And could we start with the roll call vote, please Mills here Ellen Rodkey here Israel Herrera Very
nice roll call Yeah
Okay, so We don't have Jim Whitlatch, but we do have a quorum with Israel there on zoom so we will go
ahead and Get started with our consent calendar. It's all of our items agenda items in section a And
do we have a movement to approve the consent calendar? I'll move to approve the consent calendar Okay
and I guess we need to roll call vote all those in favor I Ellen Rodke I Israel Herrera Okay consent
calendar passes and then we move on to section be the public hearings and appearances and we have a
Bravo award going to Doug Bruce tonight Hello, which Julie will tell us about
Good afternoon, I am Julie Ramey, the Community Relations Manager for the Parks and Recreation Department,
and it is my pleasure to be here this evening to present the April Bravo Award to Doug Bruce. Now, Doug
exemplifies the very best of community service through his extraordinary volunteer contribution to the
recently completed repairs of the limestone steps at the Banneker Community Center.
This critical repair was funded in part by a grant from the Indiana DNR Division of Historic Preservation
and Archeology and the grant funds were available only for work for properties listed on the National
Register of Historic Places. So it was really important for the grant in order to be in compliance to
have a project manager with an expertise in historic architecture and Doug Bruce
fit the bill perfectly. I learned that not only is he a past member of the Bloomington Historic Preservation
Commission, but has a passion for historic architecture. And in his informal and completely voluntary
role as a project manager for the Banneker Front Steps project, he did a detailed assessment of the
steps, prepared architectural drawings that outlined everything that needed to be done, provided an
expert review of the contractor's work,
with native limestone, and his knowledge ensured that the repairs were historically appropriate, structurally
sound, and helped the project remain compliant with all of the grantee's expectations. And so for that
and many other reasons, but we are so appreciative of his volunteer work and would like to present the
April Bravo Award to Doug Bruce.
Would you like to say a few words? Well, I'm really humbled for this I hold our park system up as high
as you can and being a park rat growing up near Bryan Park and Our mom taking us there when we were
little kids and learning to swim at Bryan Park pool It's it's just been
Parks Department calls, how can I say no? But I will say this working with the park staff made my job
easy I mean really they just rolled up their sleeves and did the hard work that the drawings are what
I do anyway So they they jumped in on something they may not have the most experience with and handled
it perfectly So I'll accept this award only if they get the credit as well Thank you. Thank you. Yeah
Thank you Thanks, Doug. Yeah, it's not often you get someone to act as a project manager manager on
a on a volunteer basis So we really appreciate it. Yeah Okay, and then into our main section this evening
section C First up Sean Marler will tell us about the contract with master rental for some items for
the Grand Faloon series Good evening
Sean Marler recreation facilities general manager and Yes, that's exactly what this is master rental
staff recommends approval of a contract with them to provide fencing and portable restrooms for the
Grand Faloon concert series at Switchard Park The do not exceed amount is thirty one thousand six hundred
and twenty Parks is going to be reimbursed from this amount by IU at the conclusion of it. I'm happy
to answer any questions and
and portable restrooms for the concert series that we talked about last month, so Yeah, make a motion
to prove the contract with master rental for fencing and restrooms for gram flume Okay, and our roll
call vote of those in favor Kathleen Mills. I Ellen Rodke. I Israel Herrera Okay motion carried
And then in C2 Sean also has the contract with HFI for the switch yard preventative maintenance switch
yard park also is asking for approval for contract with Harold fish incorporated for the preventative
planned maintenance plan for 2026 the not to exceed amount of 13,920 This was a little different this
year because we had a couple of different places
Vendors apply for the bids. Usually it's either them or Commercial services we had a couple more but
that was about it though and they had the lowest price So I'm happy to answer any questions about Sounds
good. Yeah, it does All right. I make a motion to approve the contract with Harold fish for suchard
Park preventive maintenance Bacon all right and a roll call vote of those in favor of
Kathleen Mills, I Ellen Rodkey. I'm Israel Herrera Okay motion is carried and see to thank you Sean.
