s every game is is an event.
Uh, miracle League locations. Um. Right. So if you can see the picture on the top is actually where we built our field. That’s the old satellite photo. There was a practice field. We had ripped that up.
And now that sits the Miracle League, sits there at Thomas Ryan Park, which looks very similar to Gleason Fields large. Our larger baseball fields for our older kids. And it sits off into the corner next to the concession stand, uh, right near the restrooms. Gleason. And so in the Gleason Field location, we can talk about that. So we could have Ben walk through. Some of these. Site modifications.
So, okay, so if there’s nothing else here. So one other thing that I can talk about is that the, you know, the process, um, so the field is what we have is the fields are enclosed. It’s a community field, but we control the access to it.
One of the things that I’m going to do now that I have one year under my belt of running the program, is it’s a community field. And he Gary touched on it. Is that next year or this winter? Um, not only the veterans clubs, but in Prior Lake.
And I’m sure in a lot of communities there’s a lot of memory care units, elder care units that are going up. If you think about it, that demographic in our society have the same challenges as the special needs community mobility, getting outside, something to do.
So during the day, I am proposing to build, you know, we call the Miracle League for the kids. Um, something I tagged as I want to create a Legends League and go out to these organizations to go, hey, do you want to bust out some of your residents and come out here and use the field kickball, T-ball? Just go out for walks, walk around.
Who can play, who cannot get them outside? Another extension to use this ability. This this controlled field that they’re not going to go to some dusty ball field to do this, but they can go into a nice turf enclosed field with bleachers and benches and everything that we get a sound system, get some
music turned on and, you know, have a good afternoon, good morning, things like that. So that’s that’s another extension that we’re going to do for our field. Um, which is I think no other field that I’ve talked to is attempting to do that.
But once we get going, obviously we’ll share and other communities I think we’ll find a benefit from it. If I can, is that tell me. Um. Drew told me that one of the things that, as he was just saying is that he’s going to make these fields available to disabled veterans, and it’s just fabulous, absolutely fabulous.
There are three there are over 350 of these fields across North America, Canada, Mexico, Puerto Rico, serving 450,000 kids. Okay, this isn’t a small group of people, okay? It’s just fabulous. And and again, I, I did you share that the video of the of the theme song. Oh please do please do. Um, the the eyeballs are this big.
When these kids get a chance to participate, um, and the feelings of the parents, um, that they now have an opportunity to participate. Um, Edina has got a buddy system for another kind of program. You said it’s all volunteers, and the volunteer list fills up in 15 minutes. Okay.
The starting quarterback of the high school football team is one of the buddies. Okay? These kids want to participate. And it isn’t just a participation during the during the game. It’s after the game, too. Okay? These kids become friends, lifelong friends.
And I mean, it’s just it’s such a positive environment that I can’t describe how good everybody who participates in it and gives an opportunity to, uh, feels about it. I haven’t I haven’t heard one negative comment from anybody to which is really, um, probably pretty rare. Okay. All right.
And, um, to be able to do this and, um, I’m fortunate to be in a position to be able to help contribute. Um, this is I can’t think of a better place for our charitable dollars than to do something like this. So we’re really excited about it. And one last context stat for the 350 fields in the country. Like, well, there’s 350 fields in the country.
I’m looking at the I think that’s Gleason Fields up there. There’s four baseball fields there in Pryor Lake within a five minute drive, two miles within where I put my field. There are 16 baseball fields. They’re more baseball fields than two miles of my field, than Miracle League fields in the state.
People build parks. How many baseball fields? And that’s how many pickleball courts worry about the soccer field. Nobody talks about where’s the adaptive playground? Where’s the American League field going to go? These kids need something because there’s not a lot of programs outside of this that focus specifically on adaptive kids in a way that
every single one of them can participate. That’s what we do. Thank you. Mr. Chair. If I could add a few things, um, to this, as the board, you know, begins to think about, uh, and, and way this information, we did have our, um, intern, Aiden, uh, measure out and drop a few locations at Gleason Weaver and
the Maple Grove Middle School just to show how the miracle field might fit at each site. Um, you can see in this image, this is, uh, proposed the first proposal for Gleason Fields where it fits. Just, um, adjacent to the concession stand and west of field one. Um, fits in there nicely.
Would require some, um, rerouting of trails, but, um, that area of Gleason fields has been graded already, so it would fit in there quite nicely, I think, um, we’d have to do a little bit more research on sight lines, sunset, you know, and when the field would be used and which way to orient the field, um, and its final
location. This is another option. Um, having it, you know, home plate face towards the, uh, northeast. Again, a little bit of trail rerouting, but would fit in that sort of main lawn quite well. I know, uh, Mr.
Edelstein had mentioned in the past one of the constraints for the miracle field was wanting it to be, um, somewhat close to parking. So there wasn’t a great distance between, um, where somebody might get dropped off and where they have to go. Um, so keeping that in mind, this orientation works out quite well. Um, gets it away from concessions a little bit.
Um, and probably lessens the, the foul ball proximity to other field and other play happening. Um, this is a little bit closer to that sledding hill. Um, this would have to be studied a little more detail as well.
Um, not sure of the angles of how the sleds and tubes come down the hill, but we would want to, um, face it in a way that wouldn’t affect that winter usage of the hill. But this also fits quite nicely in this location as well. Um, this is, uh, between the pickleball courts and sledding hill at Gleason. Um, we do have a location at the junior high.
There’s a, um, small backstop and kickball field just north of the school. Um, one of the benefits to this location is the school does use that field for their gym classes currently. Um, but have issues with, like, the kids getting dirty and muddy if it’s rained recently.
And so this could be an added benefit to that and it would fit in that location without affecting the soccer and lacrosse and football fields at the middle school as well. Um, and then lastly, we did look at possible location at, um, Weaver Lake. Uh, this is the one location that would, um, likely eliminate one of our existing fields there.
Um, but the usage is less that Weaver Lake than it used to be. Since we’ve opened up Gleason, um, each of these sites, uh, because we are, we’re basically final graded already and would have just a little bit of trail rerouting. Um, we believe it would cost around $500,000 total. Um, Mr.
Adelson has graciously, um, uh, is wanting to donate $100,000 of that. I believe the, um, the remaining cost could come from the Park development Fund. Is that correct? Yeah. So, um, just as the board is weighing that, weighing these locations, weighing this project, um, that’s kind of the backstory.
