AGENDA #6e
MEMORANDUM
TO: Mayor
and Town Council
FROM: W. Calvin Horton, Town Manager
SUBJECT: Community Gymnasium at the School at Meadowmont
DATE: June 11, 2001
The following resolution would authorize providing $236,000 towards the cost of a community gymnasium in the elementary school building at Meadowmont, provided the remaining funding is available from the County and that a mutually acceptable joint use agreement with the Chapel Hill-Carrboro Board of Education has been executed.
Plans are underway to build the school district’s ninth elementary school at a site provided by East West Partners, the developers of Meadowmont. The Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools, the Town of Chapel Hill, the Orange County Board of Commissioners, and the developer are all involved.
A gym instead of a multi-purpose room in the school building is being considered. The gym would be used by the school during school hours and by the wider community on evenings, weekends and during school vacations. The Board of Education estimates that building a gym would cost about $715,000 more than a multi-purpose room.
On March 26, 2001, the Town Council resolved to ask the Board of Education to include a gym in their plans for the ninth elementary school and to request funding from the Board of County Commissioners for a gym to be built as part of that plan. The Superintendent of Schools answered that the Board of Education had requested additional funding for the gym from the Board of County Commissioners. The Commissioners have not yet replied.
A gymnasium at Meadowmont could be used to accommodate basketball free play; organized practices and play, and for other recreation programs such as aerobics, tai chi, yoga and volleyball that require large spaces. One of the biggest challenges facing the Parks and Recreation Department athletics program is meeting community basketball needs with our limited amount of gym space.
Last basketball season our program consisted of 54 youth league teams, 14 adult league teams, and 2 weekly clinics for young children. We used three gyms (Community Center, Northside and Lincoln) regularly as well as the multi-purpose room at the Scroggs Elementary School. Scheduling an appropriate number of games and practices for those teams was a challenge. Also, with such a large amount of time and space devoted to league play, there is very little time left to have free play for drop-in use. Creating additional programs or adding more participants to existing programs is virtually impossible. Having access to another gym would lessen the burden on the existing facilities and provide more room for growth of established programs and the creation of new activities for the community. We also note that there are no public gymnasiums in the eastern portion of Chapel Hill.
If the Town were to contribute part of the cost of the gym, we would recommend using the following sources of funds:
It may be possible to design the site so as to leave room for a fourth, smaller field even with the gymnasium option. This is the alternative that we understand is being developed for presentation on Monday. Such an alternative would presuppose that the fourth field would be built at a later date, when funding would be available. Grading the entire site for this plan would probably include some grading where the field would be later, even though the fine grading, soil amendments and seeding would be done at a later date.
If it is not possible to include an acceptably sized fourth field along with the gymnasium, we believe it would still be preferable to have a gym and three fields rather than four fields with no gym. While the community’s needs for a gym and athletic fields are both strong, we believe that the possibilities of increasing our inventory of fields are better than building another gym. Planning for the Southern Community Park is proceeding now and we expect that several fields would be included in that location. There is no planning now for any new gym. In fact, the possibility of a gym at Homestead Park was briefly considered along with consideration of an aquatic facility there, but such consideration was terminated.
The cost factor is probably the most important. Depending on the site, field amenities and related project work, an athletic field could cost between $100,000 and $130,000. A gym built as part of an elementary school was estimated about four years ago to cost about $715,000 more than a multi-purpose room. The free-standing Northside Gymnasium was completed in 1998 for about $1,450,000.
Therefore, we believe that the addition of the community gym and associated restrooms would be a good trade-off, if necessary, for the foregone field and restroom facility. This plan would leave three athletic fields on the school site, two of them available for Parks and Recreation Department programming. The restrooms with the gym could easily be substituted for the free-standing facility in the park originally planned. In fact, the restrooms in the building could be available year round, while the free-standing restroom facility would need to be closed in the winter.
The Town and the Board of Education have negotiated a joint use agreement for the shared use and maintenance of school facilities including the art room, and multi-purpose room. If a gym is built, we would recommend that the agreement would include that as well, and would provide for Town use of the gym outside of school hours. A later agenda item discusses this agreement in greater detail.
Timing is important. The designers of the school advise that they would need to know by the end of this month whether or not to include the gym in their plans if they are to avoid redesign work.
Parks and Recreation Commission: Voted 7-0 on March 21, 2001: While a gymnasium at the Meadowmont School would be desirable, an additional gymnasium is not the highest parks and recreation priority at this time. If the addition of the gymnasium can be achieved through an alternate funding source than the Town, the Commission fully supports the project.
Town Manager: If the Council wishes to pursue the gym, we recommend adoption of the following resolution offering to contribute $236,000 to the construction of a community gym at the Meadowmont Elementary School, provided that the Orange County Board of Commissioners will finance the remainder of the cost, and provided that there is a mutually acceptable joint use agreement with the board of Education concerning the facility.
1. March 26, 2001, Memorandum from Town Manager to Town Council (p. 5).
2. March 29, 2001, Letter from Mayor to Chair of Board of County Commissioners (p. 8).
3. March 29, 2001, Letter from Mayor to Superintendent of Schools (p. 9).
4. April 19, 2001, Letter from Superintendent of Schools to Mayor (p. 10).
5. March 22, 2001, Recommendation from Parks and Recreation Commission (p. 11).
A RESOLUTION OFFERING $236,000
TO THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS FOR THE CONSTRUCTION OF A GYM INSTEAD OF A
MULTI-PURPOSE ROOM AT THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL IN MEADOWMONT (2001-06-11/R-12)
WHEREAS, the Chapel Hill-Carrboro Board of Education and the Town Council of the Town of Chapel Hill have a joint use agreement for facilities at the elementary school at Meadowmont; and
WHEREAS, both the Board and the Town Council agree that community use of school facilities should be encouraged; and
WHEREAS, the Town does not have any gym in the southern or eastern part of Town;
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Council of the Town of Chapel Hill that is will appropriate $236,000 for the construction of a gym instead of a multi-purpose room in the elementary school at Meadowmont, if the Orange County Board of Commissioners funds the remaining cost of the project, and provided that the Town and the Board of Education complete a mutually satisfactory joint use agreement.
This the 11th day of June, 2001.