Based on the context provided and the dialogue within the transcript, here is the formatted version with speaker names identified. **Speakers:** * **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Councilmember and Chair of the Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee. * **Eric Carlson:** Parks and Recreation Director. * **Randy:** Committee Member (identified at 22:20). * **Mark:** Committee Member / Secretary / Incoming Interim Chair (identified at 59:00). * **Craig:** Committee Member / Incoming Interim Secretary (identified at 23:14). * **Jess:** Committee Member (identified at 1:03:17). * **Jim:** Golf Course Representative (identified as staff by Eric at 49:17). * **Kayla:** Recreation Manager (staff member mentioned at 5:34, speaking on aquatic details). * **Audience Member:** Residents participating in the meeting. *** [0:59] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** All right, uh, welcome everyone. We're going to call the November 21st, 2024, Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee meeting to order. Uh, first order of business is if everyone can stand and join us in the Pledge of Allegiance. [1:13] **All:** 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. [1:35] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Great, again, welcome everyone. Good evening. Uh, first item on the—or second item on the agenda is uh, approval of the agenda and uh, do we have some edits or changes, additions? [1:45] **Eric Carlson:** Yep. Madam Chair, members of the committee, we would suggest that you add one item to the agenda and that's to accept the resignation of your Chair, Lisa Hiebert, because she was elected to the—the uh, Apple Valley City Council in the most recent election. And so the committee should uh, ex—well, I—I think the committee should accept her resignation um, and then have a conversation about how you want to handle um, the—the job of chairing the meetings um, moving forward. So I would suggest that gets added to the agenda. [2:21] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** All right, we want to put—be—a motion? Uh, I think we would then put that uh, item E to accept my resignation. [2:27] **Randy:** Make a motion to accept Lisa's resignation. [2:33] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** I'm sorry, I'm sorry, to add it to the agenda. We still get to talk about it later. Add it to the agenda to accept my resignation. [2:40] **Mark:** I second the addition. [2:43] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** There's a motion and a second to um, make a change to the agenda to accept my—my resignation. That feels really weird, sorry. Uh, um, all those in favor signal by saying aye. [3:00] **All:** Aye. [3:02] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Those opposed? All right, that carries. Um, I think though we still have to technically then approve the agenda. [3:08] **Mark:** Make a motion to approve the agenda as amended. [3:12] **Craig:** Second. [3:14] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Second. A motion and second to approve the uh, amended agenda. Um, all those in favor signal by saying aye. [3:22] **All:** Aye. [3:24] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Those opposed? All right, we have an amended agenda. Thank you, everyone. Uh, next item on the agenda is our audience participation, and love seeing a couple faces out there, so again, welcome and thanks for joining us, and those online watching us as well. But um, this is the opportunity for anybody to come forward, speak on anything that is not on the agenda. Any questions, comments, concerns, ideas, holiday recipes? I don't—things like that. So um, seeing none, all right, we will just move right along the agenda. So item number four is the approval of the October 2024 minutes. Um, it's been in our packet. Has everybody—everybody has had a chance to review them? Um, you know, for Eric and staff and committee, was there any edits, changes? I'm going to keep my mouth shut. Um, all right, with that, um, I'll entertain a motion. [4:30] **Mark:** Move to approve and accept the October 24 minutes. [4:33] **Jess:** Second. [4:35] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** All right, there is a motion and a second to approve the October 22, 2024 minutes. Um, all those in favor signal by saying aye. [4:38] **All:** Aye. [4:40] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Those opposed? All right, we have minutes approved from October 2024. Onto our agenda items. The first item is to uh, hopefully hear about and approve our Parks Amenity Plan with Eric. Welcome, Eric. [4:43] **Eric Carlson:** All right, Madam Chair, member of the committee. Um, so we're here to talk about the parks plan. I think the committee's well aware that we've been going through a process for a number of months now to try to figure out exactly what we're going to do in some of our parks based on the parks referendum... [Eric presents technical details of the plan and classifications]. [18:32] **Craig:** Hey Eric, real quick on that last slide. Um, one thing about the um, replanting of—of trees with diverse species. As the city does that, um, through my work we volunteer with Tree Trust and it makes for a really good event. Whether or not it's with Tree Trust, it would be good to see if that's a—a way that we can get the community involved through tree plant—tree planting events like at Earth Day, um, or you know, I know you can plant kind of spring or fall, but that