There might be additional funding available from the Rotary and Lions as well. Anything else from staff? All right, drew, thank you Gary, thank you. What I’d like to do is open this up to the board for reactions, questions or comments. Uh, I’ll start with board member Hansen.
First off, I just love the passion that you both have for this. Um, I was a Special Olympics coach here in Maple Grove. I did bowling and floor hockey, and so we did have adaptive stuff for that.
Um, and I know that here, and I don’t know what fields are used because I know that Omega they do have, you know, softball and baseball teams for their Special Olympics, but I don’t know what kind of if, if it’s if you’re just talking for like that, this would be for adaptive kids primarily because I don’t know that we have anything like that here in Maple Grove or even what, um, the Special Olympics groups does for folks that have some
adaptive issues. So I’m really excited about it. I am wondering, though, I mean, I’m guessing, of course, the maintenance of these things would fall to our parks teams to do that.
Um, and I know you talk about volunteers, but you know, along with the Omega program and Special Olympics, you know, they have a whole organization that kind of manages and has volunteers and stuff. And so if you could tell me a little bit more about that, because I, I would hope that it wouldn’t fall necessarily on us needing like additional staffing to like, manage any of that program.
When I spoke to Andy, the Osceola Maple Grove. Athletic Association, um, this would just be another league under his umbrella. So okay, same way that all the that the fields now get maintained, it would be a similar kind of structure. And um, and it was like that’s no big deal. Okay.
So he’s just really on board and and and he obviously understands the concept. He’s a special ed instructor. So he understands the integration and why that’s so important. Um, so yeah, that um, all of those kinds of things are fair questions to ask.
Um, but, uh, we had sort of addressed that upfront to find out because quite frankly, you can build a field, but if you don’t have somebody to be able to run it right, it becomes a it can become an issue. So Andy was right on board with that. To be able to do that, uh, to begin with. So that was that was really cool. Okay.
Great. Let me piggyback on that, because I think your question also is the physical maintenance of the property. Not yes, not not the program. I mean, the program support. Well, it would be on our property. So I’m guessing that that’s that just would come under our purview.
Yeah. And I obviously I my city had a lot of questions around, you know, what do we have to do. And you’re just going to build it and walk away.
At the end of the day, when you look at the Miracle League field, it’s it’s steel, concrete and rubber. Uh, so the maintenance, you know, by itself is very, very low. You’re not mowing it, you’re not watering it. Um, it’s it’s a leaf blower and some brooms. Okay. Basically, um, funny story.
We had a baseball team used the field outside of my knowledge and didn’t see the sign or have common sense that they shouldn’t be eating sunflower seeds on the turf that went out there. And so, um, went to the association, and they team showed up with shot vacs and vacuums. We got some extension cords out there and we vacuumed the field. So that was, you know, a an early funny story.
But, you know, at the end of the day, uh, the, you know, if it’s built properly, water runs off. It’s okay. You can go turf or rubber. But so this would be part of an association essentially. Yes. Okay. Perfect. Modeled after how we did it in Prior Lake.
We’re under our play. And then I’m the director of the athletic program and registrations and scheduling and all that. I think. it’s exciting. Shared this with with a number of parents in the association and uh, without exception, all of them are just really, really excited about this.
Um, is is there a young woman in either your department or the city named Autumn? Uh, not that I’m familiar with. Okay. Um, I my I brought my daughter up to the recent fields on Wednesday. She’s in town from New York, so I wanted to show her what we were thinking of doing. And we were talking about the miracle field.
And this young woman comes up and said, are you involved in Miracle Field? And. And we said, yes. We’re so excited about it. I mean, the the enthusiasm across the board has just been wonderfully rewarding.
I want to I got to tell you that when I came, when I went back home, I said to my wife, that was about as wonderful response as I could possibly get. What just made my day. Okay, um, that’s the kind of of excitement, I think, that we have all the time with this kind of project. Um, and so, um, I hope you share in that enthusiasm. I go to board member Mielke.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you. Gentlemen, I appreciate the presentation. Um, I love the concept as well. I echo Judy’s comments about your passion for it. That’s, uh, to be commended.
My son has helped out with, um, hockey in a similar vein, and I think the the buddy system is a great idea as well. You know, the buddy’s probably, in the long run, probably get more out of it maybe than the the players themselves, which is a wonderful thing. Obviously, there’s a lot of details to be worked out in terms of operations and, and specifics.
Um, we’ve got a great staff that, uh, that, you know, can hopefully figure that out. But I love the concept in general. And, and would be supportive. So thank you guys. Thank you. Uh, one more thing if I could. Sorry. I also like the idea of integrating it with other fields.
I think that was a great point you guys made in that, you know, it helps with exclusive inclusivity, making them feel special. They’re they’re another player just like anybody else. And that feeling. And so um, I think that’s an important concept to not lose sight of.
I got involved in special education when my, uh, my son was, I think 5 or 6 was diagnosed with a learning disability. Um, and, um, special ed has come a long way over the 45 years since he was first diagnosed. But back then, um, it was the kids were put down, you know, an LD was lazy and and, um, and dumb. Okay.
And so there was this, uh, horrible, um, connotation of that. Okay. And so when we first started to have special needs kids and special classes, um, uh, then we had some parents who thought it wasn’t fair that the special needs kids were getting special treatment because their kids weren’t special needs. Okay.
Um, and I remember having, um, a parent teacher conference, um, and I explained to the parents who were complaining because they thought their kids should get special treatment even though they were disabled.
Um, I said if you were at a restaurant, um, and, um, two booths down, somebody was having a heart attack and there was a doctor in the restaurant, and he gave that person CPR to save his life. Would you say that it’s not fair that he didn’t give it to you, to you didn’t need it. Okay? That person did. Okay. That’s what fair means is providing what is appropriate for the circumstance. And this kind of field is exactly that for these young kids and for the older kids to as well.
Any other comments from the board before I put a couple of thoughts in front of where this could go, vice chairman firm. Um. I. Appreciate again is everyone I said your passion and dedication to this entire thing.
Um, this is something that we have a lot of parks and a lot of activities, and this is something I think that we’ve missed along the way to an extent. I’m not saying completely, as we do our playgrounds and things, we’re very cognizant of, you know, the needs of the handicapped and the accessibility and things like that.
Um, I’d have to say, I think it’s a fantastic idea. Finding the right spot for it, I think is, is a challenge. But I think you’ve come up with some good, good options for that and something that we should further investigate. I, I’m all in favor of going forward on something like this.
