MAY 16, 2000 PUBLIC WORKS AND SAFETY COMMITTEE MINUTES PAGE 33

CITY OF SHAWNEE

PUBLIC WORKS AND SAFETY COMMITTEE MEETING

MINUTES

MAY 16, 2000

7:00 P.M.

Chairperson Segale called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m.

Committee Members Present / Staff Present
Chairperson Segale / City Manager Montague
Councilmember Severance / Public Works Director Freyermuth
Councilmember Goode / City Engineer Wesselschmidt
Councilmember Boettcher / City Clerk/Human Resources Director Gonzales
Parks and Recreation Director Holman

Councilmembers Present

/ Project Engineer Gregory
Councilmember Roche left at 9:10 p.m. / Fire Chief Hartley

Councilmember Meyers

/ Project Engineer Lindstrom
Councilmember Thomas / City Codes Administrator Thompson
Deputy Parks and Recreation Director Lecuru
Police Chief Hayselden

Members of the public who spoke were: Ron Vine, Vice President, Leisure Vision/ETC Institute, (Item #1), Dave Hoelting, 13871 W. 57th Terrace, (Item #2), Curt Talcot, Shafer, Kline and Warren, (item #3), Charlotte Hargis, 6925 Ballentine, (Item #1 & 6).

1. DISCUSSION OF POOL STUDY QUESTIONS.

Chairperson Segale stated that on March 27, 2000, the City Council approved a Pool Study to be conducted by Yarger and Associates. One phase of the study includes a community survey that will be randomly sent out to 3,000 Shawnee residents. He stated that the goal is for the City to receive at least 75 survey forms back from each ward.

Parks and Recreation Director Holman presented a draft of the cover letter as well as the draft of the citizen survey.

Councilmember Meyers asked if the surveys would be broken down into wards.

Parks and Recreation Director Holman answered that there would be 3000 surveys sent to residents. The goal is to obtain participation from at least 75 people from each of the four wards. If the City does not obtain 75 survey forms from each ward, telephone calls will be made until the goal is achieved.

Councilmember Severance asked when the Parks and Recreation survey was done was a survey mailed or was it all done by telephone.

Parks and Recreation Director Holman answered both.

Councilmember Severance asked if a survey is the most efficient way to contact residents or could 75 phone numbers be called at random, which would save mailing costs.

RON VINE, Vice President, Leisure Vision/ETC Institute, stated that he has been with the company for the past ten years and prior to that he was a Parks and Recreation Director. He stated that over the past few years Leisure Vision/ETC Institute has implemented a way of doing surveys that other communities have found to be very helpful. The surveys are mailed out, and then in approximately two weeks the company follows up with phone calls to either encourage the residents to complete the survey or do the survey over the phone. He indicated that the company has found this to be the most efficient way to handle a survey. More people would be reached through the mail survey, however the phone survey would let them control the number of people contacted in each ward as well as demographics. He stated that approximately 80% of Parks and Recreation clients prefer both mail and telephone surveys.

Councilmember Severance asked if the 3000 surveys would be sent to one out of every four households in the City.

RON VINE answered that the Leisure Vision/ETC Institute is guaranteeing that the City would have 400 completed surveys targeting 100 in each of the City’s four wards.

Councilmember Roche asked on question 13F if the language could be changed to make the question clearer. He indicated that if the residents have to study the survey they probably wouldn’t send it back.

Councilmember Goode stated that the question was also unclear to him.

RON VINE stated that question is asking the resident how important it is to them for the site to generate revenue. He indicated that the language could be changed to make the question clearer.

Councilmember Roche asked if on question number 15 the survey should state the current pool fees.

RON VINE stated that it is better not to say what the current fees are because by the order of the questions a vision is being established to see what residents would be willing to pay for what they think the features that they would like to have are worth to them.

Councilmember Roche stated that questions 23 and 24 should ask the question without the third pool, then a separate question to include the third pool. He indicated that there could be people that would support revitalizing the two existing facilities but not be interested in supporting construction of a third facility.

Councilmember Severance asked if the words and/or could be added.

Councilmember Roche answered that could work but the end result might not be accurate.

RON VINE asked if on questions number 23 and 24 rather than saying for the improvements of existing pools and building a third facility, leave the words and building third facility out. He asked if the amendment was to add and possibly building a third facility, meaning that it is not a given that the City would do that, however the engineering studies could indicate it might be necessary to build a third facility, or if the results of the survey indicate that residents would like to have a third facility in the City.

Councilmember Roche stated that residents could read the survey and indicate that they would like to have the two existing pools renovated but would not support a third facility.

RON VINE stated that question number 22 was asked to lead into question number 23.

Councilmember Roche stated that a resident might be swayed to answer the question differently because they do not support a third facility.

Councilmember Meyers stated that a question could be added to ask if residents would support improving the two existing facilities but not adding a third facility.

Councilmember Roche stated that questions 23 and 24 should not be taken off the survey but separated to include the two existing facilities and another question to include a third facility.

RON VINE stated that his only concern is that after the survey is completed and the engineering studies are done, one or the other might not be possible as an improvement.

Councilmember Segale stated that questions 10, 11 and 12 pin point what residents might want to have done with the facilities. He indicated that people who answered question number 12, very important, would be more supportive of a third facility than a resident who answered question number 10, very important.