feels like a—a good community involvement thing. [19:15] **Eric Carlson:** Okay, awesome. Thank you. Uh, moving along here... [Eric discusses dog waste stations and next steps]. [21:01] **Randy:** I went through all the comments that came in—Social Feedback, Social Pinpoint, whatever—today. And absent taking out the comments that were made specifically about a single park, the most common comment that was there was people saying, "Nice work, you listened to us, you made the changes that—that our neighborhood recommended." There were comments—it was sprinkled all over with those kind of comments, which confirms the good job that I think the city has done in listening to people's feedback. The number of meetings you've had, the number of opportunities you've had for people to help direct this project—it's—it's—it's not insane, but it's overwhelming. You guys have done one heck of a job and doing your best—your damnedest—to listen to what people wanted, and that's reflected in the amenity plan that's before us today. So nice work. [22:15] **Mark:** You're never going to have everybody be happy. That's just a given. So I mean, I think this is an excellent plan, and I—I agree with—with Randy. I guess you guys did a great job of sorting through all this and coming up with this, and hopefully this will all be able to fit in the budget. I do suppose you thought about that a little bit? [22:30] **Eric Carlson:** A little bit. Okay, good. I have a couple spreadsheets on that thought. [22:35] **Randy:** My—my only comment is uh, a meeting or two ago uh, when you laid out this schedule, I was skeptical that you'd be able to get all this—the feedback and the revisions done in this year. But you pulled it off, so nicely done. Thoughtful plan, well executed, included a lot of folks in it. I was proud to be part of that, so I support the plan. This is 14 years in my making. Good job. [23:14] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Craig, any comments from you? [23:15] **Craig:** Uh, no. Very pleased with—with what I see. I think that um, you know, as—as far as the level of detail that we've gotten to, I think that um, the city staff has done a really good job keeping both the big picture and people's more immediate needs and their local parks uh, balanced well. So yeah, I—I'll just echo the—the kudos to everybody on this. [23:45] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** I'm, you know, the late nights with all the community engagement—I mean, I just like, you know, all the time you're not at home um, and doing this on behalf of uh, the residents here in Apple Valley. You know, again, thank you. Because I—I think that this is truly a really a one—once-in-a-generation opportunity that we have to make such an investment in our—our parks which people clearly have come out passionate about... [24:15] **Eric Carlson:** So maybe a couple other comments I'd like to make if you wouldn't mind. Um, so we—we started this with the kind of the neighborhood going to each neighborhood project, and um, I decided to go for a bike ride one day and—and had a little accident, so I had to miss some time. And so I want to say thanks to our staff that stepped up and filled in for me: Kayla and Brian and Nate and Steve... [26:28] **Mark:** You brought up something that kind of dinged in my head. Um, the residents of the—of the Apple Valley adopted something new, you know, going online, registering their—their information. Um, that—that's—that—that was out of their comfort zone, I'm sure, to do. [26:50] **Eric Carlson:** Actually, didn't get very many emails because we kept asking people and encouraging people, "Please go to Social Pinpoint." It's such an easy place for us to keep track of what you want... [Eric provides stats on email lists and engagement]. [29:20] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** All right, so I'd like to recommend that the committee uh, approve the Parks Amenity Plan for presentation to the city council. [29:26] **Craig:** Second. [29:27] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** All right, there has a motion and a second to recommend the approval of the Parks Amenity Plan to the city council. All those in favor signal by saying aye. [29:32] **All:** Aye. [29:34] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Those oppose? It's approved. Congratulations. Thank you, thank you, thank you all. All right, I think uh, next one is to talk about—again moving right along with uh Parks referendum work—the uh reviewing Redwood Park design. Exciting! [29:56] **Eric Carlson:** Yeah, Madam Chair, members of the committee. So the next item on the agenda is to talk about the plans for Redwood Park... [Eric presents the architectural and aquatic details of Redwood Park]. [39:46] **Mark:** Question on that. I know you talked about uh, firming up the number of parks we have. Is Redwood there going to be two parks or one park? [40:00] **Eric Carlson:** One park. Our plans at this point is—would be—would be for it to be one park. [40:04] **Mark:** Okay, then from a construction schedule standpoint we are... [40:07] **Randy:** Hold on, can we go back to the reader board? Can we—I mean, we've talked about having some type of signage, some type of reader board that's a changeable message to inform people of what's going on in the city. This sounds like it's just for the pool? [40:22] **Eric Carlson:** No, we can put—we can put any message we want on the reader board. Oh, okay. So it'll be electron—it'll be—it'll be very close