Um, I think it’s something that makes everybody a part of the community. And I just really think, uh, it’s important that we do things of this sort in our system. Uh, my biggest concern on the whole thing. And Ben made the comment that he thought could do it for about $500,000.
I’m a little leery that, um, our costs with the price of as we build everything that we build in this park system, um, that we’re going to be a little shy on what we need, but that’s something that we can figure out down the road. But but I just want to say that I’m definitely, um, on board and in favor of something of this sort.
By the way, I spoke to Special Olympics. They were ecstatic about, uh, because my concern was this field is smaller than a normal, uh, little league field. It’s 115 to 125ft from pole plate to center field.
And so I wanted to make sure that Special Olympics, if that field would be okay, they were ecstatic about being able to use it. So. I remember sorry. Dear. I think everybody’s comments are right on. I think what you’re doing is amazing. I’m on board 100% for this.
Um, it’s one of the things that everyone needs and they need to be treated fairly and openly and welcoming. And I think that’s one of the things that our parks do is we welcome everyone, no matter what their needs are. So I think this is a great addition to what we can add to what our park system is already. And thank you for everything you’re doing.
I love your comment in having a way to make this accessible to other people during the day. Seniors and things like that. Such a simple idea and um, I think they’d have a great time. My aunt has basketball tournaments and she’s 91 years old and she’s in her wheelchair and she’s got her crown on because she hits the most baskets.
So I think it’s a wonderful idea. Thank you very much. Um, are you considering still seeking out additional sponsorships or. I’m actually talking to a number of people right now. Okay. Um, part of me, I needed to get, I guess, to the first step is that everybody liked it and wanted to do it.
Um, so that when I tell people, here’s what we’re going to do, um, and, um, and they’re on board, um, I have no idea that the time frame you guys will tell me what that is.
I know when our first visit with Chuck, he said, well, when would you like this, bill? And I said, well, I’m 78 years old. Okay. I got this bill yesterday. Okay? I want to be able to enjoy watching these kids play. My wife and I live in Minnetonka, so we’re 15 minutes away.
Um, and so, um, as soon as we can do this, um, I would certainly appreciate it, but, um, that will help me then be able to tell people when the monies are going to be due. Okay. Um, it’s not they’re not going to write a check tomorrow because you don’t have it yet. But when when they do, then I’ll be able to do that.
And so my goal is to raise as much of these funds as as I can, and I will. Okay. Um, um, my wife Barbara, and I, as I said, uh, going to contribute $100,000 up front.
We’re going to commit to at least $25,000 a year for the next 10 to 12 years, so that there’s enough monies to replace the artificial turf when it needs to be replaced. So we’re not, um, Minnetonka just had to replace its turf, and they had a hard time trying to find the funds to do it. Okay. So I learned from that. Um, we learned as well from that, uh, that program.
Um, uh, Ben was commenting the the parking lot will go right up to the field, so they’ll literally be able to drop the kids off right at the field. They’re not walking a block and a half from the parking lot to get to the field.
Um, those are the kinds of things that that I’ve been thinking about from the very beginning to want to do this. And, um, was just, um, thrown back by the Gleason Field complex to begin with. Uh, to, to be, uh, have that be, uh, there is like, okay, here it is. All right.
Um, and so it’s it was fabulous. And, um, my kids, um, were all excited to hear about this. I’ve played baseball most of my life. Uh, I played for almost 55 years. Um, most of the Hall of Fame, a lot of the Hall of Fame ballplayers are friends of mine.
Okay, I as I said, I was introduced by Harmon Killebrew to this 18 years ago. Um, Harmon and I are good friends. We’re good friends. Um, and, um, so to be able to, um, now be in a position to be able to do this is exciting for us as well.
And it it honors my friend, um, which makes me feel good as well. Well, I will dogpile on the appreciation that everybody has. I do want to summarize, I think so that you’re aware of where this might likely be going so that you don’t wonder what’s what’s next.
And for staff as well, there’s some things to figure. Tonight was informational and educational. That was the purpose for tonight. Some things to figure out. They’ve been discussed. The financial piece, the involvement with the Baseball Association, Omega, the ongoing operational plan. Gary, I echo your comments. It’s one thing to have it. It’s another thing to care for it.
And then finally location, location, location and figuring that out. Uh, we’ve said Gleason a number of times. I think we saw some other options. I don’t know that we have landed on it.
It’s too early, but my encouragement is for Ben and Chuck and whoever else on staff would be the right people to have involved to continue working with Gary and Drew and or others. I will have a guard against Mr. Stifter and Ben have extremely limited bandwidth. In many ways. It might take a while. It won’t. We won’t be getting shovels out. Tomorrow, is the comment. But you can count on them to be bringing a lot of expertise.
There’s not much in this community. They haven’t personally touched by way of development and design, so will count on that. But I am making sure that we’re guarding your bandwidth on what you’re able to do and not do, and to put that on the record. So things to figure out.
This is not a yellow light. This is very much a green light. We’d like to see more and we’d like to have some things to look at for approvals when the timing is right.
One of the things that that will be my goal now, in the short term, is to raise as much of this half $1 million fund as I can so that the concern about man with et cetera becomes less of an issue when it’s pre funded. Yeah okay. We like that. Yeah. Yeah. Why not. Well it makes it easier. It just makes it easier. With all kidding aside it makes it easier. So. All right anything else from the board? Anything else Gary Drew.
Anybody else on this topic? Very good. Thank you both for being here. Much appreciated. Great cause. All right. We’ll move on to our next item under Special Business. Alexis, we are so glad you are here. Just thrilled. And I see you brought along your sidekick, your mom page with you.
And we’re just really delighted to have an opportunity to hear from you on this exciting idea you have. So a welcome. And the floor is yours. Tell us what you want to do here and some of the things you have to show us. Yes. Okay. Um, hi, I’m Alexis, um, I’m a girl scout, and I’m working on my silver award project.
Um, so the silver award is all about leadership, and it’s doing something. Talk right into that microphone. We want to make sure to get it recorded for you. And it’s doing something sustainable for your, um, the community. Um, that addresses a root issue. It’s not.
It’s like doing something new, um, not participating or volunteering and something that already exists. Um, so the issue that I want to address is that playgrounds, um, are more focused for the kids. So it’s really easy for the adults to go sit down and just, like, supervise the kids while the kids, like, go and play alone.
And that’s where you lose that, like child to guardian interaction. That’s really, um, important for building connections. Um, so for my project, I’d like to propose the idea of adding interactive signs to the Central Park. Um, we really like Park and Gleason Fields Park playgrounds. Um, the purpose of these signs would be to encourage that interactive engagement. Um.
