At the last several City Council and planning commission meetings, the AYSO and Little League parents have bemoaned the lack of fields, and recent Board of Education directives to charge a fee for use of the school grounds, which had been free. It sounded like $10 to $30,000 was the additional annual cost. At the same time, the city has authorized $830,085 to pay outside consultant Envicon to prepare final impact reports on the MBC development project. It seems to me that the MBC ought to be reimbursing the city, and some small portion of this allocated to the AYSO, etc, families.
In cities like Menlo Park, Palo Alto and West Hollywood, the cities require developers to provide parks, develop them and turn them over to the city. In West Hollywood, a “parks fee” is part of the requirement for development, and it certainly is greater than what the MBC is proposing, as a percentage of their development expense. I really question the priorities of the City Council.
Christian Benjamin