Park Board meeting, Nov. 6, 2014

Work has started on the Exceptional Foundation expansion, but it must remain on the Foundation property until a shared-use agreement is reached with the Homewood Park Board.

To end the acrimony, but also resolve persistent issues arising from the Exceptional Foundation’s expansion, Park Board Chairman Chris Meeks tonight announced a “board-to-board” meeting next week with EF directors, and out of the public eye. The meeting, to be held Monday or Thursday of next week, will include Public Services Director Berkley Squires, Mr. Meeks, and board members Keith Stansell and Tom Walker. Mr. Meeks said he suggested the meeting when he previewed the Foundation’s latest proposed shared use agreement, and realized the board would reject it.

Conflict erupted last month when the Foundation gave the park board just two weeks to approve a substantially changed shared-use agreement on the parking lot before it started construction on a expedited timeline. The latest proposal apparently doesn’t reflect park board demands made at the time, including a Dumpster relocation. Maintaining parking spaces for the Rec Center and getting the construction finished before a March 15 basketball tournament were top priorities, Meeks said.

The park board wants a private meet up with Exceptional Foundation directors to settle conflicts over parking spaces, Dumpster location, scheduling, and other issues with the shared parking lot.

Mr. Squires explained that until the new agreement is reached, Brasfield & Gorrie has agreed to keep its construction work completely on the Foundation’s property. However, a power pole was delivered early and takes up two parking rec center spaces; 15 parking spaces are already fenced off; and other spaces are being used –temporarily–to unload supplies and equipment. Those spaces will be freed up when construction access is opened from Oxmoor Road.

Mr. Walker said the board-to-board meeting was meant to help end the acrimony over the Foundation’s expansion plans. Because fewer than a quorum of the board will be present, the assembly doesn’t meet the legal standard of a public meeting and will remain private, he said.

Members present: Chris Meeks, chairman, Becky Morton, Keith Stansell, Tom Walker, Marjorie Trimm, Tom Blake, Michael Murray, and Tyler Vail.

Members absent: Paula Smalley. Also absent was council liaison Richard Laws.

Staff present: Berkley Squires, public service director, Rusty Holley, park and recreation superintendent, Jakob Stephenson, athletic director, Dianne Rice, board secretary and her assistant Angie Montgomery.

Audience attendance: 2

Approved minutes of the Oct. 2, 2014 meeting.

Approved three 2015 events at Central Park: The board approved a March 28 5K and Fun Run to benefit Alzheimer’s Research, a June 13 “Summer Watermelon Festival” from 4-10 p.m. to benefit Alabama EDSers (people diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a connective tissue disorder causing joint damage and pain), and a 5K from 6 a.m.-noon Aug. 22 to raise funds for Impact Family Counseling, in Birmingham.

Park Board meeting, Oct. 2, 2014

The shaded area indicates excavation staging areas for a basement in this most recent plan of the Exceptional Foundation expansion. Click to enlarge.

The normally congenial park board showed another side tonight when presented with a substantially changed, enlarged and accelerated construction plan for the Exceptional Foundation. At the end of more than an hour’s debate with Brasfield & Gorrie VP Robbie Hayes –and some stern words for Foundation Director Tricia Kirk–the board agreed to let construction begin on the Oct. 13 conditioned on several substantial concessions and a rewritten shared parking agreement.

The current parking arrangement had been hastily put in writing earlier this year when the Foundation’s expansion plans were first made public. Public Services Director Berkley Squires said he wasn’t expecting construction to begin for “several years,” based on the Foundation’s previous fundraising timeline. Instead, the facility has reached its $4 million goal and is ready to move dirt. Also unexpected was the Foundation’s plan to add a basement–more than doubling the addition’s original square footage and requiring 12 Rec Center parking spaces be temporarily used for excavated dirt and construction staging. Those spaces will actually be excised from the ground and replaced and restriped by the June 3, 2015, construction deadline, according to Hayes, possibly sooner.