Yes. Okay, so these are the signs that we were thinking to put at Weaver Park. Um, sorry. Um, one of the examples is Escape the Climb, where I know it might change, but, um, it has that big, like, spiderweb thing, so it could be something a game or activity, like, um,
the lava is rising and the adult could be, like, trying to tag the kid as the lava is rising, or a spider or Bigfoot or something fun and creative like that. Um, for that. And then for central. Um, so central has that really big, um, hill. So step it up is using, utilizing that.
Um, so it’s like, uh, how many ways can you get from the top to the bottom or bottom to the top? And it’s like, which way was fastest? Shortest? Um, was like, which way was the most fun? Just like fun activities like that.
Um, for each and then another one for central was airplane adventure. So central has like that sand area that could be viewed as like a rocky desert, like, so you could buckle in and fly to that destination, or a splash pad could be like an ocean or water. Um, and then the playground structures could be like a jungle.
And just like, fly and have an adventure at each of the areas. Um, and then for Gleason, um, the rubber kind of has like the blue, like water and then like the grass kind of as the rubber.
Um, so it’s just like, pretend the, uh, lose the water and then, like, what else can you turn the, um, green into, like, grass, lava, fun things like that. Um, and, like, how can you move through the park and get across without falling in? Um, we would want the signs. The signs would be 18 by 24, and they’d be, like, more eye level to, like, younger kids. Um, so like 30in off the ground ish.
Um, they’d be similar to like, the road signs or, um, like the new e-bike signs that have been putting. Oh, sorry, that, um, have been starting to be put in at other parks to. So my goal is to encourage that, um, interactive engagement, um, play learning and connection between kids and their guardians or caregivers.
And then for funding, I’ve raised um, $800, um, from cookie sales and just other Girl Scout activities like that. Um, and when I talked to Ben and Amy, we had estimated each time to be $100. Yeah. Um, so and then we’d have like, three signs at each of the parks.
So 900, um, dollars, and we would cover all of it, um, with funds, um, and then another big part of this project. Is the sustainability. So for the sustainability, there would be a QR code on the signs.
And, um, uh, the parents could scan that, and then it could also be like there would also be a web page on the Maple Grove Parks and Recreations web page. Um, that leads to more games like, um, there could be like car games, games to play at the beach, like, um, I-Spy, Simon Says or other like creative games that I could come up with that we could put on that page so you could play these games beyond the park or
like other parks you go to, or at a friend’s house, just other ways to, um, put this into, like other play areas. Um, and then for spreading awareness, um, both my mom and I could talk to our friends, um, so we could talk to them to spread
the word, and they could spread the word to other families who have younger kids. Um, and then the it would be on the Maple Grove parks, um, web page. Um, and they could hopefully also spread awareness through that. That’s all. Wow.
If you’re not busy tomorrow, you could do a presentation for me. I have to do somewhere that was really well done. Uh, reactions from the board. Uh, yeah. I’ll go to, uh, board member Siri first. I did daycare for years, 35 years, long time. I love this. Anytime you can bring imagination into the world of adults is great.
Kids have great imaginations and they need to keep us reminded that what’s going to keep us young is using that imagination. Like, you’ve got. So good job, girl. Thank you, thank you. Uh, board member Conley. I agree with what Deb said, and I love your imagination. How you came up with this is amazing.
And anytime you can get kids to interact when they’re at the playground, besides, just the equipment I think is awesome. We Deb and I do a lot of the playground equipment in the city, and we, I say all the time like they can play hot lava on this. So I love what you have designed. Thank you. That’s awesome. Vice chairman.
I’m gonna echo the sentiment that they’ve already provided, but I’m very impressed with you as a person and the way you presented tonight. And, um, I’m all on board on this. And the fact that you’ve raised the bulk of the funds already, um, you should really be commended for that.
And your mother should be very proud of you. So thank you very much for. Tonight. Thank you. Uh, board member Alvey. Well, thank you, a great idea. Awesome project. I mean, I won’t repeat everything everybody else said, but, you know, great work. You did a great job presenting. I know it’s nerve.
It’s hard to stand up in front of people. You don’t even know what you’re on TV to. So? So I’ll tell you that now that you’re done. Great job. Thank you. Board member Hansen. What kind of what Deb said earlier. Ditto, ditto, ditto across the board.
Um, I already told you how impressed with you I am because I really begged for my daughter to get her silver award, and because I was her Girl Scout leader. And I told her the benefits of it. We talked about that out in the hall. She never went through with it.
So I’m super excited and I want to adopt you. Um, but you know what? What I love is you really understand. Kids. I have a grandson that’s five. The hot lava thing. Oh, that is just such a thing. The other thing that I love is. You’re right.
I go to these parks, and a lot of, you know, parents that aren’t grandparents. I mean, I play with my grandson because he makes me, um, but a lot of them, you know, they are just kind of sitting on their phones and just, you know, they’re there isn’t that interaction. And it’s actually kind of bugged me a little.
So I’m super impressed. I love your designs. I love your ideas. I love your ideas beyond this, other than just the signs, everything you thought about, even that the sign should be lower so the kids could see it. Um, okay, I know I’m going on and on. I’m gushing, but thank you. Yes. Thank you.
Thanks, Judy. Board member Mielke. Yes. Well done. Uh, amongst everything else that everyone else said, I’m very impressed that you were able to weave in and have some understanding of sustainability as well. Yeah. Very impressive. Yeah. Um, but, no, it’s a great idea. I hope your mom gets the ice cream or something on the way home.
Yeah. At least, um, a couple comments from my point of view. I mean this sincerely. You’re very poised young lady and very clever with the imagery you put together. And I guess I’m cool because I know what the show floor is. Lava or hot lava is.
And, uh, you touched all of our buttons. I just want you to know that you did a fantastic job. Do we know who? Um, who Alexis would work with moving forward here? Would who would would it be with you, Amy, or who would that be? Yeah.
And I can just share a little bit more about kind of the next step. So it’s kind of a collaboration with myself with the kind of the, the programming part, social work with my team. As far as getting the website all on, we’ll get the design work and get the signs ordered.
And then obviously working with Ben’s team to really install those and make sure we’re getting a, um, a quality sign product and then they’ll really work with on the exact location of where we can, where we can, um, install these. So with that, um, Alexis is working towards a goal. She does have kind of a timeline.
So we really would like to install these and get these ordered. We’re really close to the design. Um, we’re going to add some QR codes basically on those. And we should be good to go.
