Um first meeting of the park and recck commission in 2026. Um January 14th, 2026, 6:30. Um meeting is just being held virtual. I guess the town hall is closed for today. Um Cara, do we have
anybody on other than board members? >> Nope, it's all board members. >> Okay, so I guess no public comment tonight. >> Next thing up was the minutes. Um, I took a look at them, but since we can't sign anything, I guess we could probably
hold off and just do those on the next meeting. >> Okay. >> Okay. >> Okay. >> Unless you have to get turned in. >> Just so you know, I won't be able to see them unless someone can send them to me. I when Cara when you sent them out, it it gave me a warning that it had
something attached to it, so I didn't open it. >> Huh. Okay. >> Yeah. You know, I was thinking about because some of the other I noticed some of the other boards their uh minutes they just say they approve them and not necessarily everyone signs them. So, I was thinking maybe we should go to that.
So, they're approved but not everybody has to sign them, >> you know, unless you guys want to sign them, but something we can look at going forward. >> I don't have to sign it. I mean, if they're they'll take them unsigned. I mean, I looked at the last one you sent out a while ago and that was fine with
me. But, yeah, >> if you feel better waiting, that's fine, too. I'm not sure what everybody else looked at them, not looked at them. >> I have not looked at them. >> Okay. Well, why don't we wait then? >> Okay.
>> Um, I guess that's it for minutes. Um, next thing up was the Wally Park. Um, I had a a couple things I thought I would I'd just run by the board. Uh, we've had the same field prices pretty
much since uh, baseball and soccer started up there. I don't know if we should revisit that over the winter before the season starts up again for everybody or everybody's happy with the prices. I believe it's $50 for a a game
or nightly practice. >> Yeah, $50 per field use. Um, and then the pavilion is $200. That's pretty cheap for the fields with the amount of work they do to get them ready and keep them ready. I would think up a little bit on that
and not not lose any of our our renters. >> Yeah, I think it is on the low side. I mean, we probably had it eight years or so anyways at that price, but I I don't know care if you started
booking or we have a month out before we start booking people. So, >> so the Titans gave me their whole schedule for the spring. Um, they they made their last payment for the fall, so they're they're up to date with their payments, but yeah, they already started booking. They wanted to book um an
opening day in March, and I told them it depends on the field conditions. Um, I mean, if we're it's completely dry and it's doable, that's fine, but if not, they can't they can't do it. They can't hold it. And then they wanted to do some camps. So, yeah, I've started booking with Titans, but other teams haven't
reached out yet. >> We know what other towns get for their fields. >> What's that? >> Do we know what other towns get? >> Yeah, so I did research that. It seemed like $60, $50. I haven't found anything more than 60. Um
I I checked with Graanby and East Hampton. Um I didn't check like Springfield or anything like that yet. So, >> do we have other teams that are interested or we're not sure yet? >> Yeah, [clears throat] so we usually have
um like four teams that always rent. We have the um wood bat league, um a couple adult leagues, the Titans, and then the softball. And then every once in a while I have, you know, random people who want to just
rent the field for a day or something. Um, so yeah, we have the regulars definitely that we've had for years. Uh, >> oh, sorry. Uh, >> oh [clears throat] no, >> the cat unruly cat.
>> I don't know. Maybe maybe for this year you keep it you keep it at 50. Or if you want to raise the oneoffs, you know, the people that use it once in a while, you could you could raise their rate and uh figure out a rate for next year possibly. >> Yeah.
>> Any idea how many rental days or days or games that the Titans have used? I mean, they're the biggest user by far. >> Oh, they So, they have like the 90 foot is rented four days a week. The 5070 is I think three and the softballs two. So
they have a lot of rentals. >> Yeah, >> they're um Yeah, I mean they have the majority of the bookings. So even from them, if you add up all your bookings, if you went up $10 to the $60 level, I don't think it would hurt
the cost. Nobody's going to walk away, >> right? That would give I don't know how many bookings you have throughout the season from all users, but that's got to be 100 or more open for this four or five month season. So, >> oh yeah, bookings definitely.
