MEASURE DD COMMUNITY COALITION MEETING
AUGUST 16, 2004
MONTCLAIR RECREATION CENTERLAKESIDE
GARDEN CENTER
Agenda Committee: Jennie Gerard, Liz Borowiec and James Vann
Minutes by Kathy Raymond, Executive Director, Friends of Oakland Parks and Recreation
In Attendance:
Beat 15x NCPC – Jim Ratliff
Bicycle & Pedestrian Advisory Committee – Ron Bishop
Friends of the Cleveland Cascade –Jim Ratliff
Coalition of Advocates for Lake Merritt – James Vann
East Bay Bicycle Coalition – Rick Rickard
Friends of Oakland Parks and Recreation – Kathryn Raymond, Judy Johnson
Greenlink Taskforce – Nancy Rieser
Lake Merritt Institute –Liz Borowiec
Lake Merritt Rowing Club – Jerry Denham
Oakland Heritage Alliance – Naomi Schiff
Oakland Parks Coalition – Jennie Gerard
Also:
From the City of Oakland:
CEDA – Kerry Jo Ricketts-Ferris
Council member Jean Quan’s Office – Richard Cowan
Council member Jane Brunner’s Office – Justin Horner
Council member Danny Wan’s Office – Pat Kernighan
Public Art Program Director – Steven Huss
Public Works Agency – Joel Peter
The meeting was called to order at 7:10 P.M. by chair Liz Borowiec. The attendees introduced themselves. The group discussed setting a standardized venue, instead of moving the meeting on a monthly basis. It was agreed upon that we should keep the meetings at the Lakeside Garden Center through January to see how it goes. The original idea behind rotating venues was to try and get more local participation, but this has not been the case.
OUTREACH:
A discussion was had about how to get more involvement and attendance at the DD meetings, as it hasn’t really expanded the number of participants. It was suggested that perhaps we should outreach through the schools or the PTA groups. It was also suggested that we should have a broad outreach. Perhaps having Road Shows, which would go around to individual groups. Other suggestions were local Neighborhood Crime Prevention Councils or other neighborhood groups. It was indicated that it would be very hard to get people to attend regular meetings, as everyone has busy lives. It was suggested perhaps the outreach should focus more on bringing people to the Annual Meeting so they could learn more about what is going on. Perhaps creating a newsletter would be another way to keep people informed.
GRANT FUNDING:
Kerry Jo Ricketts-Ferris, CEDA, gave an update on the grants they have been applying for to match the Measure DD funding. All the projects need additional funds to complete them to the design vision. The City has applied for Prop 12 and R’zburg Harris per capita grant funding in the amount of $500,000 to go towards the Oakland Waterfront. Prop 40 per capita funding in the amount of $200,000 to fix the Lake Merritt Lawn Bowling Facility’s roof. The City has an extensive capital funding list and the Council has leaned towards putting the majority of the funds towards health and safety issues before capital improvement. The City has applied to the Transportation Development Authority for $116,000 grant for 12th St. and is reapplying to the Recreational Trails Program Grant and will be more focused around a specific request for Trails funding as we did not receive the grant last year. The City has applied for $8 million from the Coastal Conservancy, as this is an allocated amount this funding should come through. There are also two $1,000,000 grants form Prop 50 and $250,000 provided to Union Point Park through Murray-Hayden. The City received no Federal funding last year but have reapplied for funds and are waiting to hear.
Kerry mentioned that she is working on two RFP’s for grant writers, each would be under $15,000, and they should be ready in October. This would be for as needed assistance. There may also be some private funding opportunities with outside organizations like the Rotary Club who are looking for a project to fundraise around at the municipal boathouse, private bench donors, and the Lake Merritt Breakfast Club to work on the expansion of the necklace of lights. Also some possible MTC funding, will work on writing a $4 million grant for the 10th St. bridge project, however, the preliminary application is due September 3rd and the final application would be due in late Oct. It was also discussed that this group should be sensitive that there are a lot of competing interests around Oakland for the limited amount of grant funding that is available.
