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PC - Minutes - 09-05-2023MINUTES OF THE ROSEMEAD PARKS COMMISSION REGULAR MEETING SEPTEMBER 5, 2023 The regular meeting of the Rosemead Parks Commission was called to order by Commissioner Dang at 7:15 p.m. in the Rosemead City Council Chamber located at 8838 East Valley Boulevard, Rosemead, California. PRESENT: Commissioners Chavez, Mendez, Dang, Hernandez, and Luau ABSENT: None PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE Commissioner Dang ADMINISTRATION OF OATH OF OFFICE Charlie Chavez, Alina Hernandez, and Karen Luau REORGANIZATION: Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking opened the nominations for Chair. Chair Chavez nominated Chair Chavez; the nomination was seconded by Commissioner Dang. Motion carried by the following vote: AYES: Chavez, Mendez, Dang, Hernandez, and Luau. Chair Chavez opened the nominations for Vice -Chair. Vice -Chair Mendez nominated Vice -Chair Mendez; the nomination was seconded by Commissioner Luau. Motion carried by the following vote: AYES: Chavez, Mendez, Dang, Hernandez, and Luau. 1. PUBLIC COMMENTS FROM THE AUDIENCE — None 2. CONSENT CALENDAR A. Approval of minutes — June 6, 2023 Vice -Chair Mendez motioned the approval of the meeting notes at 7:28 p.m. ACTION: Moved by Vice -Chair Mendez, seconded by Commissioner Dang to approve the June 6, 2023 Minutes: Motion carried by the following vote: AYES: Chavez, Mendez, Dang, Hernandez, and Luau; ABSENT: None 3. MATTERS FROM STAFF A. Garvey Park Amenities An essential role of this Commission is to identify potential park space and amenities offered at each park. The City Council asked the Department to bring this item to the Commission, and for the Director to formalize a report later on this year or early next year. Therefore, we are going to discuss what kind of amenities we have in the parks and discuss what we would like to see as amenities added to the parks, and what amenities we are not too fond of at the parks. Due to the quantity of information, Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking felt that it would be more efficient to take this task park -by - park. Therefore, in June the Commission was presented with the largest park first - Rosemead Park. Today we will discuss the second largest park in Rosemead, Garvey Park. Garvey Park is located at 7833 Emerson Ave. It contains approximately 2 acres of land. The amenities in Garvey Park are substantial for a park of its size. We currently have two baseball/softball fields, a dog park that provides space for both small and large dogs, fitness equipment around the park, a multipurpose field that is used for a variety of activities as well as for team rentals, and a gymnasium with a basketball court, locker rooms, and restrooms. There's also a parking lot located off Emerson Avenue, picnic shelters that surround the area that are available for reservation, and playgrounds. There are two playground structures located within Garvey Park. A couple of years ago we had to remove one of the playground structures, so the Department is looking at replacing it. There are also two sets of restrooms, one is relatively new - built only about 3'/z years ago, the other is on the older side. Unfortunately, there was a fire last winter, and half of the building containing those restrooms was destroyed. The Department is looking at rebuilding and replacing those. Garvey Park is also home to the Splash Zone. Splash Zone has two sides, a water pad, and a small lesson pool. There are five tennis courts at Garvey Park. The resurfacing of the tennis courts will begin next week and will include the retrofitting of one tennis court to be Pickleball courts. There has been a ton of public interest and excitement surrounding that project. We also have our Youth Center in Garvey Park. This facility has two multipurpose rooms used for a variety of activities, classes, day camps, and an after-school program. Both full- time and part-time staff are housed in this facility. The Department is looking at developing the programs in this facility. This concludes the list of current amenities available in Garvey Park. If the Commission has any ideas or comments on amenities for the park, now is the time to discuss that. Vice -Chair Mendez had a question about resurfacing the tennis courts. She asked for clarification on the type of surface the Department will be converting to during the resurfacing project. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking responded that the surface would be the same style as the existing surface of the tennis courts which is a textured overlay over concrete. The surface of the Pickleball courts would be the same as the surface of the tennis courts. The difference will be that the lines on the pickleball courts will be different than the lines on a tennis court. The court which will act as both pickleball courts and tennis court, and will continue to have the tennis net up. As this court is not designated full-time to pickleball, at assigned activity times a temporary pickleball net will be put up for players to utilize. Chair Chavez had a question about adding a track at Garvey Park. He mentioned that in Rosemead Park there's a lot of foot activity and surmised that putting one in Garvey Park may be a way to get the community more involved in using that park for that type of purpose. Chair Chavez further asked about the open grassy space at the south end of the park. He asked if this was a multipurpose field. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking affirmed that it was, and their plans are to simply leave it as a green space. This area is the largest green space available 2 without being on a baseball field. Chair Chavez suggested adding more City logos around the park. He said adding them might brighten the image of the park. Commissioner Luau had a comment about the amenities as well. She noted that we don't have many water fountains in the park, especially around the dog park and the tennis courts. She suggested adding water fountains to these areas, particularly water fountains which enable a user to fill their own reusable bottle. Water fountains with bowls that fill at the bottom for dogs would be nice near the dog park. Commissioner Hernandez asked if there were many amenities for bicyclists at Garvey Park. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking replied that there were not any. Commissioner Hernandez suggested including lockable bike parking for those who would like to access the park via bicycle. Chair Chavez asked about the playset area. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking said that right now that area is filled with sand and is being used as a sandbox for children. Eventually, that area will be a playground for toddlers. The reason for this is that a Playschool program is run out of that facility. This program focuses on children ages 3 to 5 years. It would, therefore, be beneficial to have a playground area designed for children of that age as it would be directly accessible from the playschool. Vice -Chair Mendez asked about the basketball court inside the gymnasium at Garvey Park. She wondered if the Department ever opens it up for public use rather than keeping it strictly for team usage. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking responded that it is something that the Department can investigate. However, that court is booked up consistently, and opening it up would be very challenging. Commissioner Luau asked if we could implement recycling bins next to the trash bins in the park. She also asked if there were any electric vehicle charging stations in the parking lot of Garvey Park. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking responded that there are not any. Commissioner Luau asked if we could add charging stations to the parking lot. B. Fall Events Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking introduced the Fall event lineup. The first event coming up is the 9/11 Remembrance Ceremony. This will take place next Monday, September 11, at 6 p.m. in the Civic Center Plaza. This event is a ceremony to remember the 22nd anniversary of September 11, 2001. The City is excited to welcome back the Moon Festival for the first time in a few years due to COVID-19. The festival will come back on Saturday, September 23. We will be partnering with VOCO Media, and they will take on most of the responsibility of bringing in the event. Valley Boulevard will be shut down from Walnut Grove all the way to Rosemead Blvd., and it will be lined with vendor booths, food trucks, and entertainment. The event runs from 3:30 p.m. to 11 p.m. On Saturday, September 30, the City will hold its annual Pumpkin Dive event at the Rosemead Aquatic Center. The pool will be filled with pumpkins, and kids can jump in, pick a pumpkin, and decorate it. There will also be games, crafts, 3 and snacks. This event will run from 12:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. Participants do need to register for the event ahead of time, and there is a $10 fee to participate. The next event will be Fall Fiesta. This is a Dia de los Muertos event. It will take place on Saturday, October 7, from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. at Rosemead Park. This is our second largest event of the year, just after the Fourth of July. The event has a ton of different activities, live entertainment, vendor booths, carnival games, arts and crafts, laser tag, and moon bounces. If it does rain that day, the event will be rescheduled to Saturday, November 18. We are excited to welcome back our Craft Fair for the first time in years. The Craft Fair will be located in Garvey Community Center on Saturday, October 14, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Vendors will be able to come in and sell their crafts and decorations to get everybody ready for the holidays. Our Pumpkin Patch event is coming up on Saturday, October 21, from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. We put on this event in partnership with CultivaLA, a nonprofit organization that also helps us run our two community gardens. This event will take place at the Del Mar Community Garden. Participants will have the opportunity to pick out a pumpkin and enjoy a slice of pie. Registration is limited. Participants will need to register online prior to the event. Registration opens September 18. Our annual Trunk or Treat event will take place on Tuesday, October 31, from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. It takes place in the parking lot of the Rosemead Community Recreation Center. This event is extremely popular. We usually have between 20 and 25 cars giving out candy. There's also a costume contest, arts and crafts, games, and a haunted house. Commissioner Dang asked about the Moon Festival. He asked if there would be more seating areas available this year. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking responded that he would look into that, but he believes there should be more seating this year. Vice -Chair Mendez asked if we had considered having the Farmers Market open at the Craft Fair as well. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking responded that unfortunately, we are not able to move around our Farmers Market. This is because we have to apply for a permit and have a location approved for our Farmers Market. So, unfortunately, as great as that would be, this event will just be a Craft Fair. Commissioner Hernandez asked about doing a pie -eating contest at one of our events. She further stated that it would be fun to have a holiday cookie decorating area for kids at the Trunk or Treat event. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking responded that we do have a craft area at that event, but that it will be paper crafts. This event usually draws anywhere between 4000 to 6000 children, and therefore we must think about how we can keep the masses moving during this event. However, we might be able to keep this idea in mind for other smaller events. 4 C. Monthly Parks & Recreation Department Review Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking provided the monthly update. The Department of Parks and Recreation's Summer season was fantastic. The city's two pools were open. We were able to have a ton of Swim Lessons take place, which was great. No major incidents were reported at the pools, which is always excellent for us. We had a Shark Week Celebration, which was a fantastic event - so many people were out there. We hosted the SCMAF (Southern California municipal athletic Federation) Swim Meet. SCMAF is part of one of the associations that the Department is part of that is also part of a Federation. So, we hosted numerous cities and numerous swimmers - they came and competed in our pool, which we were pleased about because we have a beautiful facility. We also hosted a Dive In Movie at our pool, which was a great event. Garvey Community Center had loads of activities. We had Craft Classes going on, Senior Bingo, our Daily Lunch Program, so many things for the seniors to do. We had numerous special events during the Summer season. We had our Summer Concert Series which consisted of six concerts. We celebrated in Parks Make Life Better Month, which is in July, with a big event. We brought back Movie in the Park. We haven't had that since we did drive-in movies during COVID-19, so it was great to re -introduce that. It went very well. Fourth of July was a huge hit. Rosemead's Fourth of July Celebration is enormous. There are 10,000 to 15,000 people in the park around 8:30pm, and then 20 minutes later everybody's gone. But it was a beautiful event. We had a great time, and there was lots of entertainment. We have several events coming up this season. We have our Anti -Hate Art Contest, which is coming up. It is open to students ages 5 to 17 years. They will be able to submit artwork based on our themes: Love Not Hate, or We Grow Together. This contest is a great opportunity for students to get creative and to stand up against hate. We will be accepting entries until November 3. Our Craft Fair is coming up on October 14. We have a continuous event coming up which is our Virtual Trivia Night. It's a lot of fun. People are able to sign up and we send them a zoom link and they are able to test their trivia knowledge and compete to win gift cards. It's a great time. Our Farmers Market is continuing to operate all the way through the end of November. We are excited to have them with us. All of our Youth Programs were really busy this year. We had our Free Lunch Program. We had our Day Camps which are always sold out. We had our Youth Sports Programs, Basketball Leagues, Adult Sports, and Volleyball League. We are excited for the Fall. Registration for Fall classes began today, so we are excited about all of our upcoming events and we're getting ready for the holidays. Chair Chavez commented that he got to enjoy some of the events this Summer. He very much enjoyed the Fourth of July Parade. He further commented that many of the coaching positions for youth sports were filled by staff. He wondered how we might encourage parents to volunteer as coaches as that's better for the children. Vice chair Mendez commented that she had a great summer in Rosemead as well. Her son particularly enjoyed the Fourth of July Carnival. 5 MATTERS FROM COMMISSION A. Commissioner Comments Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking explained that this is the Commission's opportunity to ask for any items they would like to be placed on a future agenda or to ask simple questions that he can answer right away. Commissioner Hernandez had a question about the Trunk or Treat Halloween Costume Contests. She asked if the contests were just for humans, or if we would have a dog costume contest as well. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking answered that we will be having a dog contest in addition to our human contests. Chair Chavez interjected that he was lucky enough to judge the contest last year. Director of Parks and Recreation Boecking mentioned that we also have a dog costume contest on the Fourth of July. 4. ADJOURNMENT The meeting adjourned at 7:56 p.m. The next Parks Commission meeting will be held on Tuesday, November 7, 2023, at 7:00 p.m. in the Council Chambers. APP Ken ahl Otte , Co fission Secretary OVED: ez, Chair