>> You got the three fields, the big one, the 70 or the 90 foot, the 70 foot, and the south ball. So, >> I'll make a motion to raise it to $60. >> I'd second that. >> All in favor? We'll do a voice vote. Just say your
name. >> Tom Wallally. I >> Yeah, well try >> Mike Shei. >> David Dori. I >> All right. Do we have a price on a scoreboard yet, Dan? >> I have not. I've been working on tax
stuff for the last month and a half. So, I'll try to get out to >> All right. get a hold of the new company. They changed their sales, the way they sell them, so it's going to be more local. The guy wasn't very responsive before. So,
okay, I guess we're set on that. Uh, next thing I was thinking, um, this kind of ties into the budget, which we are getting turned in by the end of the month. Um, I think we should come up with a long-term maintenance plan for the park. I mean, we do have things that
are constantly going to have to be done. I mean, it could be a one year, fiveyear type thing, but I mean, even simple things like the roofs on the bathrooms will have to be redone at some time. Just the painting of the bathrooms, walls, and floors. Um,
the the uh splash pads going to need regular maintenance here and there. painting on the pickle ball. I mean, we don't have to come up with everything at once, but I just like to throw that out there so people could start getting that together so we have some kind of long-term thing
so when we do the budgets, we can say, "Okay, this is going to have to be done five years and we can put that on the budgets instead of thinking every single year." I think it would be worthwhile to have a long-term plan. If anybody's got any comments to that.
>> Well, we shouldn't use shouldn't need roofs for 20 years. >> Yeah, I I realize that. But [clears throat] like certain things we will need. >> Yeah. >> Like even simple things like the parking lot painting. I I imagine that was probably last done before this year.
What 11 years ago? >> Um like the playscape maintenance. There's always like little things that get broken or knocked out that people bring to our attention. >> So I I think just to throw that out there.
>> What do they do at town hall? >> They must have similar problems >> as far as the budget. >> What do you mean? What do they do at town hall? But for a maintenance plan >> for a maintenance plan. >> Sorry, I think it's on mute. Hold on.
Okay. I didn't hear you. >> I wanted to know what they do for maintenance at the town hall. >> That would probably be something we could we could ask Stephen the the fill-in or temporary or full-time maintenance guy. But I mean, they've had
a few turnover of guys in the last three years. I'm not sure if they have a full plan like for all their stuff or not. I mean, we could talk to him and see. >> The park shouldn't be anything different than the town hall or the police station
or fire station. >> Right. That makes sense. >> Yeah. But they don't they don't have a splash pad or a playscape and and that kind of thing. I'm just thinking we need some kind of plan just to have
in place. I think would be a good idea. >> It would probably help us defend our budget when he went for a budget. >> Well, we do one of the the items in our budget. Um we have quite a fair amount from the parking over the years. I I
think they're going to want us to start tapping that on certain things. I think we should probably figure out what we want to spend that on and what we don't want to spend it on. >> How much do we have accumulated? >> I think it was close to a 100,000. Is that right, Cara?
>> Yes. >> We're going to need to do some playscape repairs because we had put that in the budget last year. Um, I think we had requested like 30 grand cuz that net costs about 30 grand, which is crazy. Um, and we didn't get that. We They had
given us like 12 grand. So, we're probably going to have to start using the Wally Park money to um do the playcape repairs. >> I wonder if we could use a different vendor than that. Um, Cindy Mac. What do
you think, John? Cuz that, like I said, that net itself with installation was 30 grand. That seems like a lot of money for a net. >> Kind of insane. >> Yeah, >> I don't remember what it cost the first
time. [clears throat] It should be uh you should have the parts available to maintain it. I think that's the quote we did get for it to buy the net and then you'd need somebody to install it again.
The installation was only three grand. Well, only I mean it was three grand, but the majority of the cost is the net. Just seems very expensive to replace um pieces of the playscape. Like if we if we replaced everything that needed to be replaced, we'd probably drain our
account. I think easily >> think we should have it fixed. >> Definitely. >> Okay. It's like those kind of things like for the next meeting if everybody wants to come up with certain things.
You think we have to I mean I kind of keep an eye on it here and there when I'm up there, but I mean I'm sure having a couple different sets of eyes on things that would probably have to be maintained over time. I mean even things like the pickle ball courts will have to
be restriped at some point. So I I think it'd be better if we had it like kind of prepared and know what we're looking at down the road on things. Even if it's a little longer time frame off, I figure I'd just get that out there, maybe review it a little bit more next meeting.