The question arose around lobbying and how successful we can be at a State and Federal level. Don Perata and Wilma Chan, along with the local Parks Commissioner and Port Lobbyist are apparently all doing what they can for Oakland and these applications. It was suggested that outside lobbyists from groups like the Sierra Club or Historical Society to aid in these efforts. It was asked how do we get strategic around working to secure this grant funding. Is there more we should be doing as an outside group to help positively influence the outcome. Kerry also mentioned that the City will do an RFP to bring on a consultant to analyze the projects and potential funding opportunities for each area.
ANNUAL MEETING:
There was discussion around what the Annual Meeting should be and if it is necessary at this point. There were two viewpoints, one that it should be informative and let people know what is happening with the Measure DD Bond (though someone suggested there should be no PowerPoint presentation) or that it should be more of a social party to celebrate the progress. The meeting could be an opportunity for outreach and to remind people why they voted for the bond. The suggestion was made to have more of a gallery feel where each project is on display around the room and people could speak with the designers and participants for whichever projects they may be interested in. There was a feeling, however, that this may not be the right time for a meeting as there is nothing concrete to show, and perhaps it would be better tied into a groundbreaking event. It was suggested that perhaps an annual report could be prepared in lieu of the annual meeting. In the end it was decided that October was not the right time for the meeting, perhaps early Spring, and we would discuss this more at the next meeting.
PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS
Justin Horner, Chief of Staff to Jane Brunner, came to the meeting to discuss the progress of setting a policy for public-private partnerships. There will be a meeting between various City Departments and non-profit groups held either this week or next. The City has broken down the development issues into three main areas: 1. The contract itself 2. The Project Management roles and who does what (inspections, sign off, etc.) 3. The issues surrounding the unions. Also, what establishes criteria, the amount of funding that is private or public and/or the amount of work each party is doing. It was noted that another area should be around what happens pre and post contract, when issues arise in the middle of a project and around renegotiations. It was asked of Justin how long he thought it would take to get these issues worked out, he said it depends on what is involved if it is just administrative changes then it would be quicker than if it required some kind of change to the municipal code. Justin mentioned that the staff had been very cooperative around discussing this issue and everyone thanked him for helping to work on this issue.
PUBLIC ART
Steven Huss, Public Art Coordinator, attended the meeting to discuss the community meeting that was help on July 29th and to give an update to where they are in the process. Due to a shortage of staff, they have only had one part time person working on the master plan for implementing art around Measure DD. The meeting on the 29th was to begin to gather more community input around this process. The City hopes to bring in a public art consultant shortly and to have the master plan in final form by the end of the year. After this time they will begin issuing RFP’s for artists to apply for the projects. The Public Art Department is also planning to set up a steering committee of about 10 members to continue to guide them in the planning process. Steven suggested that perhaps 2 interested members of the DD Coalition may like to join the committee. There were many questions and suggestions around who should be on this committee, including local artists, someone from the heritage alliance, the museum, etc. Steven is open to all suggestions and he is still developing the make-up of the committee. He indicated one area of concern is the funds would become diluted and that there would not be a major focus if the funds became too scattered. They are working on locations for larger focal point pieces but indicated there would be plenty of projects for artists. There will probably be some projects dedicated to local artists and some will be open to national competition. Steven plans to implement a training process for local artists to help them become more competitive with the national competition. There is about $2.8 million overall for local art in Measure DD. The one project that is moving forward is Union Point Park and there may be a few others where funds are released if necessary before the whole process, Fairyland and Studio One may be these exceptions. There were about 60 people at the July 29th meeting. The Coalition asked if we could see the master plan before it was final and Steven said he would bring it to the coalition at a later meeting.
WRT MEETING – MUNICIPAL BOATHOUSE, EL EMBARCADRO AND
LAKESHORE/LAKESIDE IMPROVEMENTS.
About 60 participants came to this meeting to discuss these three areas. The Municipal Boathouse design should be in more final form later this fall. El Embarcadero is coming along and they plan to hold a technical committee meeting with some of the dog owners around the dog park. It was mentioned that some new ideas have arisen through the Greenlink Committee and other neighbors that they would like to discuss. All in all it was a positive meeting.
Next Agenda Items that were suggested:
The next meeting dates were set, they will continue to be on the third Monday of the month. The next meeting date is Sept. 20th at the Garden Center in the Ebell Room.
The meeting was adjourned at 8:45 p.m.