Thank you and in c3 Leslie Wearing many hats this evening will take it agreement with Catalan, Indiana
for parking lot usage. I
Thank you, Leslie Brinson recreation division director staff recommends the approval of this indemnity
agreement with cattle in Indiana LLC For the use of their contractor parking lot off of South Roger
Street during the three grand balloon concerts June 20th July 18th and August 29th the Parks and Rec
department as you know is partnering with Indiana University to host the
Grand Faloon concert series at Switchyard Park this summer due to the expected crowd of these concerts
The department wanted to ensure that we had adequate parking for the attendees Catalan Agreed to allow
us use of their contractor lot Located right across the street from the park during the three shows
We'll be providing staff support security signage for the lots during those dates From a time frame
around 4 p.m. To 11 p.m. I'd be happy to answer any questions
Sounds like a great idea to plan ahead for that parking Yeah, and if I recall didn't we at one point
they used our parking lot at Twin Lakes. Yes, correct Yeah, that's a nice little exchange Okay, all
right Well, I'll make a motion to approve the indemnity agreement of cattle in Indiana LLC for use of
contractor parking lot I think Okay, and a roll call vote of those in favor
Kathleen Mills. Aye. Ellen Rodke. Aye. Israel Herrera. Aye. Okay. Motion is carried. Thank you, Leslie.
And then C4, Bill Rehm will tell us about the partnership with Studio Cipher for gaming event.
Good evening, Bill Rehm, community events coordinator, and I'm here to recommend the approval of the
2026 partnership agreement between Bloomington Parks and Recreation and Studio Cipher.
for the new event called the Free Range Arcade. No money will be paid out in this partnership. We will
be partnering with the Studio Server to offer a new event. It's called the Free Range Arcade. The event
is designed to bring together local and regional game developers, game stores, gaming groups, and suppliers
of game-related items in an interactive environment. The event will allow attendees to try out and experience
a variety of new games, including mobile,
PC arcade card and board games and we will also have a make your own board game area No money will be
exchanged again during this Partnership and the event will be held Saturday mace May 2nd from 1 to 7
in the pavilion at Switchyard Park and we are looking forward to this new partnership and this new event
and I'm happy to answer any questions you may have Sounds great. I think it seems like there's a little
something for everyone there. I
Yeah, that's what they came to us Interested in in trying to partner with us and we thought it was a
good fit and we're trying to bring our our own spin into it. So Yeah, okay Make a motion to approve
the partnership agreement with studio cipher Okay, and a roll call vote of those in favor Kathleen Mills.
I Ellen Rodke. I Israel Herrera I
Motions carry. Thank you, Bill. Thank you and then in c5 we have We have keto to tell us about the agreement
with sphere for the 2026 aquatic services. Thank you Kido sports division director pinchy heating for
Chris Hamrick today Staff recommend approval of the service agreement for sphere aquatics. This agreement
is for startup and
shutdown and ongoing service that in a poor season Improvement or fixing equipment there in a season
will still be quoted and processed as a normal park board procedure Both Brian Park and Mills Pools
are scheduled to open on Saturday, May 23rd Okay, all right any questions or keto about this I
Questions here. No, okay. I'll make a motion to prove the service agreement with spear aquatics I Say
come okay and a roll call vote of those in favor Kathleen Mills. I Ellen Rodke. I Israel Herrera I Okay
motion is carried. All right. Thank you And then in c6
Joanna Sparks will tell us about the agreement with Nature's Way for downtown planters Yes, good afternoon
Joanna Sparks urban green space manager here today to recommend approval of a contract with Nature's
Way incorporated for landscaping services related to the downtown planter improvement project for planters
located on the
courthouse square this would be for maintenance of the the planter improvements that occurred last year
as well as the addition of two more planters which are on the corner of Kirkwood and walnut by the book
corner and Trojan horse I'm happy to answer any questions. Oh and one other bonus. This is funded by
Public Works Department. Okay and Joanna if you can just remind me did we in
Did parks ever maintain those planters or was we did? Yes. Yes. This was a new conversion to contractual
maintenance in May of 2025. Okay. Yep. All right. Okay. Thank you. See I don't see any questions from
Israel Okay, I make a motion to prove the contract with Nature's Way Inc for a downtown planner improvement
project I say
Alright and all overall call vote of all those in favor Kathleen Mills. I Ellen Rodkey. I Israel Herrera
Okay, that motion is carried and then Joanna will stay with us for c7 for the agreement with drink green
dragon for beeline south mowing and
Yes, good afternoon doing a spark serving green space manager once again here to recommend approval
of a service agreement with green dragon lawn care for mowing and trimming services on an as needed
basis for areas that include the southern end of the beeline Trail as well as the rail trail and various
other parks and parks manage properties throughout the city I'm happy to answer any questions Okay Is
the season for mowing? Yes
This is like an addition to the one we already approved correct. Yes. Yes. This would be in addition
to the 30 yes. Yeah, there's 36 sites that are already currently being mowed contractually between two
contractors. This would be a third for additional properties Okay, I make a motion to approve the contract
for mowing and trimming with green dragon They don't
And a roll call vote of all those in favor Kathleen Mills. I Ellen Rodkey. I Israel Herrera All right
motion is carried. Thank you Joanna Thank you and then in C8 Haskell will tell us about an agreement
with Mother Nature for ash tree Treatment. Good afternoon board of park commissioners Haskell Smith
urban forester
Staff recommends the approval of this contract with Mother Nature landscaping to inject 82 ash trees
totaling one thousand six hundred and fifty Diameter at breast height inches around the city of Bloomington
to protect them from the emerald ash borer Amount not to exceed $20,000 bit is sourced From our general
fund revenue and a grant Okay and
Feel like Haskell for as long as I've been on the parks board. We've been doing Ash tree treatments.