That's a good idea, Dave. >> Okay, >> we got to look. Speaking of pickle ball, we should look a forward ahead. We're going to be six months or more to get it up and going. But if somebody comes in and wants to rent it for a tournament, kind of block out the average user for a
tournament. I know they do a lot of tournaments in Westfield, but >> Okay. >> But we can we can say, "Okay, yeah, you can have it. We can block out the the public. They can go down to the city the town hall and use that one, but we should come up with a a fair price for that and have it have it ready versus
scramble if somebody calls us up and wants to do something." >> Okay. Maybe for the next meeting we kind of find. >> Have some ideas what what the market is. >> Okay. It's a good idea. >> I'm sure we could ask Westfield and Agalan, right? They have
>> Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure we can. Y >> um speaking speaking of pickle ball, I it was supposed to go out today to get put on the town site in the the state site for bidding on the pickle ball courts at Wall-E Park. Um Rob Le sent
out an email or his secretary, somebody in the office and Nicole was going to put that on. It was supposed to go on today. I haven't had time to check, but um if it went on today, they have a month to do the bidding. The bidding should be opened in February.
Um what we're looking at from there is hopefully to have somebody start April 1st more or less. And I I think we are looking at two to three month time frame be putting the courts in, letting them sit, getting the fencing in, and then
getting them striped. So, we're hoping Juneish to get things going if all things go well, which they don't always, but that's what we're looking at roughly right now. I mean, once we get the bids
back and get those in February, we can do another update and let you know where we are with everything. >> We'll review those and makes a decision. Is that something that Rob helps us with or >> uh Rob and Nicole? >> Nicole. Okay. >> Yeah. and they'll go through and find
the lowest best bit and vet the contractors. So, we should have a little bit more by next meeting or right after next meeting with that. Um, let's see. Anybody else have
anything at the park? Okay. Well, I'll pick it up then. I had somebody from the uh um civic fund ask us about doing uh fireworks again this year. I know we had quite a big turnout last year between there and over at the rec center
and the motocross with that. They're looking to expand it a little bit other than fireworks and food trucks like last year. Maybe have some smaller carnival rides for the kids and maybe tie that in with other things. but he was looking at
maybe doing it in August. And the town is also the select board has requested us along with some of the other boards to see if we have any interest in doing anything for the 250th celebration
not of South but of the country. Um if we have any ideas for that. They have a meeting on Monday, January 26 with the select board for that. If anybody's got ideas, if you come up with anything between now and then and aren't going to
be able to make it, I'm going to be going to that meeting. You can forward them to the select board or forward them to me. And >> I think the civic is talking about having like a two or three day event. I think >> um
>> I thought he was to get rid of you won't get him for one day, I don't think. >> Yeah, I was just he was talking to me informally about it and said he'd like to do that again, but I didn't get like the whole scope of everything. He was going to come to a meeting and present
it to us. >> What What's the town doing and why don't we piggy back off of that? >> Um I don't think they have any anything definite going on with that. So they don't have anything. So they want us to figure it out, you know. Yeah. But I'm
thinking, >> but we should be picking off, you know, what the town's doing. Are they doing a parade? Are they doing fireworks? Right. And you bring them into the park, you can fit a lot of people there. You have food trucks. You have different events, you know. So I think the town would have some ideas what they want to do as well
to celebrate. >> So I I I think we're the the recreation committee, so I think that's why they're looking for ideas. I I don't think fireworks is going to be a a great choice for >> the recreation the sports recreation but not the entertainment recreation
committee. >> My my own opinion is the fireworks are going to be extremely expensive this fourth of July because everybody is going to want to have them on the 4th of July and seeing we have no money in our budget to pay for fireworks.
But if anybody has ideas for other things or things we could do at the park, maybe John Wall-E wants to sponsor a car show, but any ideas would be great to have before that. Okay. >> Okay.
>> All righty. Anybody else have anything on the park? Okay, we'll move on to the rail trail. Um, still been a lot of use on it this winter between even though it's had snow and ice on it with people walking or cross-country skiing and snowmobiles
here and there. Um, I've had people bring it up to me about plowing the trail or sections of the trail if that would be an option to think of, not this year, but maybe next year. I know we have had private people out there to do
it themselves and I don't know who's doing it and how often it gets done, but I have had people call and let me know that that's being done, but that's nothing to do with us. But I didn't know if that's something we should consider at some point.
>> How do we staff that? [clears throat] Excuse me. We have no staff. >> I realize that. >> Um, your hat and gloves on, Cara. I I have an idea for that. I'd like to >> have no we have no staff and no money.