to what we have at Valleywood, only it's going to say "Redwood Park" on it. [40:35] **Randy:** Okay, got it. [40:51] **Eric Carlson:** We will step up to the line. We might put a big toe across the line, but we won't get totally over the line. [41:00] **Randy:** They won't cut off your toe. Try not, hopefully not. Okay, so it will be a "Welcome to Apple Valley" type sign or no? [41:10] **Eric Carlson:** Thanks for asking that question. So in the area south of 42... we are saving a space if you will for the city to put that "Welcome to Apple Valley" type signage there. [41:38] **Mark:** Okay, that's been something that I know a lot of people have wanted to see for a while. So can you go back to that picture? Can you go back to the floor plan, please, Kayla? Thank you. Almost looks like somebody could get into that room and then get into the pool. [41:56] **Eric Carlson:** So the—the only once you're in the room, the only way to get into the pool would be the door in the top left-hand corner and we—we'll have that locked so that you can't get out there. [42:15] **Mark:** I'm talking about the exterior... there'll be a—there'll be a door to get into there. Kayla, can you paint—to point to the door down by the—the sidewalk? Yeah, to the right. Yeah, there's going to be another door there as well... [43:08] **Mark:** Okay. [43:10] **Eric Carlson:** [Eric concludes the Redwood Park schedule update]. [44:40] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Great, thank you, Eric. Um, I just—just from a—a question. So are you asking us—just to clarify—are you asking us, is this just a review or you—you're going to be asking for a motion to recommend approval of this? [44:55] **Eric Carlson:** Or a motion to—to rec—u—recommend the concepts that you see in front of you knowing that we're still working on some details. [45:27] **Craig:** Well, I'll start. Uh, so overall this looks amazing. Um, I think the point you made about this being a nice entryway into the city... the one thing—and I mentioned this in—in the informal but just so I get it in the record is—um, I think that uh, we'd be well served to see if we could move that uh hammock grove a little bit away from the uh road just to a quieter location. But otherwise I have no—no real complaints or or anything about the uh plan. I think it looks awesome and I can't wait to—can't wait to go. [46:25] **Mark:** Gonna have to wait a little while. [46:27] **Craig:** A little bit. Gotta wait another year. [46:31] **Mark:** I'd like to make a motion to recommend approval of the site plan and concept building plans for the Redwood Park to the city council. [46:40] **Randy:** Second. [46:41] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** There's been a motion. Is there a second? There's a motion, a second to recommend approval of the site plan and concept building plans for Redwood Park to the city council. All those in favor signal by saying aye. [46:55] **All:** Aye. [46:57] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Those oppose? Motion carries and excited to pass that along. Thanks again, Eric. [47:02] **Eric Carlson:** Yep, thank you. Nice job. Thanks to our—I mean, honestly, thanks to our consultants for all the work they've done on it... [47:45] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Next item on the agenda is approving the department fee schedule for 2025. [47:48] **Eric Carlson:** Yep. So Madam—Madam Chair, members of the committee, each year we look at our fee schedule... [Eric lists specific fee increases for the arena, water park, and Valleywood Golf Course]. Jim, maybe you could give a quick update on what's going on with the golf cart situation? [49:22] **Jim:** Uh, yeah. We—so as part of our cart lease was up this—this year and um, working with a vendor and through some rebate programs, we just took delivery actually yesterday morning—believe Randy saw the semis pulling in—of 60 new golf cars. Lithium battery golf cars. So um, and a lot of our price adjustments are just based on supply and demand and what we're seeing in the marketplace. So yeah, we're set on golf carts now for the next five or six years. [50:00] **Eric Carlson:** Important to point out that our old—the fleet that we just retired was a leased fleet... we were able to pay cash for this fleet... we saved about $80,000 in finance charges. [Eric continues regarding the fee highlights]. [51:38] **Craig:** Yeah, so uh, back to the uh season pass for Splash Valley. Happy to see that we're implementing that. Uh, one thing that I—I was curious about is if you have a season pass, do you still have to pay if you want to do water walking? [52:16] **Eric Carlson:** So we're still working on those final details... [52:17] **Kayla:** I will add though, to the season pass, it basically equals to coming out seven times... We did also add a nanny pass or custodial pass—if you—I can't remember the exact name I gave it. Caretaker. Caretaker. [52:35] **Craig:** How does that transferable portion work? [52:45] **Kayla:** If they choose that, it'll be an honor system on there, and that's—I've had that in the past and it's working—it's proved to work very well. [52:55] **Craig:** Okay, thank you. I'll just add, since we're on the topic, I like that you've got an early bird—some discounts for early bird for those who uh, are regularly out there. [53:45] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** I know that there's a lot of—lot of folks who go you know, almost daily uh, if the weather's right... [54:01] **Kayla:** And