So we would like to start installing these in September if um, if we, if everyone’s in agreement on that and then, um, I know and Alexa also shared kind of there’s a next step. So this is there’s one more um, metal or no. Yes. Yeah. There’s above the silverware. There’s the gold award, which is like the next step of making it more. National. National. Yeah. So I’ve already I, you know, I fell in love with her too.
And she gave our presentation. So I’m already thinking I’m going to go do a conference, uh, thing and have her come in and show other people, whether it’s the Minnesota Rec and Park Association, how they can do this in their park. So maybe we can get her closer to that next level.
So, um, so that’s kind of our next step. And again, we’ve enjoyed working with Alexis and looking forward to this, this project. We need a formal action. Are you guys good with just taking it? I don’t think we. Need it. I don’t think so either. Thank you. The formal action I would give is congratulations.
You did a wonderful job, Paige. We know you’re proud. We do. And so I can count on one hand, in 30 some years, a number of times we’ve applauded somebody. And that was really, really a well-earned. We’re proud of you. You should be proud of yourself. Thank you. Thank you. Alexis. You’re proud of you. Thank you.
You’re welcome. I don’t know where to go next. That was just so much fun. Okay. Alexis, you’re welcome to stay for the rest of our meeting. It’s really. It’s not as much fun as what you just took us, but this is real good ice cream.
This is recorded so you’ll be able to watch this on, uh, through CC and media. Yeah, that’d be awesome. Yeah. I want to tell her beforehand. This is on TV. Oh. No. Sometimes I have to remind the other board members that were on TV as well. But thank. You, thank you.
Yeah, thank you very much. All right. Boy, that was that was special. That was fun. All right, I’ll go on to our reports. We’ll begin to my far left with board member reports tonight with board member Mielke. Nothing tonight, Mister chair. Thank you. Andy. Board member Hansen. I have nothing to report. Thank you. Board member.
Nothing tonight. Thank you. Thanks, Ken. Um, I had a chance to, uh, along with Chuck. As I mentioned during the work session, uh, be part of the cookout. That it’s been Chuck’s idea for a number of years.
And I want to thank also a board member, Selby, and board member Hansen, for showing up. Um, I know others of you have attended in past years, and this was another great year of just good camaraderie, a vibe, and just a nice chance to show some appreciation to the people who do all all the heavy lifting in our organization. In your organization.
But for Chuck and for Angie, Amy and Ben, I know how proud you are of your teams and it shows during an event like that. It really was a nice, nice morning. Nice afternoon. Uh, that’s all I had vice chairman for. Nothing this evening. Thanks, John. Board member. Siri.
I just have one thing. When she gets the sign up. I’d like to challenge all the park board members to come and play at the park. I think I’m busy, But now that would be fun and let her know we’re doing that. Yeah, I’m busy. Anything else? Deb? That’s all. Thank you. That’s good. Uh, board member Conley.
Nothing for me. Thanks, Krista. We’ll move on to, uh. We had nothing from Councilmember Johnson. She will be with us next Thursday during that joint session with the council. Uh, we’ll move on to, uh, staff reports. And we’ll start with the director’s report, Mr. Stifter. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Uh, board members. Um, yeah.
So, regarding the joint work session with council, this is to discuss committee center phase two. Um, that is again scheduled for next Thursday, the 27th at 530. That’ll be down in the EOC. Um, so if you can join us. Uh, if you don’t mind, just send me another note about your availability.
Um, and, uh, we’ll make sure that we get that in line. Secondly, um, in a recent email to you, we talked about the Weaver Lake, uh, plant master planning work. Um, the request is out there for a few volunteers from the park Board. Council. We’ll have a staff team there.
Uh, from not only Parks and Recreation, but some other departments. PD. Um, engineering, uh, water resources. Some of those folks available. Um, possibly bringing some residents in. Uh, but at this point, um, uh, looking for a volunteers, uh, board member Hanson has offered to participate, which is great. Uh, board member Mielke, as has said that he’s available.
I don’t know if that was a full commitment, but he said that he wouldn’t mind being involved. Uh. Council member staff has shown some interest. So, um, we’re getting close. If you want to add more than two board members. I think that’s probably okay.
If there’s a high level of interest. Um, but just let me know, and I can work through that. So, um, that process and Ben is working on that, uh, RFP is are accepted to, uh, through September 9th, I believe.
Uh, then we’ll do an internal review of those, likely make a recommendation of who would move forward for interviews and then have those interviews, whether we do that with a full committee or just a subcommittee, if you will. That hasn’t been decided yet. But, um, that would happen in early October. Likely.
And, uh, hopefully we can get them on board and get some of the community engagement already going yet this fall. This is not on a fast track. You know that. You know that the funding has not been, uh, established for this project. Um, but we know there’s a high need, and we want to get this process, and we want to do it justice by making sure that the community is involved.
And because it’s going to be another beautiful, uh, facility in our operation. It’s a wonderful, wonderful site, um, to work with, uh, very unique. So it’ll be a lot of fun. That’s all I have. Thank you. Questions or reactions for Mr. Stifter. Board member.
Chuck, I have a quick question for the overall master plan. I mean, comprehensive plan is the park section of that just going to be part of the city process? And we’ll work with that when that part comes along. I know that’s not we’ve related, but. I’m sorry. Um, yeah, that’s a good question.
The, uh, process with that is we are really trying to be, uh, integral with the city’s comprehensive plan. So we’ll have a park and recreation section in that plan. Per requirements by, um, Matt Council. We’ve always done that. Um, we still are looking to have a standalone plan. Um, like we always have. So.
But we will work with one consultant to do all of that stuff so that these things are real. That was my question. So last ten years ago, we had a standalone plan and we were part of the the city plan. And we’re going to do the same thing. We didn’t always have the same consultant. We understand we had a separate consultant.
Right. Yep. So this this time we’re going to have one. That makes sense to me. I just I just want to know what the possible synergies I would think. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Thank you. Thanks, Ken. Other reactions or questions for Mr. Stifter? Very good. Thanks, Chuck. Move on to the assistant directors report. Miss Peterson, Amy Flowers.
Great. All right. Good evening. Chair Lewis. Board members. All right. Um, on to the report here. Oops. Okay, well, our fall registration opened this week, and it was kind of fun to run some reports and just kind of see the stats.
Um, for the same time period of our first week of registration from 25 compared to 26. And, um, was pleased to see that we’re at 20/2400 registered people registered as of the eight on the 18th. Um, compared about 1847, in 25. So it was kind of nice to see that we have really good momentum. Um, I think board chair, um, Lewis mentioned this at the picnic.