So >> if [laughter] that's my >> I have an idea for it. I'd like to talk to the finance committee about it, but it would be juggling around a few other departments and items to get to that
point. But I don't know if it's something we should even consider before I mention that if that's a good thing or just leave it as is. I mean, could you put um salt on the trail? So, like right now, if you had plowed that it's parts of it is very
icy. I mean, would they salt that? Can you even salt the trail? Like, is that even >> Yeah, it would have to be plowed right away. I think it gets pretty icy because people are walking on it right away and soon as it melts, it gets a thicker layer of ice. But I don't know if we
plow it if then we're on the hook for having to salt it and sand it or if we can do it at at your own risk kind of thing. >> Well, if you plow it, you're going to have to salt it. >> Yeah. No. I mean, they won't even plow Wally Park because they don't want to
get involved in all the [clears throat] >> Well, they they do the entrance and at Wall-E Park, but people are still like the last two storms are still driving up there no matter how much snow is on the ground. I I think we should probably
revisit that sometime, too, because one of these days we're going to get people stuck up there, and I don't want it coming back to haunt us. a lot of plowing. >> Yeah, I realize that. I don't think we should I don't think we should do the
whole thing. I think an option we could do is maybe just the entrance in one parking lot, but like you say with the trail, then we're on the hook for salting any time. And that's just another chunk of our budget that's going to go pretty quick.
>> Yeah. >> Yeah. The trails the trail is so shaded in a lot of it's just it's not going to melt. >> I think it opens up constantly sanding and salting it. I think that just extremely amount of high liability. >> Yeah. >> Yep. You plow it and then you salt it
and then it refreezes. You didn't salt it. Someone slips. Well, you plowed it. I thought I could walk out, you know, just let it melt. >> Okay. I think that answers that then. >> Right. The only other thing I had on the rail trail, the friends of the rail
trail uh met last Wednesday. Um they're thinking of disbanding. They have mostly older members that have been on it for a while. And a few of them want to step down and not do the leadership things anymore. They're also trying to look for
younger members. If anybody knows anybody that might be interested in that, they'd welcome that. They have another meeting next February, the same thing, to formally decide about disbanding the friends. I think it would be a worthwhile group to keep I because
they do an awful lot for the trails and they do a lot of little maintenance things like fixing the kiosk, planning things. So, the trail basically looks better than everybody else's section. And without them, I mean, we either kind
of let it go to hell or get have to get more maintenance people to do all the finesse kind of things that they do every year. >> Yeah, we should encourage them to stay in existence. For sure. >> Well, I have been
I was thinking of if it's coming down to that, like maybe taking over one of the things myself, but I don't know if that's a conflict with the board. I'm still running it back and forth in my head and I've got to check into that. But if anybody does know anybody that
would be interested, the only thing they ask from their volunteers is maybe twice a year for cleanup thing. Once in the spring and once in the fall. Um they also do the trail counts twice a year. Um, and that that would help us
because if we apply to any grants for trail work, they take into account how much use is getting out of the Southwick Trail and that's way up there in the past few years. That would help us quite a bit.
>> How have they gone about trying to solit solicit new members? Have they like advertise? >> They've been advertising a little bit on Facebook. A lot of word of mouth. I was going to get something printed up and put on the kiosk this week, but I haven't gotten around to that yet. Um,
we also had somebody show up at the last meeting um who's starting a drone business, and he asked about flying the drone over the trail and taking videos and then putting something about looking for friends along with that and posting
them on Facebook and Instagram. Hopefully get some people. It's not a huge time commitment, but it it definitely helps us out with everything. So, I figured I'd say if anybody knows anybody that's remotely interested, I mean, you could give my
number or email and I'll get them to the next meeting. We'll go from there. >> Sounds like a good plan. >> Okay. appreciate any help I can get on that. Um the the budget I kind of mentioned
before is being submitted the end of the month. I'm not sure. Do we have to go in this year, Karen, and talk to him or did you already get beat up about it yourself? >> I have to. Um I'm going to ask. I was supposed to have my meeting this afternoon. Um and I didn't, but I was
going to ask him. >> But you clogged the toilets. >> No, was not me. Okay. I was joking, by the way. >> Yeah, that really wasn't funny, but okay. [laughter] >> You're laughing. >> Um,
>> yeah. So, I'm not sure if we'll be going in front of the finance committee or not. I'll have to find out when I have my meeting. I'll let you know. >> Okay. Anybody else has anything? All right, John. I know you're it. >> Motion to adjurnn. >> I second that motion.
>> All in favor? >> I >> I >> All right. I'll see everybody next month then. >> All right. I'm ready.