Is it pretty successful on the hole for the trees that we treat? Yes. Yeah The trees we have and it's
not Yeah, but yeah, it has there's several in Brian Park that respond well to it And those are the ones
on this list specifically that will probably look to treat kind of in perpetuity Okay I liked the fact that I
The replacement value of these trees is almost $400,000. So it seems like a pretty good deal that we're
spending 20 or less at this point for preserving them. I make a motion to approve the 2026 ash tree
treatment for emerald ash borer. I second. OK. And a roll call vote of those in favor. Kathleen Mills.
Aye. Ellen Rodke. Aye. Israel Herrera. Aye.
Motions carry. Thanks has to thank you and Then we get into c9 Rebecca Swift the acceptance of Rose
parcel auditors number. I'll let you read the numbers Thank you, Rebecca Swift operations and development
division director and I'm here to recommend the quick deed Approval of the 1.1 acres known as the Rose
parcel otherwise known as the SOMO parcel So if you're wondering why I'm here again to re-recommend this
We actually only were able to accept a portion of this partial and Monroe County Planning Department
necessitated the acceptance of the full parcel Luckily between now and then we have also had those two
dilapidated buildings removed I came forth with an MOU with us in the SOMA development about responsibilities
of management of that section of the bridge and beyond but this is truly now forever moving forward and
Recommending the acceptance of this parcel. So this is located again Just along the rail trail corridor
blue into rail trail by South Roger Street where we just did that wonderful new realignment So happy
to answer any questions, but this is to officially accept the deed okay, and so then the Permanent or
maintenance responsibilities will lie with parts, correct? Okay, any Any questions from Israel?
Okay, make a motion to approve the quick claim deed to acquire 1.1 acres known as the Rose parcel Okay
in a roll call vote of those in favor Kathleen Mills. I Ellen Rodke. I Israel Herrera Okay, all right
motion carried and then c10 is also Rebecca's that's the agreement with convergent for op center entry gate and
Yeah, so something that's kind of been on our invest in what we have to do list for a while is Improvements
to our ops security gate at our main parks and rec ops center located off of Adam Street So this is
in order to make improvements We actually already have the new gate but in order to get it to move and
use with our badges we have to
Start with convergent, which is actually a vendor that supplies the card reader kind of like the goose
neck and the electronics that hook up to them the engine of the gate But now we need to hook it up to
the building and so I'll get to that staff report next probably should start with the other one first
but so convergence specifically we recommend the service agreement and they will provide and install
the control of the
For the one vehicle access including the enclosure power supply and card reader the gate pedestal gate
Conducts cabling all that stuff as well as one additional security camera mounted facing this way we
can start capturing Vehicles and people coming in and out of our back gated area So this will improve
security for us and also just down the line access Our gate and padlock sometimes get cut by different
service providers. So this is going to really help things Happy to answer any questions
You said it's been on the to-do list for a while is the is the was the old gate just there was no sort
of badge in Correct. It was just an old-school gate that we had to just a padlock open and close that
stayed open pretty much throughout the business day But sometimes we have no staff on site and people
can kind of just walk in and out As well as we have more and more weekend events and weekend needs and
so that would be locked Nobody could get access to the dumpster. So this will really improve weekend
access as well. I
Okay. All right. Sounds good. Any other questions for Rebecca on this one? No. Okay. All right. Make
a motion to approve the contract with convergent for Adam Street Ops Center gate security system install.
Okay. And a roll call vote of those in favor. Kathleen Mills. Aye. Ellen Rodkey. Aye. Israel Herrera. Okay.
