Fact-finding trip shows WECRD-YMCA partnership can work

It's nice they can take a trip on the tax payers dime. We still won't see any progress.

My thoughts exactly when I read the head line.

I'd like to see the results of this fact finding trip posted. What facts??? I would also like to see the expenses charged to the account posted.

Seattle area? Really???? Why not travel to an area similar to Mt Home so as to compare apples to apples rather than to oranges.

If more people showed up at City Council meetings questions would have to be answered. The problem is that very seldom there are concerned citizens at any of those meetings!

Why do we need the Y involved in Mountain Homes recreation anyway, the WECRD acts like this is such a big project that they need outside help..

Stan and his crew at the city Parks and Rec Provide recreation to our 14000 person population and do a fine job everyday with running exactly the same kinds of programs..

All the Y has done so-far is sponge money out of the WECRD account (our taxes) and get nothing done!

I and many others feel like this is an AEHI, Don Gillispie kinda thing going on here..

Its time to tell the YMCA to hit the road and get something built OR refund my tax money for the last 15 years!

City Council meeting at 6:00 December 1, 2014 for a public hearing on this mess. If you do not go, you can't continue to complain. There are things going on that NEVER make the meeting minutes. Hope to see y'all there.

I don't understand why they needed this trip. you would think that after all these years they would be done with the planning stage and have moved on to the building stage.......

Hi All:

The 2013 election of WECRD Board Member...or whatever they call themselves, went uncontested, didn't it.

How's that for an electorate wanting real change??????

Thanks,

Tim

I'm surprised they didn't go to Hawaii? Maybe next year...the corruption continues.

The problem with this is that info is never provided till after the fact, Nothing on the city or WECRD web site about the meeting. Why are they asking the city for financial help? Then we city taxpayers get a double hit on our taxes for something we don't need. Millions of tax dollars have been wasted on this. What was different about the Sea/Tac YMCA compared to Meridian? A nicer hotel and meals. I'm out of town thru the 1st Dec. But Since I don't like fraud, or wasting tax money I'll keep complaining.

You could have hopped in a car and drove to Boise and Caldwell if you wanted proof that YMCA's exist and work in Idaho. Just another example of paralysis by analysis. 10 years from now they will release yet another study to document that the cost of construction has increased, as well as the cost of gas... And groceries.... And cost of living in general. At that point we should probably have another architect draw up the 500th rendition of what a rec center might look like. WHAT ..... A....JOKE.....

This gaggle of idiots couldn't run a lemonade stand. People that live in the city get recreation taxed for Parks and Rec, then get taxed for the WRECD, and then get taxed for any gimmes that the city kicks in to try and help these mentally disabled narcissists.

15 years. 400k a year in taxes. Endless study's and fact finding and advisors. An office and employees that costs over 100k a year and produce NOTHING.

They need to beg 600k from out of thin air to start this monument to incompetence. Who's writing that check? Nobody. They are short funds an need to stop with all this nonsense and start over with attainable goals. They should be shunned and driven into the desert. They should be ashamed. There were kids over the last 15 years that NEEDED help and they just kept dreaming about unicorn farts and giggledrops. It's morally reprehensible to pimp out the kids, (for the children), to forward an agenda while those same kids need help. These people have only their inflated sense of self in mind and care nothing for the kids or their responsibility to spend the taxpayer dollar wisely.

WECRD needs to be dissolved. Find out what can be legally done with the money they are sitting on, and proceeds from the sale of the property. Free rides to the polls if this could ever be put on a ballot. This massive blunder ranks right atop in the history of Elmore County. Right along with the Boise valley getting all the water rights from Anderson Dam, and Elmore County nothing. Lets at least buy some water rights with the money.

I still go back to my conspiracy theory... Hundreds of thousands of dollars have been pumped into a fund over the past XX years, and the project has gone nowhere even though it has dedicated resources to keep it moving along? Sounds like an embezzlement to me. if that is the case, they may be short of funds to complete the original rendition which would lead to the hundreds of new architect renditions. Once the embezzled money is replaced with all the new funds that keep getting pumped in, maybe it will start to move. What? I am way off base and that theory has zero validity? Wild theories are the only thing we are left with, because this whole fiasco makes no sense whatsoever.

I second the thought of dissolving this dysfunctional endeavor. This whole joke is the equivalent of gross negligence, mismanagement, incompetence, you name it. At this point, it is fairly obvious that we will never have a rec center. Either that, or by the time we do have one all of our children will be grown, married, and moved. At least if they dissolve it, they will quit taking our money with the same end result. And those books need to be scoured with a fine toothed comb from an outside independent auditor to get answers as to where all the money has gone. This fiasco ranks right up there with the Boise Downtown Pit/Tower that took 20 years to finish. But at least in that case, we knew why it wasn't moving forward (developers filing BK, etc. but at least they had SOME ongoing progress in between years of nothing. Please do the right thing and quit taking our money. At least when the government takes our money in taxes we are entitled to the occasional refund along with deductions and tax advantages. You just keep taking our money, the only thing we get in return is a report that out of State YMCA's do exist. Maybe they picked a Seattle YMCA due to their 300 days of rainfall each year, they probably don't need a swimming pool there. That is probably what they went there, to verify that a YMCA can exist without a swimming pool. That is he other huge joke about the whole rec center, who builds a red center without a pool? Apparently Mountain Home (in the event one is ever built)

The other massive joke about this project is the nonsense they feed us. The WECRD website shows constructions costs for our 25,000 square foot building to be $5.1 million. It goes on to say that we can't add a pool because the cost to build the pool ($5 million) would double the costs to build. AND... The yearly cost to maintain a pool would run $700,000. What a load. A quick google search shows that Wabash County built a 75,000 square foot YMCA with TWO pools for $12 million. If our building is a third of the size with half the pools, how could it cost us $10.1 million? Granted, that was in 2009 but the comment on that topic from WECRD came in 2010 so it is more or less apples to apples. How about this... Find the dude that built the Wabash Y and hire them since they apparently know how it can be done. And you can easily Google costs to operate and maintain an Olympic sized pool (yes with staffing, insurance, chemicals, testing, everything) for anywhere between $90,000 and $350,000 per year. On the flip side, you can generate revenue to offset costs (swimming lessons, swimming meets and competitions, etc). But obviously somebody on the WECRD board is being influenced by whoever in the community is chirping at them so it is much easier to tell us it would double the building and operations cost.

Any info on the City Council meeting 12/1? Is this maybe some sort of discovery meeting or what?

Maybe they are planning to do what Larry Craig did and use tax payer money to defend themselves in court. I hope it is some sort of fact finding meeting.