the water walking does occur before we open for regular hours and occurs after we close for regular hours. That's why it's not you know, it's not really you could go determine that route on it. [54:30] **Mark:** Everything's going up, so we might as well. Well, not—I mean, we're going up like two bucks here, four bucks there. [54:47] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Other questions from folks? Otherwise, I will entertain a motion to recommend approval of the Parks Rec Department's 2025 fees as proposed, granting Parks—I think this is important part—granting Parks and Recreation Director or designate the latitude to adjust fees for promotions. I think that was a really good add. [55:18] **Mark:** So moved. [55:20] **Craig:** Second. [55:21] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** All right, we got motion and a second. All those in favor... signal by saying aye. [55:36] **All:** Aye. [55:40] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Those oppose? All right, motion carries. Thank you. It feels—I just have to say, it feels kind of good to also be doing just kind of some of the regular ordinary business. Regular ordinary business as well. So uh, so thanks for keeping everything else going. I think that's again another big kudos. All right, uh, the next item on the agenda is to accept my resignation—oh sorry, no we're not there that quickly. Jumping ahead, sorry, sorry. [56:10] **Randy:** No, I don't—I don't want to leave. [56:15] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** I know, am I blushing? I feel like I'm—all right. Okay, I'm going to correct that. The next item on the agenda is to approve the 2025 meeting schedule which was provided in our packets. [56:30] **Eric Carlson:** Um, so we're still holding to the monthly—well, we're—so the ordinance would suggest that you need to meet January, March, May, September, and November of every year. Given that, it's just easier for us to schedule one for every month and then cancel it if we don't have reason to meet. [57:08] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** I would agree. All right, uh, I'll entertain a motion to approve the 2025 Parks and Recreation—you're doing it again—committee schedule. [57:24] **Jess:** I'll make a motion to approve the 2025 Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee meeting schedule. [57:34] **Randy:** Second. [57:36] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** There's a motion, a second uh, to approve. All those in favor... signal by saying aye. [57:43] **All:** Aye. [57:50] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Motion carries. Thank you. [57:52] **Mark:** Now you can resign. [57:54] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Now I can resign officially. All right, um, so the next item is to accept my resignation as on the Parks and Rec Advisory Committee as of what—as of December 31st. So you're not quite rid of me yet. Might have to see you next month. Yeah, yeah, you gotta put up with me for a little longer. [58:20] **Randy:** Uh, I'll—I'll make a motion to accept that. [58:25] **Craig:** I regretfully second that motion. [58:28] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Oh, that's sweet. All right, um, all in favor... looking at Eric for something... all right, so there's a motion and a second to accept my resignation from the Parks and Rec Advisory Committee. All those in favor signal by saying aye. [58:38] **All:** Aye. [58:40] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Those oppose? All right, motion carries. [58:40] **Eric Carlson:** So Madam Chair, members of the committee. So now would be appropriate for the committee to have a conversation amongst yourselves about how you want to move forward starting in January with who should run the meetings. [Eric explains the interim chair and secretary process]. [59:30] **Randy:** I think Mark can handle it. [59:32] **Mark:** Does Mark want to handle it? So it kind of sounds like an informal formal nomination... I have no problems handling it. I think we can with help. I think we—we'll be fine. Uh, but I will not be here for February. I think I told you that. Um, I—it—it's not going to happen. So if we have a meeting in February, you'll either need to come back. [1:00:10] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** I don't think I can do that. [1:00:13] **Randy:** But this is why—this is why we need that interim secretary. That's what I was going to say. It's—we—we need an interim secretary just in case for the rest of the time. But February I will not be here, so we'll have to—we have to cover that. [1:02:18] **Randy:** I'd make a motion to have Mark serve as Interim Chair. [1:02:25] **Jess:** Second. [1:02:27] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** All right, there's a motion and a second to uh, approve Mark as Interim Chair. All those in favor signal by saying aye. [1:02:35] **All:** Aye. [1:02:40] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Congratulations, Mark. Thank you. Um, and—and if talk a little bit about Secretary, we need to... [1:02:50] **Randy:** Yeah, do we need a secretary or? [1:02:55] **Mark:** Yeah, I think we do. I think so. [1:02:58] **Randy:** I'm willing to if nobody else want—wants to, but I'm pushing my wife pretty hard to uh, get away in February, so—so probably not you then. Probably not me. [1:03:10] **Mark:** Is anyone else interested in the interim secretary position? Seeing none, I move that Craig be nominated for that