That motion is carried and then Rebecca has one more item in C 11 the agreement with PQC for the entry
gate Correct. So as I mentioned Convergent is who actually installs
The gate reader the card reader but in order to connect that to the power supply of our existing building
op center PQC otherwise known as precision quality Contracting is going to be hired to actually do that
electrical work and cabling So I should have mentioned this in the first one. This is being funded through
our non reverting funds with a cell tower revenue So if you remember last meeting I was here to recommend
the lease agreement We do have a cell tower in the back of op center. So we do get revenue generated
from that that's been growing and so we're we just
Inputting it back into our ops gate. So again, this is a service agreement with precision quality contracting
Not to exceed seven thousand six hundred thirty and this is for the electrical work to connect it to
our new card reader Happy to answer any questions. Okay All right, I make a motion to approve the contract
with precision quality contracting for electrical system upgrades They come here
Okay, and a roll call vote of those in favor Kathleen Mills. I Ellen Rodkey. I Israel Herrera All right
motion is carried. Thank you for those three items. Thank you, Becca And then in our section D, we have
a couple of reports this evening So first is the draft 2025 annual report which Julie Ramey will
Explain to us. Good evening Julie Ramey community relations manager with parks and recreation in front
of you is a printed copy of a draft of the 2025 annual report the annual report is for Review of the
entire last year. It includes unaudited financial data. So reports from our New World financial system
and includes our participation numbers. So there's a few bits and pieces that we still need to collect
in order to have the complete annual report. So I'll come back to you at the meeting in May to ask for
your formal approval of the 2025 report. Okay. Yeah, looks good. I always enjoy looking at the numbers
for the different facilities and engagement. I saw 10,000, was this on the Facebook videos?
this number. 14 Facebook videos exceeded 10,000 views. Our digital content coordinator saw his first
full year of employment in 2025 and he's rocking our social media channels. He's creating great content
and doing a great job of promoting our programs, our facilities, and getting the message out about parks
and recreation. Thank you. Yeah, great. Thank you, Julie. Thanks for the draft.
Okay, and then in our D to section Is the draft master plan for the next four years which Tim Street
will tell us about? Good evening commissioners Tim Street director of Bloomington Parks and Recreation
Thank you for being here tonight with us tonight. I'm going to turn it over in just a moment to Jamie Sabak and
Who is our master plan consultant who's been working? Alongside us to help generate these results and
coordinate things like the community survey and all of the public engagement that we've done Before
I turn it over to her. I'll just mention a couple things One this has been a very thorough process.
This is the first time At all actually not even as director that I've been able to go through one of
these with the department I've been here for about five years
When I started in 2021, we are at the very tail end of wrapping up the previous master plan, which was
also occurring during COVID, and it was all a bit strange. So this has been a really rewarding process,
a very thorough process. I think we've done a really fantastic job of really making sure there were
lots of opportunities for engagement with the public, with staff, through focus groups, through all
of the different voices you're gonna see represented in the master plan itself.
Secondly, I think we are an organization and we strive to be an organization that acts upon our plans.
So this isn't something that we're gonna get this done and say, great, this is checked off for five
years, now we can check out and be eligible for DNR grants and have it on file with the state and then
we'll do it all again. No, this very much, we're presenting it to you tonight
Informationally, this is the draft. We're open to feedback from board members over the next month before
we bring it back for adoption in May. And as I mentioned from there, then it's time for us to start
moving and acting on some of these things. So we're excited for that. We're lining some things up for
after potential adoption, of course, pending any feedback.
I'll just mention as well, between now and May, we will come across our digital accessibility deadline
for local governments. And so an aside, bigger than the master plan, this is sort of the last time the
park board process and the documentation will come to you looking like it does right now. In May, things
are gonna look a little bit different. We're gonna be working through Google Docs a lot more, doing
accessibility checks on documents, things like that.
So between now and May, we'll also be working to mitigate the final documents to meet digital accessibility
standards. And what will happen is in May and beyond, looking at your agenda, the way these are linked
in there, you're gonna see that with every agenda item. So instead of it being a giant PDF, we're gonna
have live links in the agenda to each component of each agenda item. So that's a little off topic for
where we're going, but I wanted to mention that no, this is not there yet. You know, we just received
the draft.
It's awkward timing as we navigate this deadline, but when we when we have it when we come back in May
We will have mitigated it to have it all good to go for those standards That said I am going to turn
it over to Jamie who has a presentation that she's going to share and then we can take any questions
at the end
Quick check. Can you all hear me and can you see the presentation? And yes. Alright, thank you.