Councilmember Boettcher stated that questions number 2 and 5 are asking the same question with the exception of leisure play usage of water slides, fountains, zero depth entry, etc.

RON VINE stated that the current pools are more traditional than recreational, the question is asked that way to be more specific to determine what options a resident might like to have since those options are not currently available in existing facilities.

Councilmember Boettcher stated that question number 7I is not clear with regard to an area with deep water, that question could have different meanings to different age groups.

RON VINE stated that he would check with the designers to see what the appropriate depth for deep water would be.

Councilmember Boettcher stated that question number 9 should be two separate questions, the east pool versus the west pool. He indicated that possibly there could be a 9a and 9b so it would be clear which pool the residents were rating.

RON VINE stated that he is looking at the survey from the standpoint that the survey should be kept as short as possible. He indicated that question number 10 and 11 address each pool separately. The survey contains approximately 200 bits of information that could be cross tabulated.

Councilmember Boettcher indicated that there had been an instance of a mother going to pick up her children and being yelled at because she came into the pool area with street clothes on. He asked why there weren’t any management/rules questions addressed in the survey.

RON VINE stated that a question of that nature could be added.

Councilmember Boettcher stated that a customer service question could help Parks and Recreation Director Holman.

Parks and Recreation Director Holman stated that the rules have changed, however there are rules in place to keep the pool safe.

RON VINE explained that in question number 1 the question specifically asks whether the resident uses the east or west pool, as a result when the survey comes back ETC would know which facility the resident is talking about.

Councilmember Boettcher stated that in the last two years a resident could have used both facilities.

RON VINE stated that a separate question could be asked on each pool if that is what Council would like.

Councilmember Goode stated that generally residents use one pool or the other.

Councilmember Boettcher asked if question number 15 stems from prior questions that were asked on the survey.

RON VINE answered yes. The question is asked to determine if the facilities are built, as the resident would like, what would they be willing to pay for the service. He stated that for example of the residents who indicated that they would pay in the top 20%, what improvements would they like most, it all relates back to cross tabulation.

Councilmember Thomas stated that the first sentence in the cover letter should read planning any improvements rather than planning the improvements, because Council has not voted on making any improvements.

Councilmember Thomas stated that in paragraph two she would like Council to consider only doing the survey with registered voters. The point of doing the survey is to get some guidance on what Council thinks they would like to put in the package to present to voters. She stated that the challenge of the Council is to present a package that the voters would approve.

RON VINE stated that if Council would like to get a list of registered voters that the survey could be sent to only those people on the list. He indicated the problem with only sending the survey to registered voters is that anyone who has moved to the City since the list was compiled would not be a part of the survey because they might be not on the voter list, as well as anyone who has not voted but this is an issue that interests him or her and would bring him or her out to vote.

Councilmember Thomas indicated that a voter registration list could be obtained from the Johnson County Election Office for $50.

Councilmember Severance asked what list was used to do the Parks and Recreation survey.

City Manager Montague stated that all citizens were used in that survey.

Councilmember Thomas stated that Council was not considering putting something on the ballot with that survey.

Councilmember Thomas stated that the benefit of doing a survey before an election is that it creates an awareness of issues as well as educating and informing the residents of the details.

Councilmember Thomas stated that Parks and Recreation Director Holman and Councilmember Goode names are both misspelled in the cover letter.

Councilmember Thomas stated that in question 1 the word side should be deleted and possibly Old Shawnee Town added and it should read has shallow water instead of shallower water. The deep end had to be closed for safety. In the second paragraph, delete the word side, and Pflumm is misspelled.

Councilmember Thomas stated that question number 4 should list Country club/private club last, and add Oceans of Fun because it has the highest leisure activity usage in the area.

Councilmember Thomas stated that question number 6 instead of the City of Shawnee can be designed to serve different groups, should read the City of Shawnee could be designed to serve different groups.

Councilmember Thomas stated that question number 7I instead of area with deep water should read water deep enough for safe diving. She asked where the other letters of the alphabet were in the question.

RON VINE explained that the survey is still in rough draft form and that ETC does not use certain letters because they are sometimes hard to distinguish from each other.

Councilmember Thomas stated that Lazy River could be added to the list on question number 7. She asked is there any other way to say zero-depth-entry pool.

Parks and Recreation Director Holman stated that zero-depth-entry is the technical term that is used for zero depth.

Councilmember Thomas stated that some of the questions on the survey could be deleted to make room to add other questions.

Councilmember Thomas stated that question number 9, how would the resident rate the quality of the City of Shawnee pools, should show a comparison possibly to other municipal pools.

RON VINE indicated that the resident is asked to rate their experience, they are not asked to compare the pools to anything else, only how they rate their experience with the facility.

Councilmember Thomas stated that question number 9 should be split out by the east and west pool. She stated that people might only go to the east pool because they do not like the west pool, which would give them cause to have an opinion about the west pool even though they marked the that they frequent the east pool.

Councilmember Thomas stated that questions 10 and 11 the word side should be deleted.

Councilmember Thomas stated that question 13, possibly A and B could be combined to read initial costs to tax payers. She stated that normal citizens do not know about the costs of developing a site and it is not their issue.