slot—Interim Secretary. [1:03:17] **Jess:** Second. [1:03:20] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** All right, motion in a second. All those in favor for Craig as Interim Secretary, signal by saying aye. [1:03:25] **All:** Aye. [1:03:31] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Congratulations and thank you, Craig. All right, in good hands. Feeling good. Thank you. All right, I think that was all the agenda items. Moving on to committee and staff discussion items. The first one is reviewing uh, more exciting Parks Bond referendum stuff with the Youth Baseball and Softball Complex. [1:03:52] **Eric Carlson:** Yep. Madam Chair, members of the committee, so just kind of run through some slides on where we're at with the Youth Baseball/Softball Complex... [Eric discusses the field layouts, lighting, and moving the VAA building]. [1:09:00] **Audience Member:** Um, so my daughter plays VAA softball down at those fields and every night in the spring it's packed with all the girls' teams playing. We're going down to just four—what's the plan then going forward since we just merged with Fusion to hopefully grow the program? Where will then practices move? [1:09:20] **Eric Carlson:** Madam Chair, members of the committee. So there's 11 fields on the site today and none of them are lighted. Um, in the future there will be five fields, all of them will be lighted. So the five fields will play like ten because they're lighted. [1:09:55] **Audience Member:** And how about when it's under construction? [1:10:05] **Eric Carlson:** When it's—when it's under construction it's going to be challenging. There's no question about it. [Eric explains the construction phases and alternate fields like Belmont]. [1:11:33] **Audience Member:** I guess I just want to verify that they're going to have both the—the—the inner field for the little girls and the longer lines for the bigger girls when they put in the base movements, because the little girls play shorter. [1:11:55] **Eric Carlson:** Yeah, there'll be multiple pitching rubbers, multiple base distances, but the fence will be static... home plate's always going to be where home plate is, but there will be pegs at different levels or different distances. [1:13:28] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Okay, any committee—any further questions? Otherwise we'll—can move right along. Um, other Parks referendum update? [1:14:00] **Eric Carlson:** Yeah, so just so the public can hear... [Eric lists the 10 upcoming construction projects for 2025, including the skate park, pickleball courts, and Splash Valley]. [1:15:44] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Well, I—again just compliments and kudos. This has been an amazing planning design year. It's been non-stop for you and the whole entire team. [Hiebert asks about how to stay in touch]. [1:16:30] **Eric Carlson:** Yep, so they can send me an email and ask to get um, added to the email list. [1:16:45] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Yeah, that would be great. Well, thank you. Um, so next one is kind of the committee members. Um, we've got on here kind of the future meeting items. Uh, we still have kind of update on the park dedication funds. [1:17:16] **Eric Carlson:** Um, I don't remember who asked that question. Mark, can you—can you give me some more insight into what you were looking for? [1:17:28] **Mark:** We were looking at something and there was an article in there on the dedication fund and basically it explained what it was about—the annual report. The bottom line said that this committee would review it annually and we've never reviewed it. [Mark asks for details on how the fund is generated and spent]. [1:18:48] **Mark:** But then there's also the park facilities fund which we don't know anything about either. [1:18:55] **Eric Carlson:** We'll do the same thing for that. [1:19:15] **Mark:** That would be great. Okay, thanks. Thanks for the clarification. Appreciate it. [1:19:25] **Craig:** Did we skip over the discussion about how we're going to fill the opening on this committee? [1:19:30] **Eric Carlson:** So that's actually done by the city council. [Eric explains the reappointment and application process]. [1:20:21] **Craig:** Just thinking on—depending on how the process was going to work... we just had when Jess and I were appointed fairly recently there were four or five other people that had indicated interest in joining the committee. [1:21:09] **Mark:** One other thing. I know we had a—agenda item to accept Lisa's resignation. We did not have an agenda item to thank her for her service. So I'd like to right now uh, thank you for all you've done, for all your hard work and—uh, appreciate everything you've done. [1:21:30] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Thank you, thank you. It's—it's been—it's been an honor, a joy, and a privilege to be a part of this committee. And in my resignation letter I—I said you know, five years and you know, Mark and Noel were—were there um, and then the rest joined this merry band. [Lisa reflects on her tenure]. Again, thank you so much for your support, your friendship, and everything. It's been great. [1:22:15] **Randy:** Congratulations on that. I make the motion we adjourn. [1:22:20] **Jess:** Second. [1:22:22] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** All right, all those in favor to adjourn signal by saying aye. [1:22:25] **All:** Aye. [1:22:28] **Chair Lisa Hiebert:** Motion carries, meeting is over. Thank you.