Thanks Tim. Good evening. It's a pleasure to visit with you again. I think last we had the opportunity
to meet it was to review the comprehensive engagement portion of this process. So tonight I have the
pleasure of providing you an overview
of the master plan effort along with some principal takeaways and to give you a sense of the depth of
the deliverables that have been presented to the City of Bloomington Park and Recreation Department.
I have to say I've had the pleasure of presenting these completed documents over the years.
This one has been, as I think some of you know,
more special to me as I have a history with this organization. So I was incredibly privileged to have
the opportunity to not only serve the city of Bloomington as an employee, but now I have the opportunity
to work alongside the staff, all of you, and of course the community to present this updated master
plan. I do want to, if you will, provide a shout out to an incredible
professional staff of this organization, Tim, the entire executive team, the project team, all of the
employees that participated in this effort along with all of you and of course the community, a very
engaged community and a community I think that truly understands the value of public parks and recreation
and what it provides you know for quality of life in the community. So I wanted to say that we're out
of the gate. Alternatively very brief presentation of a year-long process does not do it justice but hopefully
This brings back top of mind some of the things that we have discussed over the last 14 months and gives
you a sense of the complexion of the deliverables and what has been provided to the organization. So
with that, I'm going to spend probably about 15 minutes or so just giving you an overview and depth
regarding certain elements of the master plan and then certainly open the floor for any comments and
questions that you might have.
What I'm going to share very briefly is overview of the process. We're going to dive a bit into the
priorities and intended outcomes that resulted from the effort. I'm going to share with you high level
the strategic plan and really the actionable part of
this effort. Any master plan obviously requires some strategy relative to how things are going to be
implemented. So I'll share with you high level what that strategic plan looks like in its composition,
touch on policy briefly, and then pass it on to Tim to close and share any next steps. So that said,
quick refresh if we were to summarize this entire process, I think this image represents that
summation. We really wanted to have an incredibly robust and rich foundation of engagement that included
of course staff engagement, elected and appointed official engagement, as well as obviously community
engagement and I think we did our due diligence relative to a tentacled approach to engagement. I have
to say it was really incredible the feedback that was received as well as the amount of feedback received.
I give Julie and her team a lot of credit for thinking about creative ways to
Get the word out, if you will. So people felt that they were being asked their opinions and
their perspectives and their
their thoughts regarding need and desire and so on. So really robust engagement sets the stage for how
we think about analyzing conditions. We analyze systems, a bit of discovery, if you will, and then assessing
the system. And then, of course, all of these things roll up into the development of the plan itself
and the draft plan that you have in front of you today. We're focusing on what we hear, of course, what
we observe and what we learn over time to feed the development of the document.
There were three principal phases to this work. First of all, we did a conditions assessment of Bryan
Park and Mills Pools and we started the financial sustainability strategy during phase one and these
really kind of set the stage for the overall master planning effort. Phase two was when we started to
engage staff and board
in conversations regarding the condition of the organization and the community issues that community
members were facing, you know, lived experiences in the Bloomington community. We wanted to make an
effort to ensure that we had equitable community engagement, translate, ensure that we were hearing
from representative community members, and I think through the engagement process we found that we had
a solid representation of the people who live in Bloomington and experience Bloomington on a daily basis.
We, of course, dove into some organizational
Everything from looking at ADA transition plans and, you know, environmental commitments that
the organization has made, as well as obviously just how administrative functions were working in the
organization and how productive and effective they were.
All of this led to identifying what organizational priorities the system would choose to prioritize,
if you will, and focus its energy and efforts on in order to have the greatest impact on the community.
And then phase three, taking all of the things that resulted were to design a strategic plan and work
with the entire staff as well as concentrated efforts with the administrative team, the project team
to create actionable steps towards implementation.
Of course, again, all of this resulting in the final master plan draft and the deliverables and this
presentation this evening. I think it's important to take a step back for a moment because we tend to
use a lot of words, terminology, if you will, in the planning world that sometimes can be conflated
with other things. We wanted to ensure that not only words mattered, but meaning was consistent.
And so I felt it important to call out some of the terms that you hear often in plans and how this linked
to the ultimate master plan document that you have in front of you tonight. So first of all, when we
talk about community issues, all those things that we heard by way of staff engagement, community engagement,
of course, meeting with you, we're attempting to identify what the key call that business issues were,
essentially the highest priority problems affecting the department and or the community,
or anything that may be perceived as negatively affecting the system. So these issues become,
if you will, a bit of an umbrella, which is counterintuitive to how this is built out, but an umbrella
under which we start thinking about construction of the plan. This then, these issues feed how an organization
begins to identify its priorities, like these broad-based statements of intention. What is it we're
working towards affecting and resolving? The issues essentially become a feed to identifying priorities.