Um, some of our staff were sharing about the senior registration day and our senior trips by far, um, off the charts on, on the first day of registration.
So, um, huge congratulations to Kara Anderson, who really puts a lot of work into coordinating those trips and just the different, diverse trips that she’s been offering. I think there’s a lot of, um, a lot of fun interests. And again, constantly changing those trips around a, um, retains the retain, um, participants. So great job with that.
And then a big thanks just to the entire team of all the planning that goes into the programming, all the, um, getting it up online and then, um, creating those brochures. So just the whole admin team, um, just want to thank them for their, for their work on that as well.
Um, and then I wanted to share with you on Monday, I um, along with Commander Purpura, I, um, presented to the council on some, um, ordinance amendments for our motorized wheels, devices and in our park regulations. So specifically about e-bikes, e-scooters. Um, and, um, Segways. Um, so we basically really looked at updating the code to align with the Minnesota Current Minnesota Statutes.
Um, I shared with you, I believe, at the last park board meeting that we were finding some contradictions, and I from that meeting, I really took that. You guys were all in favor of having us really follow what state statute is to make everything more cohesive. Um, so we really looked at that, um, we clarified where we devices could operate. We really talked about improving education enforcement. Um, addressing that repeated unsafe operation.
Um, and then we one thing that I really wanted to do was kind of still maintain some city authority where we could, um, restrict devices and designated park areas by park policy or sign.
So we still have that ability if we want the new skate park to be non-motorized, everything we can do that by either park sign or park policy. So that is in the in the new policy, in the new um, ordinance.
Um, so I just kind of went over this already, but basically there’s two sections within the park section of ordinance that were changed, section 2221, which really just identified the definition of the e-bike, the motorized foot scooter, scooters. And then we also updated the definition of a pathway, because that is, um, one of the words that the state statute uses. Um, so those really all just link back to Minnesota state statutes definition.
Um, and then section 22 to 2025, um, that was um, some language about where we prohibit things. And so that is where we added some language on what is permitted, what’s not permitted, and then how we have the ability to have park signage or policy.
Um, and then what the police department have been working, um, really, really closely with them on this. And they really, um, we’re focusing on how do we get some more education out. Um, and then also, how do we maybe enforce this a little bit more within the community and educate, um, residents about the safety concerns that these e-bikes and e-scooters have, especially with juveniles.
So, um, one piece of section 32 dash four when we’re talking about motorized wheels devices, we did put in an enforcement policy for um, for PD to follow. And basically it is if if it’s again, it’s focused on juveniles.
So if we have a juvenile that’s not meeting, um, requirement of our state law, our state statute or our current ordinance. Um, they would receive, um, uh, a letter at home would go out and kind of explaining, you know, your child violated this ordinance. And then, um, well, first we’re going to be doing a lot of education.
But if they don’t follow that, we would send them a letter. And then if the juvenile has a second, um, violation within 12 months, that does give the authority for the police department to cite the, um, parent or guardian of that child, if it is, um, if, if, if they haven’t been taking any, any way to prevent this for the future
violations. Um, the other thing that also is in there is that, um, we can impound, um, it might go in order, but it also could be something if they are being very unsafe, reckless, it can be impounded on that first violation as well. Um, so that’s kind of the the work that the PD is doing.
Um, it was supported and we work really closely with city prosecutor, our attorney, um, um, and making things clear so we do can enforce them. And that it follows with falls within our, um, jurisdiction, jurisdiction to do so. Um, I mentioned that we’re doing a lot of education outreach.
So again, partnering with the, um, PD, we’re doing we’ve done things in the community newsletters. We’re doing the CCI videos. And you’ll continue to see some of this. Um, we’ve updated some of that trail signage. Um, we’re working on a collaborative on doing a bike rodeo and really talking about e-bikes.
Um, we’re working with the schools, especially with back to School and giving them a flyer that they can hand out at their back to school nights again, continuing our social media. Um, and, and additional outreaches that we can do at different city events and things.
Um, the one thing we really are working on, and we’ve worked on a lot since this last board meeting, was really updating our website to have, um, a lot more details. And we added some tables and things like that. And really, we’re going to start now that this ordinance has passed. Um, putting on there a little bit more education about the enforcement as well.
Um, but we did um, we are working towards an FAQ kind of page, and these are just examples, but where we can really kind of have the try and make the rules easy for parents to understand. If I do this, what then? So we’re going to work on working together.
What are the things we’re seeing and what are the questions we’re getting. And kind of make an FAQ on that web page as well. That has not been done yet, but that is in the works. Um, so those are just some of our efforts towards education. Um, and I do have, um, the official ordinance, um, that we changed that was approved.
Um, that I will email out to you guys, but so you can have the formal language. Um, but that was kind of overview of what? Really what was, um, got changed. So any questions on on that? Vice chairman firm. Uh, Amy. You, um, address the enforcement process and, yes, with the juveniles.
I’m just curious, what is the adult penalties or problem or situations with. That if it was an adult? Yes. Yeah. Interesting. Because that, um, we had that question asked after the council or. Yeah, after council meeting by a resident. And, you know, they are, um, they’re, they’re adults, so they can be cited.
But what like right away if they’re not following a rule? Um, what happens with the juveniles are really struggling with. They can’t do a lot with juveniles. So this is a way that they can then cite the parents. So if you are, um, riding recklessly or not following or state statute, you could be cited for not following. That because there’s plenty of that going on out there.
I’m just I’m just with adults as well as the juveniles. But when you’re cited, are you find or are they they impounding adults vehicles or what. What is the situation.
Well I think it again it depends on on the situation and what the I guess we’ll say the crime is on um on what the severity is. So, um, if you’re riding a modal as an adult, which you can, but you’re not licensed to or your or your emoto is not licensed, um, you might get a ticket. You might it might get impounded. I’m not quite sure about how they decide that, but, um, but they have at least the authority to.
They’ll probably have more detail about how they how it gets written on when they do what. But thank you. Yeah. Other questions or reactions for Amy? Board member Hanson. Just a reaction. I’m really excited to see this going forward.
I’ve just seen such an increase in young kids, you know, just going down the roads and even into people’s yards on some of these bikes. And then, you know, with the path behind my house. So and I think those are going to be hard to enforce just because they’re the paths are internal.
