07-27-2020 Council Minutes - Laserfiche WebLink

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MINUTES OF THE ORONO CITY COUNCIL MEETING Monday,July 27,2020 6:00 o'clock p.m. Johnson asked if they established a general range of budget and expenses that they would have. Mr. Burrell said it would be north of$1 million, although he was not quite sure how far over it would be. Walsh asked if the bathrooms would be public bathrooms. Mr. Burrell stated Walsh was correct. Originally,they had a separate pavilion building with bathrooms, and then they backed off of that to keep the footprint down and the architect added them to the back of the building. Printup said Mr. Burrell mentioned there would be an opportunity for picnic tables and benches. He asked if the Crew would be maintaining them. Also, if the bathrooms are public, would that fall under the purview of the Crew. Mr. Burrell said the Crew would look to the City to maintain the bathrooms if they are going to be public bathrooms or it could be a shared responsibility. Seals stated she mentioned at the last Council meeting she wanted to see what rowing was about. She is not a good rower, but people need to realize Birch's is not a good location because of having to carry boats down the hill. She can say that because she did it,although not gracefully. With everything that is done,the devil is in the details. When she looked at the emails,there's questions about the size of the building and public access. There's an email about the City selling the land and giving it to them. The question is, if the City does a public-private partnership,what happens if the Crew decides to go away, is the City stuck with the bag. She said this is not the first time the City has done a public-private partnership. The baseball fields on the corner are owned by Orono,there are buildings there, and she thinks people are pretty happy with that. It's unfortunate that an email went out from a Parks Board Commissioner that didn't tell the whole story. It's the Council's job to listen to the whole story. There's always good and bad about everything, so there's going to be some good things about the Rowing Crew, there will be some concerns from some of the neighbors about change,which she understands. The Council's job is to weigh all of those things and then make sure they are talked about. From what she experienced,she did not see Birch's as a great location for LLRC,although Birch's is being very gracious by letting them be there. She thinks the LLRC needs a home. She noted comments from some residents included that the LLRC should just stay there and make it better. LLRC does not own the land,they are essentially renting at the leisure of the company, and that might not be on the table. She is in support of exploring things. Right now, it's very early in the picture and it's good to hear everybody's statements. Mr. Burrell said he would like to include a couple of additional points. He feels they had some good, productive meetings with residents and neighbors and answered a lot of questions,tried to correct a lot of false information, but there are still a few items they could use the Council's help to address. There are still some people who believe they want to build on the beach,which was never LLRC's intent. They understood from the outset the beach is off-limits and their plan has always reflected that. There's also some misinformation about the docks. On the original plan last fall,the former Parks Chair contacted LLRC's architect independently and set his own meeting to talk about his own idea for the park and to create a concept for a U-shaped swim dock as part of his vision for Summit Beach, not LLRC's. It was included in the original design at the November meeting per his instructions. LLRC's dock needs are more simple, and LLRC is proposing them to be east of the beach. Referencing the overhead display, he noted the rowing launch and said it would ideally be moved closer to where the boat launch dock is so LLRC is Page 8 of 21