A swimmer enjoys a splash at Hill Pool in this 2022 file photo. Council will be asked next week to rank its priorities when in comes to staff drawing up a long-promised recreation facility reinvestment plan.--News File Photo
cgallant@medicinehatnews.com@CollinGallant
Whether to maintain, modernize or expand city pools, arenas and rec centres may be debated at a special meeting of council to determine a direction for the bandied about issue, according to the head of a committee tackling it.
Coun. Ramona Robins, head of the public services committee, says she feels a focused meeting would finalize what council wants to see in the plan, and how it would grade proposals from staff for spending priorities and projects over the next 25 years.
“It was the first notable decision we made (to solicit the report) … and we aren’t being hasty with it,” Robins said Wednesday, following a presentation earlier this week.
“Staff is looking for what council wants out of it: is it status quo, adding an outdoor pool, an arena, a doubled or quad arena, a curling rink? There are a lot of options.”
That could lead to debate when the committee’s work arrives at council Monday, but, a survey for councillors won’t include specific projects, like a south-end pool, the location of a potential twin-plex, or repairing existing facilities.
Rather, a survey of how council members rank outcomes and which of council’s strategic priorities – financial, social, well-being, etc. – should be considered and in what order, by report authors.
That would inform the report that was originally due back in the fall, said James Will, director of the parks department.
“It’s a very complex problem,” said Will. “(For example) we think there are things we can do at Hill Pool (to make it expand), but there are limitations because there is an older arena on site.”
“(The council survey) will help us expedite (the report) if we can narrow down some guiding principles.”
The city’s two-year budget, including approved capital projects, runs until the end of 2024, but capital construction plans are generally laid out and put into a 10-year time span.
According to Will that could include relatively little spending on much larger projects to conglomerate facilities in much larger “destination” areas.
Generally, the plan has been discussed as having three tracts; maintaining current facilities, replacing them with like facilities, or centralizing several into larger projects.
But, each strategy could be applied to each facet of recreation, and joining different types of faculties – a rec centre with a pool or arena joined to a curling club – creates overlap, another goal of council is to engage other rec providers, like the YMCA, school boards and community sporting groups, on partnerships.
“There are a lot of (issues) that I think are known in the community, and staff is going in 50 directions, so maybe we can get that down to maybe five directions,” said Robins, adding her recommendation is to move the issue to a council of the whole committee where staff could present and the public could be informed.
Documents state that maintaining existing facilities might require $42.5 million in city spending over 27 years, about $8 million less than the “like” replacement option.
The cost of a more “comprehensive overhaul” including destination ice and aquatics centres, along with Echo Dale expansion, could reach well above $150 million, if all moves forward.
The department states that while population in Medicine Hat could grow by 15,000 residents by 2050 (to 80,000 in total), the percentage of seniors will double to 33 per cent, and there would be 1,000 fewer school aged children at that time.
That will change the types and number of facilities required, as well as changing trends and popularity of some activities.
The number of factors has led to some gridlock in finalizing a plan.
It was requested in early 2022 as an offshoot of a parks and rec masterplan, aligned with key election issues from the previous fall, but has now gone back and forth several times between committee and staff.
In March, council members and specifically Mayor Linnsie Clark reiterated that social and health impacts are to be ranked alongside financial costs in analysis.
In mid-2021, the department generally proposed closing at least two stand-alone older arenas in the Hockey Hounds and Moose Recreation centres, then building a twin-plex to combine operating expenses and lower costs.
That would avoid replacing the Moose slab or required work at Crestwood pool, but a newly elected council reversed the decision in early 2022, essentially reopening them while the department completed a followup report to the recreation masterplan focused on facility needs and options.