But, um, really glad to see this going forward so that officers have that tool and tools that they can do to maybe slow these things down because it’s it’s dangerous for the kids and for other people. So I’m, I’m excited to see this go forward. Remember Mielke.? Amy, I like the approach of of education as a first step. Um, you can’t educate everybody.
You’re not going to do a rollout every month or something. As new residents move in or something, but you start there, you get it out there. You’re referencing. It may change, you know, but but you’re educating them. And then from there you escalate. So I appreciate that approach. Yeah.
Thanks, Andy. Anyone else? Amy, is there anything else that you want to report on? Um, I’m sure there is. There is a couple other things here. So, um, we do have a few events. We just, um, had National Night Out, um, which they had the large picnic at Central Park on August 4th.
Um, that was a big success. Um, so that was wonderful. We had the triathlon this weekend at Weaver Lake. Um, we do have Rock in the Grove coming up September 19th at Central Park. There’s a new event, um, the remembrance Remembrance gathering that is being hosted by the friends of the Angel. And it is open to the public.
And they’re doing that at the Arboretum on September 19th at 10 a.m.. And then we have our Maple Grove Oktoberfest coming up at Central Park on September 26th.
Um, and then I just wanted to, um, also mention that we had on the consent number five here, we had two items that we were awarded a Hennepin County grant. Um, one was a youth activities grant for um teen arts programming, and the other one was a Hennepin County play. I was called a playground grant. I think it’s play activity. Play area. Thank you. Play area. Grant. Um, for $300,000.
Um, um, and I’m going to give credit that was authored by Lisa Geiger, and that was for our indoor, um, play structure, the the toddler play structure for in the new community center. And then giving credit to Krystal Anderson for offering the teen art programming. So we are very excited.
And again, we thank Hennepin County, these um, it’s great that they have these opportunities for us to apply and be able to provide programming and facilities for our, um, for our youth. And that is what I have for you tonight. For Member Hanson. I’m glad that you mentioned those. Um, but I think there was one other grant, too.
There was the Hennepin County Youth Activities grants for the teens, art programming. So. Oh, yeah. Um, very. I just yeah, I was really excited about all of these grants that you were able to get. So congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. So we’re gonna. I’m going to lift that consent so we can clarify.
About that. So we had just yeah for clarification, we had two grants from Hennepin County, one for $5,000 for arts programming, um, in the teens and then one for 300,000 for the um, playground at in the Aquatics Center. Yeah. Yes.
We appreciate Hennepin County, and we thank them for their wisdom in giving it to us. We’ll make good use of it. Other reactions or questions for Miss Peterson? Very good. Thank you. Amy. All right. Thank you. You bet. Let’s move on to the parks and Planning superintendent report. Ben. Floor is yours. Uh, thank you, Mr. Chair.
Board members, just a few updates for you tonight. Um, the the concrete steps over West Fish Lake. Um, were poured last week. Um, I think I mentioned when the board approved this. We do have, um, this sort of gap here where we’re waiting for the rail to be manufactured, and then that’ll be installed on the on the NE wall ramp there.
Um, on the opposite side of that, uh, the picture on your right, you can see the groove. That’s the bike groove that was designed for people to be able to wheel their bikes up and down. So, um, I’m expecting the rail to be done. Um, in the first half of September and installed.
And then our contractor will come back, sort of regrade the area back up to the steps. It’s a little low right now. We put the straw in just to protect, um, from erosion. But, um, that’ll be cleaned up and finished up once the rails installed.
Um, we have two playground replacements for this year, Eagle Nest and Bayless. Um, park staff will be going out towards the end of next week to start removals at both of those sites. And then, um, uh, the installer will be on site the week of, uh, Labor Day to start those installs, and we’re expecting to be done mid to end of September on those.
So keep the board posted as we go through that process. I did have the opportunity to, um, tour and attend the ribbon cutting at the new elementary school, um, Aspen Ridge. Um, really cool facility. This picture looks like a rendering, but it’s an actual picture of the of the school.
I mean, it just looks great. Um, inside and out. We have a a gym that the actual Maple Grove Basketball Association partnered with the school district on, um, to make basically two gyms double the size of what they originally planning. Um, the picture on the right, there’s just of the lunchroom in the school.
Um, really, really cool design elements there. Um, this is the current state of our soccer fields just outside. This is standing on the south side of the field, looking towards the east. That’s the soccer field on the right with the lights.
Um, they’re finishing up grading and trying to sort of make a push to get most of it done before school starts. So I’m thinking final. I can see the irrigation mains are in. Um, so they’ll be pushing for that and to get things seated before there’s too much traffic on the site, buttons not working.
Um, you can see the AG line on the infield is in, the fencing is up again, waiting on the on the seating until the weather changes a little bit. Dugouts turned out really nice.
They’re just a little bit oversized, which is what we’re hearing from our user groups, that they like them to be a little bit bigger so they can store all their equipment and have enough room to move around. Um, so those turned out nice. The restroom building still in in progress. But when I was there actually this morning, there were still about a dozen people working on it.
So I’m thinking that can they can make a lot of progress here in the next few weeks. And that as well. And that’s all I have for you tonight. Very good. Thanks, Ben. Questions, reactions for Ben board member Mielke. And I don’t want to overlook it by any means. It probably goes without saying, but the the fish Lake stairs look pretty amazing. Uh, yeah.
Our contractor did a nice job with the poor, so. Yeah. Yeah. Hats off to to you, the contractor and the whole team. I mean, that looks very impressive. I’ll be excited to see when that railing gets put in and grass gets grown up and all that. And nice job. Thank you.
I was going to mention with the Fish Lake stairs, there might be at that landing, the first little switch back there, a spot for a couple of benches, possibly as an overlook. Right. You probably had that in mind or something to it.
It turned out really nice, but that I didn’t envision that as being a space where we might be able to do that. Yeah. Mister chair, director Stifter and I were talking about how we could attach some sort of bench to that knee wall, or some sort of pad to sit on. I think we could do some pretty nice there. So we agreed. We agree. Good. Violet. That’s great. Vice chairman firm.
I just want to point out that I think it’s quite it’s duplicate, but it’s kind of cool if you go down a few slides to right before Angie’s and the picture of the community center and the way we use the beams in front is like trees and whatnot.
And if you go back to the school and you notice they did the exact same thing, uh. Similar. Similar, similar, um, a little more crooked and twisted, more like an aspen tree would be. But I think that’s a compliment to our building. Yeah. The biggest form of flattery, isn’t it, to be copied. Yeah. Other reactions for men. We’re good. Thanks. Matthew.
