Recreation department staff
 

I understand the recreation department is having problems maintaining staff to man our recreation centers, as a result the managers of the rec centers are required to fill in for any vacancies that occur. I understand that this is a part of their job, however, recently it is really getting out of hand with managers having to consistently work 6 or 7 days a week. The rec department is unwilling to increase wages for their part time employees that would even equal the starting pay of “fast food” restaurants in the area. I think it is more important to maintain the excellent service at our rec centers than spending our money on unnecessary things such as replacing flowers every few months at every traffic circle and major intersection in the villages? Aesthetics are nice but our amenity fees would be better spent maintaining staff than on frequent landscaping changes.

Do you want to bet that some residents prefer the flowers over the Rec Ctrs - especially the folks who do not use Rec Ctrs, pools, pickleball courts, etc,? Amenities and their fees are what you make of them.

I could be wrong but I don't believe our amenity fees pay for the rec. centers employees or the flowers.

I’m tired of the recreation department using amenity fees to pay for tennis courts maintenance - they should spend it on the executive courses.

See how that works - there are 150,000/200,000 individuals who pay amenity fees - they all have different priorities.

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I was surprised to find out that the rec centers and other Villages buildings still use a lot of incandescent light bulbs instead of LED bulbs, which are much more energy efficient. Also, when light bulbs need to be replaced, they hire a licensed electrician under contract to change them. It seems to me that they could hire a staff member to do this and save a lot of money.

as far as what fees pay for what and don’t care , but I fall into the group that cares more about how things look,I don’t golf , don’t use any courts or pools and have only been in a rec center to vote , I do love to walk , ride my bike and run around the beauty of this place

Well said.

Wonder why they do this. For some fixtures need to get up on a tall ladder and can see where you might want to hire a more experienced person but an electrician seems like overkill.

Than again we have several 10 ft ceilings and silly me bought a 6 ft ladder when we moved here and realized that aint going to work.

Agree that something needs to be done. The staff at Laurel Manor almost never gets the swim lanes in for the scheduled lap swim time in the evenings. When I call and ask why they say it’s a busy time of the day and they are short staffed. I would much prefer to have a lane to swim in than look at flowers.

What tennis court maintenance? I prefer the millions in amenities replacing sand in sand traps. After all that were most golfers hit ball anyway. See how that works :)

I sure like any well managed federal government facilities. To many managers and not enough peon’s.

There are job openings on districtgov.org for any who feel the situation is intolerable and want to be part of the solution. Whatever the compensation may be, it is greater than what we are getting paid to admire the problem.

I believe the rec center employees are paid by the amenity fee and the flowers on the roundabouts are paid by the maintenance fee, a line item on your November tax bill. Someone please correct if this is not true.

I guess the thought of having a senior citizen on a ladder doesn’t make the worker’s comp insurers very happy. Get a few accidents, the premiums tend to rise

Also, I bet the volume of work for the electrician is so high, there’s a fixed price to change light bulbs.