Those priorities, of course, will be impacted, influenced, improved by way of actionable steps that
a system takes. Actions, very simply, are intended to be these outcome-oriented moves.
the organization, in this case the department, is going to take to advance a strategic priority. Again,
influence or impact it. And actions require a number of tasks. So we have a strategic plan as part of
this work that includes a number of actions. You're not going to see a granular list of tasks, rather
these outcome-oriented moves, these actions in the action plan that resulted from this work.
And the capstone here, which I think must be addressed, is the fact that every organization wants to
think about what is it they're trying to do in a system. You know, what are those results and objectives
they're trying to realize as a result of their work? And so, these building blocks essentially fed the
development of the plan and fed the development of the strategic plan, the actionable steps that Bloomington
Parks and Recreation will take to affect priorities and obviously resolve, best it can, issues in the
community.
So where did this lead? It led to the development of a very comprehensive plan, as mentioned. It was
a robust process. It was quite comprehensive. We dove into everything from infrastructure to financial
sustainability to community needs to community desires, looked internally, discovery efforts around
the organization's function.
And so we have a draft plan you see an image of that plan on the left of the screen and a number of
supplements you can think about them as attachments, if you will. We had supplement a being the engagement
report, this is what we reviewed reviewed with you a few months back it's the comprehensive view of
what we heard from staff elected appointed.
officials as well as community members. Supplement B was the Comprehensive Community Engagement Summary,
so the survey essentially was in a separate document, a quite robust
review of everything we heard by way of that survey. There's another supplement, supplement C, which
is the Pool Conditions Assessment Report. This was the concentrated effort to assess the condition of
both Bryan Park and Mills Pools. Supplement D was the Financial Sustainability Strategy Report, which
includes a high-level overview of all of the data analysis, the cost of service analysis, as well as
obviously the resulting strategy from that work.
And then we had supplement E. You can see Leslie's smiling face on that report there. This was the providers
network and inventory report. We had an opportunity to visit with a number of representatives from different
providers, nonprofit, private and public sector, leisure service providers,
and allied providers to identify who is providing what in the community, to best reduce duplication,
to fill gaps, to understand how we can work together in a very productive, efficient way, and strengthen
existing relationships. So all of these were the documentation that resulted from all of the work that
was completed. The priorities of this process were the four you see on the screen.
We had community impact, the priority of how do we impact the community, how do we continue to impact
the community in the most productive, positive way, how can we prioritize investing in what we have,
taking care of our existing infrastructure, becoming a financially sustainable organization, continuing
to stay on the path of responsible fiscal stewardship, and then having a strong, connected BPR team,
essentially ensuring that those who do the work on a daily basis are strong, they're connected, and
they're thriving.
to feed a strong culture and system. I wanted to break down each of these priorities for you in terms
of what those intended outcomes were that I just referenced a bit ago. The intended outcome by way of
prioritizing community impact is that you have seamless and accessible user experiences on behalf of
the community, that you have inclusive spaces that serve all residents, that you have stronger community
connections and a sense of belonging in the community,
that you've created protected and resilient natural systems, and that there's clear demonstration of
community value and impact. Again, these are the intended outcomes by way of actionable steps that align
with those priorities that have been identified. That second priority area, invest in what we have,
the intended outcomes, putting energy resource actionable steps towards this priority will result in
proactive and coordinated asset management, reduced deferred maintenance,
and improved system resilience and reliability, higher utilization and performance of existing assets,
consistent, efficient operations across the entire system, and an environmentally sustainable and resilient
infrastructure. That third priority, financial sustainability, the intended outcomes,
of this priority are a clear understanding of the cost and value of services internally as
well as externally, more diverse and reliable revenue streams, consistent and transparent financial
decision-making, capital investments that align with long-term capacity, and improved financial performance
and operational efficiency. And that last priority, relative to a strong and connected team, aligned
effective communication across the organization. And many of these things are happening, it's continuation of.
clear expectations and streamlined systems, a skilled and continuously developing workforce, a culture
supportive of employee well-being and engagement, and a strong sense of identity, purpose, and pride
in the organization. And of course, we know we can identify priorities and we can identify outcomes,
but we really need to be thinking about how are we going to make these things happen. And that's where
that last supplement comes in.
completely understand that it looks like an eye chart up there for all of you, but it was to give you
a sense of what this attached, this supplement to the master plan actually looks like. It's
a very comprehensive list of actionable steps for this organization to take to move the needle towards
influencing and affecting the priorities that I just identified, ultimately leading to those intended
outcomes. One of the things I did want to share with
with you is as we zoom in on this, you can see this worksheet that's intended to be a tool for the staff
includes each priority along with all of the recommended actions. You'll see additional columns here
that list prioritization, meaning what level of priority is this in our organization? Is it high, medium, and low?