This plan shows the elimination of the Oxmoor Road entry. A proposed gate was removed that would have blocked park patrons using Foundation parking spots. Click to enlarge.

The Foundation’s latest plan also eliminates the controversial Oxmoor Road entryway, which satisfies some neighborhood concerns but will force more traffic through the two facilities’ shared parking area.

Officially, the Foundation’s request was made to comply with the current shared use agreement, which demands board approval before any activity requiring extraordinary parking. Parks staff and board members, however, made clear that they had been blindsided by all of the changes, which were first shown to Mr. Squires just a week ago, and to the board’s Facilities Committee on Tuesday.

Board chairman Chris Meeks and members Tom Walker and Marjorie Trimm were especially vocal, with the usually reserved Keith Stansell calling the last-minute request “irresponsible.” Neither Mr. Hayes nor Ms. Kirk was able to pinpoint when the plan had been changed so substantially, or how a building permit was acquired without notice given to the park board. “Where was the City Council?” Mr. Walker asked. To their objections were added those of neighbor Brian Thompson, who said the promised 20-foot buffer between the expansion and his house had been reduced to 10-feet, with a fence running virtually “along my property line.” Mr. Hayes, who offered on-the-spot to make several concessions that became part of the board’s final motion, did not budge on this matter, however. He also countered several complaints by offering to restore the plan’s original, and very unpopular, entry drive from Oxmoor Road.

Ultimately, the vote passed with one abstention from relatively new member Tyler Vail, who said he didn’t know enough about the plan to vote. Ms. Smalley was absent.

Among the agreed-to concessions, subject to a new shared use agreement:

• Demolish a concrete enclosure and relocate a Dumpster now in the parking lot that would jut dangerously into the new parking lot traffic pattern;
• Remove a planned gate that would have blocked rec center patron access to the new Foundation parking spaces, i.e. creating more shared spaces.
• Give the park board a two-year work guarantee on the asphalt replacement.

Among matters discussed and informally accepted:

• Better and timely communications are needed from both parties regarding special events that affect parking and traffic. Ms. Kirk repeatedly noted that the communication needed to be mutual.
• That Brasfield and Gorrie will hire, at its own expense, a third-party contractor to handle the asphalt removal and replacement.
• That the building expansion and increased square footage does not signal a planned increase in enrollment, although Ms. Kirk said enrollment will increase naturally because of longer life expectancy in the special needs client population.
• Board member Becky Morton, who also objected strenuously to the Foundation’s timing and lack of advance notice, reminded the board that the temporary loss of 12 spaces would be followed by a net gain of 14 spaces.

Members present: Chris Meeks, chairman, Becky Morton, Keith Stansell, Tom Walker, Marjorie Trimm, Tom Blake, Michael Murray, and Tyler Vail.

Members absent: Paula Smalley. Also absent was council liaison Richard Laws.

Staff present: Berkley Squires, public service director, Rusty Holley, park and recreation superintendent, Dianne Rice, board secretary, Jakob Stephenson, athletic director.

Audience attendance: 5

In other business, the park board,

Approved several events: Approved were the Cr0hn’s and Colitis Foundation Walk and the Norma Livingston Ovarian Cancer Foundation 5K, dates TBA.

Accepted the council-approved FY2014-15 budget:

Adopted were the council-approved budget of $3,899,121 for park operations, a $91,000 reduction over the board’s proposal and obtained by reducing two of three requested positions.

For capital projects, the council approved a budget of $171,122, a substantial reduction of $121,000 reached by reducing the purchase of a ball field “reel” mower, pool cover for West Homewood Park and a shade cover for the Patriot Park playground. The board’s request to design a new park entryway at the corner of Oxmoor and Central Avenue was postponed until next year, at the mayor’s request.

—Ms. Trimm left the meeting at this point.

Approved the purchase of a 2015 Dodge pickup truck: The board voted to approve a $29,300 purchase of a truck using funds from a cell tower lease previously earmarked for fleet replacement.

There being no further business, the board adjourned at shortly before 7:30 p.m.