Posted by Brandy Coscarella
on May 13, 2011, 5:37 am, in reply to "Facility Use by Outside Groups/Policy Input"
69.146.179.210
Various Email comments prior to start of this conversation:
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I am just wondering what the rental cost is for the HS auditorium is for a “for profit” group, for like plays ? Since we have the Steam Plant shouldn’t it be a comparable rental cost ?
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Sections 3 and 4 should be paying a fair market rate for the use of the facilities for non-school and non-student events. It is critical that these uses be on a paying basis as any other business. One of the main reasons, the school was not able to keep up with maintenance was the excessive use with no funds to cover in the past.
A case in point is the use of the new auditorium as opposed to the SteamPlant. The fees for the auditorium must be competitive with the Steamplant. The adult sports in the gym must also be adequately covered. The same format will be required for the proposed outdoor sports field. As it is rented for non Salida events, the necessary fee should be charged.
While the proper and necessary fee may upset a few organizations, the tax payers who have questions on maintaining the facilities will be impressed.
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I wanted to reply more directly to your concerns. I fully agree with your statement in principal. A major contributing factor in the deteriortion of our present facilities, has been the indiscriminant use by outside entities over several years. The lack of policy and rule enforcement has allowed for a destructive culture to develop. Notwithstanding the need to alter our fee structure to be more in line with incurred costs, more importantly, I believe we need to change the way we make people responsible users of our facilities. We need some teeth in our “Facilities Use Agreement”, that will cause users to be accountable. We have an opportunity to more practically do this with the new High School Facility, but it will still require a cultural change in attitudes.
We will have opportunities to discuss and alter the fee structure to be more realistic, but I hope that we will not need to put any undue strain on youth organizations, that we see as development opportunities for the kids. After all, that’s what all this is about, growing our kids.
Let’s keep the dialog flowing, this is good.
Thanks
Walt
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Please follow the dialog below. These were responses to previous questions, that may help, or may prompt further questions. As you’ll see we are constructing a Web Page discussion format on our School Web Page, that will be like a blog, where everyone will have access to Q&As as they occur. I hope you’ll take advantage of this once it’s set-up, and continue to post your comments and concerns.
Thanks
Walt
Thank you for your inquiry. Your question is a valid concern. Part of the issue as I’m sure you’ll see in the current fee structure which Brandy has sent you, is that there is no distinction between Non-Profit and For-Profit users. This categorization seems poorly defined to me. If a community organization, that is basically a non-profit operation, is looking to earn profits for the purpose of continuing the funding of their organization, should we consider them a for-profit group? Clearly, on the other hand, if an individual wants to utilize our facilities for purely commercial purposes, that should be easy to calculate, and I think our current fees and policies do not adequately address such use. I believe we may need to redraw the fee structure to more frankly define the differences. This then becomes a subject for discussion, and I would hope you would add your thoughts and ideas into this discussion.
Thanks for submitting these questions, All I can do if offer a response based on my opinion, and at the same time tell you that nothing is written in stone. All of these point warrant further discussion.
My thoughts on the 49 persons rule, is that in the Field House and in Held Auditorium, we are currently under a Fire Watch Order by the State Division of Fire and Safety, which requires that whenever there are in excess of 49 persons in the specific facility, we must have a person, (actually the rule reads two persons) observing the area for fire. My thought was that setting that number to require a Custodian, helps meet that requirement in the near future. This seemed like a reasonable occupancy level for the requirement in the new facilities as well, if for no other reason than to keep-up with bathroom supply demands and the potential for custodial type problems.
The 9:30 rule, is driven by the working schedule of our night custodial staff. I would like to put the onus of locking-up and securing the building on them, but they need a reasonable shift time also. If activities run later than their normal working hours and they incur overtime to accommodate any group, then I think the associated cost should be transferred to that group. That being said, we may consider pushing back the shift ending time, but I don’t want to do that for any one group, or any occasional reason. This is a coordination issue with the custodial staff, that should involve them and their input, which I have yet to solicit.
Please continue to offer your thoughts and suggestions. I have asked Brandy to get together with Jeff our computer guru, and set-up a blog type page in our existing Web Page, where we can post a ongoing dialog of Q&As, so that everyone can see these and respond if they want. This may help generate helpful input. It may also invite some critical input, but that may be alright too. Brandy will be sending out a prompt to get on this ,what I would call a Blog, soon. I will post comments , questions and responses there, that have been placed to date, but will not post any names, without permission. This may help to stimulate the discussion. It is my hope to garner as much input as possible prior to any decisions being made, so that those decisions are reflective of the overall consensus.
Thanks
Walt
The last item on the list of talking points to be discussed is: With only minor adjustments, the Facilities Use Fee Structure as Adopted 11/13/79, and amended 02/09/10, will remain in place. Base fees may need to be adjusted to compensate for a prorated repair and replacement cost, TBD. The TBD is “To BE Determined”, which means it is only in the discussion phase at this time. The New and Improved Facilities Use Agreement and Fee Structure, as I see it, is more about the protection and preservation of the facilities, and that will account for the greatest overall cost savings in the long run. We don’t need to try and suck more money out of youth activities if we can cut costs through simply taking better care of what we have. This is probably more of a change in culture than in pricing. With that said, in some instances, especially where there is a commercial profit from the activity, we have not charged enough, and I think we should be more realistic, and in-line with other local facilities. But then that’s just my opinion, and that’s why we need to have more discussions.
Please feel free to continue to bring forth your concerns and ideas. That’s how we’ll get to a better place.
Thanks
Walt
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