Feb 23, 2011 5 min read

The Fort Myers Beach Town Council and Bay Oaks Recreational Campus Advisory Board held a joint meeting to discuss the identity of the town-owned facility and the means of how it should grow into the future on Wednesday, Feb. 16. The consensus action will involve the BORCAB committee establishing those roles at its next meeting with Town Manager Terry Stewart in attendance at 9 a.m. Friday, March 4.

This is the fourth time that town officials met with one of its advisory committees. Council and town staff met recently with the Marine Resources Task Force, the Community Resources Advisory Board. It held a joint meeting with the Local Planning Agency last May.

Back in October 2009, the town took over the operational and ownership aspects of Bay Oaks and quickly instituted a projected five-year plan after the assembly and findings of an ad-hoc committee. That committee formulated a business description such as plans for marketing, operations, management and support, financials and strategy.

Six members of BORCAB attended the Wednesday meeting (Chair Betty Simpson, Vice-Chair Rick Loughrey, Becky Bodnar, Myra Miller, Tom Mizwa, and Rae Sprole). They were joined by the five council members, Stewart, Bay Oaks Recreational Manager Nicole Olsen (town staff liaison to BORCAB) and Public Works Director Cathie Lewis, who oversees the town’s parks & recreation department.

With Bay Oaks in its second year of transition as a town-run facility, the two groups felt the need to communicate BORCAB’s purpose and recommend implementations as well as discuss the short-term plan and long-range vision for the campus’ teen and senior programs and overall identity.

Should it be a community center or a recreational facility? The question appears to be the starting point for the committee to discuss in March.

At the beginning of the meeting, the two groups hashed out a communication problem and discussed concerns over policies, procedures and an underutilized teen program among others. The town is closing in on providing the facility a banner system for visual identification and a van for transportation reasons.

“The purchase order is already in for the banners,” said Stewart. “We had a hold-up from Lee County about the right-of-way issue. They did not want us to put them where we originally decided. Within the last week, we’ve worked through those issues, and they are now waiting to go in. The van is in the purchasing process right now.”

Mayor Larry Kiker suggested a way to improve communication would be to attend council meetings and give advisory committee reports at the appropriate time or at least quarterly reports when that time comes.

The meeting continued with each BORCAB member in attendance giving his/her own report.

Among those, Bodnar discussed the transition year from the standpoint of the Bay Oaks Social Seniors. She believes there is a need for someone to direct the programs for BOSS since there are 174 participants in that particular group out of the 210 Bay Oaks members overall. A golf cart was recommended from the parking lot to the recreational center due to the long walk for older or handicap people.

Mizwa agreed with Councilman Alan Mandel that a marketing plan is needed to promote the facility’s memberships. Mandel suggested a major fundraising event to help with costs.

“When we put together a marketing plan, we have to know the function of the facility,” said Mizwa. “We have to have an identity to utilize the space that we have and put together a marketing plan to generate revenue. The pool could be our biggest moneymaker. We are not marketing the place at all.”

A community support group has unofficially formed to help Bay Oaks and is seeking a 5013 tax-exemption. Once official, it will be called ‘Bay Oaks Foundation.’

BORCAB’s wish list includes foul ball nets; and a cover for the ball field bleachers; structural maintenance work in the town pool; gymnasium divider to separate the floor area in half; kitchen repair or facility updating; a portable teen skate park; and a bigger facility for the fitness room if the overall scope includes a weight room at all.

“We need to review the programs and find out what is working and what isn’t,” said Simpson. “We all have ideas and feel close to Bay Oaks. We need to know what is expected of Bay Oaks.”

Mandel told everyone not to lose sight of the fact that the facility is functional after taking over operations from the county.

“The question we’re raising today is how do you grow those numbers and what do you want it to be,” he said.

Kiker encouraged BORCAB members to call on individual council members and invite them to particular meetings.

“You represent every cross-section of humanity on the Beach,” said Mayor Larry Kiker. “When you develop the criteria for the things you want to talk about, you might want to specifically aim it at someone and use the resources and sources

that they know because they have done this before.”

Councilman Tom Babock offered insight from being involved in businesses that require change.

“You have to go through a period of chaos before you can change,” he said. “There are four basic steps to change: assess; discuss strategic plan; reassess; verify plan. You should look at this as an exciting time.”

According to the town website, the purpose of BORCAB is to facilitate the accomplishment of Bay Oaks’ mission statement and thereby to further the welfare of the citizens of the town and others utilizing the Bay Oaks recreation campus and its facilities, as well as to provide advice to the town council upon request with regard to matters concerning the BORC and perform such other duties as the town council may, from time to time, assign to it.