The MPRB website states "Development of a new, high quality sports complex grew out of a recommendation in l997 from the Select Committee on Youth Sports." Per contemporaneous press reports, the Neiman Complex was developed 1) to address a shortage of soccer fields, 2) because our kids needed better quality fields, and 3) so that children and their families could learn the history of the Fort Snelling area.
Shawne's recent post about the Neiman sports complex brings a lot of questions to mind. Among them are:
1. Who was on the "Select Committee for Youth Sports?"
2. Was the lease signed in 1997 Do we only have 22 years to go? Will we have gotten 6 million dollars worth of use (plus all other related costs) before the lease is up?
3. Could the Soccer Fields have been built throughout the neighborhood playground parks where all children would have access to them, the way the use of those parks was intended? Example at Armatage: they adapted the playground park to include skate board facilities.
4. Didn't the preservationists warn the park board that they would be sued before the Park Board moved forward with this project? If that is true, did the Park Board know ahead of time that they could find additional funding to defend themselves? I've been told by a current commissioner that the legal battles were very expensive.
5. Why would the Park Board invest so much money in developing property where they only own 14.5% of the land and the rest is only leased for their use for 30 years? They own so much land all over the city, couldn't a better location have been found?
6. Is there any possibility of turning this situation around without raising fees so high at the Neiman sports complex, and throughout the system, that most of the public will not be able to use these or other park facilities because they are unable to afford them?
7. Could anyone suggest a graceful way for Park Board to let go and get our money out of this bottomless money pit?
8. Was the real motivation behind some supporters of this project to simply stick the taxpayers with the expensive $2 million water line bill so that the bluff top could be improved, developed and used by private entities?
9. Why was now-superintendent-then private citizen Jon Gurban involved in pushing this forward, along with Bob Fine? Does anyone remember Bob Fine's dissembling to the press about not knowing Jon Gurban before he was appointed interim superintendent? Doesn't that seem even less likely in this context?
10. According to the Park Board 2003 Financial Report, all of the golf courses combined had a net revenue (profit) of $449,661. How can the Park Board afford to pay the $14 million in bonds off with payments of about $1 million per year using income from the golf courses when it falls short by half?
11. Has the Twin Cities Ultimate League (http://www.mnultimate.org/) been a heavy user/renter of the fields at Neiman? If not, why not? They were a major supporter, and their future usage was given as a strong argument for the need for the fields. (October 28, 1999 memo to Park Board from the Twin Cities Ultimate League.)
12. Why did Maureen Durand, Assistant Superintendent for Recreation send a memo on October 28, 1999 to organized sports organizations encouraging them to lobby the state (DNR) against other proposed projects at Ft. Snelling so that the Park Board could proceed with their plans? Supporting this effort were Park Board employees Eileen Kilpatrick (now a newly appointed district manager), Harry Harrison, Jack Palmer and others.
13. Where are the schools today that the Park Board hoped would occupy some of the buildings at Ft. Snelling, paying rent to the Park Board? Assistant superintendent Don Siggelkow claimed that such use was more important than "esoteric historic claims". (David Peterson, Staff Writer. Star Tribune. Minneapolis, Minn.: May 6, 2000. pg. 01.B)
14. Where is the two ice rink facility that the Minnesota Wild was supposed to build at Ft. Snelling on land leased from the Park Board? (Tom Jones, Staff Writer. Star Tribune. Minneapolis, Minn.: May 18, 2000. pg. 10.C)
15. Have suburban communities stopped refusing to play against Minneapolis [horrors!] now that we have a facility "up to their standards?" That was the situation according to commissioner candidate Mary Merrill Anderson, former superintendent in a story by Tom Jones, Staff Writer. (Star Tribune, Minneapolis, Minn.: May 18, 2000. pg. 10.C) She also claimed there were not enough places for our kids to play. How many kids are "playing" at the Neiman complex? Far less than 8,000, that's for darn sure. How many kids in Minneapolis? A lot more than ten times that amount.
And those are just the questions at the tip of my tongue, so to speak.
Chris Johnson Fulton
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