Move on to the community center manager report. Miss Dean. Angie flowers. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Board members, uh, just a few things for. You today, so I’m not sure I want to fast.
Um, how much you frequent our website? Um, but we’re semi limited just by the scope of our website on what we can do. And I tasked our, um, our membership coordinator, Alejandro Mendoza, is the one that does our website.
I asked him to try to create some new calendars for our, like, open gym pool times, open skate so that when most people are accessing this by mobile and it’s very small and it’s hard to see and it’s hard to differentiate what all of the things are.
So, um, probably hard for you guys to see everything, but like open gym, everything is color coded per what’s going on? So is it volleyball? Is it basketball? Is it hot time? Is it pickleball? Um, everything has a different color. Um, same with open skate. It would be if there’s open hockey or dead ice or, um, just a youth stick and puck eventually. And then the pool is a lot. Um, but it kind of just is letting everyone know when lap swimming is open, which is one schedule that people look for.
Uh, when the pool and the water or the water slide and the spray features are going to be on. Um, so something to kind of check out. It’s I, I think it’s got it to a really great place.
Um, it’s easy for staff to kind of manipulate the calendars if things were to change and keep those up to date for people. And then, um, moving to the arena, um, arena supervisor James Backus just wrote an article for rink magazine that goes to a lot of the different rinks and rink supervisors about the arena project. Um, has a bunch of pictures in it.
Great little article just about our project and it coming to fruition. And then inside the arena. TCO um, this is what TCO look like about a week and a half, like a week ago, actually, exactly a week ago, um, they got the boards up in
less than a week. They got the glass up. And, um, you can see the kind of glass there. Then we had to lay a sheet of ice or at least a layer of ice, and then they painted the ice. So that’s what you kind of see in the right picture there.
And then on Sunday, this was actually Monday. But Sunday technically, um, we opened the ice for skating and there was, um, hockey out there on Sunday night. We had, um, figure skating back in there on Monday morning. We have had camps all week.
It is already being put to full use, so that’s very exciting to see. There’s still some a few things of getting signs back up and cleaned and some other, um, areas that we’re working on rubber. You might see there’s some spaces of rubber.
There is rubber all the way around that you can walk around, but there’s just some area in gaps that we need to fix. Um, upcoming events. There’s hockey tournament this weekend. Um, on Labor Day, our facility is open 10 to 6. And then that also brings us to the last day of our indoor outdoor pool season and life of those.
And then we’ve got Taste of Maple Grove on September 12th, and I believe the dance team already has signups for that on our website. If you wanted to get tickets to that and then September 17th, we have the senior monthly, um, meetup is what I have for you today. Reactions. Questions for Angie. Thank you. Very good. Thanks, Angie.
Let’s move on to consent business tonight. Are there any items that a board member would like to lift for discussion? I’d like to lift item I. Any other items? Very good. I’m lifting item I because there’s a need to clarify the amount. Uh, Amy mentioned this earlier in her report. I think in our packet it reflects $6,000.
Is that the correct amount or what do we need to. Yep. Um, in the report I had an error. I had wrote $6,000 that we’d receive for the grant, and it was actually 5000. Well, that the minutes in record reflect that. Okay. Thank you. Any other items the board would like to live for? Discussion.
Very good. I’ll take a motion on the. I’ll actually make the motion I move that we approve consent business with the adjustment to item I regarding the teen r programming that it is actually $5,000 a second please. Second. I made the motion. I have a second from board member Harvey. Any discussion on the motion itself? Hearing none.
All in favor say aye. Aye aye. Opposed. Motion passes. We have no old business this evening, so we’ll move directly to new business. We have one item. This is regarding the rotate. The rotary pollinator garden. Phase two at Central Park. Ben. Thank you. Thank you, Mister chair. Uh, a couple months ago, Mr.
Anderson from the rotary, um, addressed the board and was looking for support for multiple projects. One of those was a continuation to phase two of the pollinator garden at Central Park.
As a reminder, phase one was completed, um, last year, um, with dollars from the rotary, we planted a 800 square foot display garden, some prairie areas. We made some footpaths in between, added irrigation, and sort of earmarked a few other areas and a master plan, um, for a future phases. Um, the rotary then applied for a grant from their regional or national partners for $15,000 to sort of move on to this next phase of the planting.
Um, so with that 15,000, they want to plant another 800, 800 square foot, um, display garden. It’s the hot sun display garden on the master plan, which I’ll bring up sort of this north. Um, north facing display garden. Um, they have about $10,000 earmarked for planting. Um, another 5000 for some, um, educational signage.
And to install that. Um, and then I think they also mentioned, um, potentially a peace pole that they would purchase and go into that site as well. What they’re asking from the park board, um, is a commitment to pay for the, uh, planting plan in the design from Heidi’s Grow house for about $1,500.
There are some additional, um, work that park maintenance staff would perform to support this, mainly in, um, peeling back the the turf and the grass that’s in that area, doing a little bit of soil amendments. We do already have irrigation in that area as well.
Um, so the, the impact on park staff would be pretty minimal. So really it’s um, staff is recommending the board approve the expenditure of $1,500 for the design. Any questions or reactions for Ben on this item? I’ll take a motion, please. Move to approve an expenditure of approximately $1,500 for final planting design services associated with phase two of the Central Park Rotary Pollinator Garden. Second.
I have a motion from board member Mielke, a second from Vice Chairman firm. This is to approve the expenditure of $1,500 for design services related to the next phase of the pollinator garden. Any discussion on the motion itself? Hearing none. All in favor say aye. Aye aye. Opposed.
Motion passes. I’ll take one last motion on the evening, please. Move to adjourn. Second. I have a motion from board member. A second from board member Hansen to adjourn any discussion on the motion itself. Why, yes, I do have an item. I have appreciation for staff in the board for all of your preparations for tonight.
There’s a lot of information to go through from our work session. And certainly even this evening we had two. I’ll call them citizens coming forward to do some pretty nifty things for our community.
And I think that part of it is the pedigree of what our staff does day in and day out, what you like to work with, and the positive attitudes you bring to it, as well as how do we get it done, attitude you bring to it. I have appreciation for that. I also have appreciation for the board and your preparations to come to these meetings. Ready to go.
Very seldom is there a question that’s asked that is naive. You’ve been informed. You’ve taken time to prepare yourself for it. So I appreciation for that. Any other discussion on the adjourn motion hearing? None. All in favor, say aye. Aye aye. Opposed. Motion passes. We are