And there's some qualifying and quantifiable statements that have directed the staff to make very informed
decisions about whether something is actually a high, medium, or low priority. Alternatively, each action
has an attached resource requirement. Essentially, is this going to take a lot of time and money to
complete high, medium, and low?
You also notice every action has an assigned staff lead and team, as well as an anticipated timeline
for completion. So this again is intended to be a tool that's useful for the organization moving forward
over this five-year window. I do want to mention that
Each priority has a different number of actionable steps. Priority one, there are actually 27 actions
identified for priority two, 18, for priority three, 19, and that fourth priority, a strong and connected
BPR team, has 11 actionable steps for a complete total of 75 actions. The last thing I'll share about
the strategic action plan is this is the part of the master plan that becomes less static. Essentially,
the intention is this is reviewed annually for updates to ensure
ensure its relevance. Things changed incredibly dynamically today, as you all know, economically,
environmentally, socially, so it's incumbent upon the organization to keep tabs on productivity certainly
and completion, but also ensure that there's relevance for all of the actions as time moves on.
That said, as I conclude this overview,
We have provided the team a policy draft relative to financial sustainability, and this is in process.
The draft has been presented to Tim for review, and this is expected to be something that he will bring
to you and bring forward at a later date as it's modified and adjusted and prepared for a work session
and ultimately adoption.
So with that, I'm going to go ahead and take any questions that you might have for me and then turn
it over to Tim. I don't have any questions at this time. Thank you, Jamie, for that information and
for the previous meeting we had in person with you with all the details. Any questions from Israel or
Ellen? No, thank you for sharing the information, Jamie.
I would say for Now we can go to Tim and then we might have questions after that Okay, thank you so
much Jamie. It's nice to see you again. Thank you I don't have a whole lot to add on that. I think we
want to get to probably public comment here in a second, but Just want to mention that if you want to
get to sort of where the rubber meets the road with the report Go to the strategic action plan
because that is how we are deciding to respond to everything that we've Discovered and heard some of
this is you know stuff we've kind of known all along obviously we we entered into the master plan process
Specifically looking for a focus on financial sustainability. So there's some things there that we've
talked about themes Etc and there's other things that have emerged from our feedback survey, etc I think
we've we've done a really good job clarifying and
Priority goals and actions underneath them to have that be a living document, but without getting into
the minutia I think we've done that in the past a little bit of Sort of day-to-day divisional operations
and reporting some of that stuff out. So I think we've honed in that really well if that part is living
but I think that's the clearest place to go look and see well, what are we doing in response to this?
That's where we're going to begin Not every decision is made
There of course some of them referenced needing to make decisions in collaboration with the park board
that will be coming up very soon. So Thank you for listening. We will revisit this next month for potential
adoption And if there are questions that come up in the meantime Please route them my way and I can
work with with Jamie and staff to ensure those are addressed before we bring it back I guess I'll just
say I do have one edit
on page 16, it references the University of Indiana. Oh. Uh-oh. Yeah. Uh-oh. Good catch. We'll fix that.
OK. All right. Thanks again, Jamie, and thank you, Tim. And then in our section E, we can take any public
comment here in person or also online. You can raise your hand online if you're watching that way.
We do have one online. Yes, Brandon. I you should be able to unmute yourself Hello, can I turn on my
camera? Camera just your audio Time did you want a lot for this Brandon for two minutes and
All right, sounds good. I prepared a script for three minutes, but I'll try to read as fast as I can.
Okay. All right. Good afternoon, Director Street, President Mills, and members of the board. My name
is Brandon Bothell. I'm an employee of the city security contractor, Marshall Security Investigations,
MSI, or rather I was until today. This afternoon, after I formally reported wage theft and submitted
my two weeks notice of resignation due to unethical practices, MSI leadership terminated me immediately.
I'm here to report both systematic wage theft and clear whistleblower retaliation. For months, I've
documented MSI leadership manually adjusting my time sheets to reflect fewer hours than I worked,
specifically omitting time spent handling critical park emergencies or training to avoid paying overtime.
I have evidence of this manipulation, including original logs compared to shortened payroll records
and recorded admissions from MSI leadership that they were manually cutting my hours despite my accurate
time clock entries.
Yesterday, I sent a formal email to director Tim Street in the city's attorney's office detailing these
concerns. Shortly after making this report and submitting a two-week notice, I was let go. In Indiana
and under City of Bloomington's contract standards, retail power is a serious violation. This is a clear
attempt to silence me and prevent this evidence from reaching you. I'm requesting that the board take
the following immediate steps
Call any upcoming contract renewals or payments to MSI until a full independent audit of their payroll
and labor practices is completed. Review the legality of my termination today as a breach of the city's
contract compliance and anti-retaliation policies. And lastly, initiate a formal investigation by the
city legal department into these manual adjustments that defraud both workers and taxpayers who fund
this contract. I have all the documentation ready for the legal department. I ask the board to stand
behind its own ethics ordinances
And ensure that contractors who manage our public spaces are held to the law. Thank you for your time
today All right, thank you for that Brandon and you've been in touch with Tim you've received something
from Yes, and it was passed on to the city's legal department. Okay. All right. Thank you for that any
other public comment here this evening and
Okay, and no one else online. Okay. All right, then we will go back to Tim for any more announcements
upcoming and Great as usual I like to Share a few things going on in this time and just mention the
happenings. There's always good things, especially this time of year First of all, thank you Leslie
for being our co-pilot this evening like you said great roll call and
Kim has managed to go on vacation and miss the last park board meeting before she retires. So she and
Becky both snuck that in on me without me realizing, but just want to recognize Kim before she retires.
I'll send you some information about her retirement as well. As mentioned, we're working a lot on digital
accessibility. It's a big lift. The deadline's upcoming. We're still learning, figuring out a lot of
things with this.
Like I said expect the next meeting to look a little different I'm sure there'll be some growing pains
as we navigate a new system But I think it's going to be really great in the end and really functional
You'll notice the ice arena didn't come up on the agenda tonight We're still moving forward getting
quotes assessing planning on opening in the fall with some repairs we anticipate Chris and keto bringing
you those items in May and
And talking a little bit more about next steps in terms of the stakeholder group that we mentioned and
getting that together this summer So we're still very much working on that and I want to you know If
anyone's watching worried, are we gonna open the ice arena in the fall? Yes, that is the plan Going
through all the appropriate channels for that But still very much need to make bigger future decisions
I want to shout out urban forestry. We got some great feedback on the tree assistance program Helping
people remove high-risk trees with some provided funding from the ESD department And and yeah, just
emphasizing that agenda item from earlier tonight It's pretty remarkable to be able to go to Brian Park
and see big mature ash trees We hear it all the time from people who maybe come in from out of town
or know what they're looking for that like oh my gosh, like look at these
amazing ash trees that we still have at Brian Park. And that is part of its wonderful status as the
Arboretum as well. Lots of things going on. We're a couple of farmers markets in now. A Food Truck Friday
in. The Performing Arts Series info is pretty much all on the website now. All the free concerts, the
movies in the park. You've heard partnerships with Cicada. Thank you to our wonderful sponsors for the
Performing Arts Series.
The new program guide just arrived. I left you one up there on the dais. And Grand Faloon concerts have
been announced during the process of being announced. I'm really excited about those as well. The Sports
Division just finished some new improvements up at the Upper Cascades skate park. It was just a repair,
but local company Hunger Skateparks always seems to go above and beyond for us, and they actually installed
some new features as well.
at no cost to the city, which is pretty incredible. Other things coming up, I'll just mention Arbor
Day. We have a tree planting at Rogers Family Park to celebrate Arbor Day on the 24th. Children's Expo
on the 26th. Bill mentioned the Studio Cipher event in May. The Senior Expo's, excuse me, the 50-plus
Expo is in early May. Pool's open May 23rd, so busy season.
And and Griffey boathouse also opens daily in May. So lots of things going on. We will reconvene For
our May meeting on the 21st at 5 p.m Earth Day is this Saturday as well. I missed one Thank you, and
even though Kim clap is off on her well-deserved vacation just yeah for the record I mean we all hope
she has a wonderful retirement the reason we're able to do what we can do up here is because she
completely organized with packets and answers all of our questions and make sure we have a quorum and
Signatures are all taken care of and everything. So well deserved. Congratulations Kim wherever you
are out there vacationing All right, and with that I will adjourn the April meeting of the Bloomington
Board of Park commissioners and