We saw a board member ask for a 90 day moratorium regarding moving ahead on the Mountainview project. Seemed like a wise choice given the unknowns regarding the project. The vote to move forward on Plan B was taken last year by several board members, several who have since departed. The newly elected board members should be brought up to speed. Everything approved last year was preliminary in nature. Artists renderings are just that, someone drawing cool looking plans, with no real sense of costs or whether what they were proposing would fit. Frankly, knowing the footprint of the property, i find it impossible to do everything they are proposing through the three phases of the project. In fact, i would argue the third phase (lawn bowling green, two-story pickleball and ADA mini-golf) was a pipe dream created to placate those impacted by the loss of venues. I could well be wrong! I put that in bold because i don't know for sure. What i do know for sure is that information is relatively easy to put together. I know from one of our TOSC posters here (Aggie), there was a study done by the RCSC back around 2009/2010 regarding where a theater would/could fit. That should be shared with board and community members alike. It has not been to my knowledge. Next up is the question i have not seen answered anywhere. Again, i could be mistaken, but the actual square footage of the theater, gym, entryway, pools and all of phase 3 should be readily available; even before any blueprints are drawn. I know the gm was requesting a million plus dollars for the blueprints, but it would seem to me to be premature. I have heard them say, no worries, everything will fit...but will it? I have heard them say, we'll meet all of the county codes regarding parking, water retention and building requirements...but will they? What is more likely to happen is to start the project and then find out what the limitations to the footprint are. You know, start the project and then say to us, darn it doesn't all fit, it's the county's fault. Let me just say, every board member has an obligation under their fiduciary responsibilities to both ask for and receive this kind of information before they start spending money. If they don't, haven't or have been told they can't have it, they are breaching their duties. There's too much at stake here to leave it all up to chance. The 90 day moratorium made sense, what doesn't is if they fail to use it to make sound decisions going forward. I hate to push and be a pain in the ass guys, but you don't have the luxury of getting this wrong. You can make the wrong decision (as board's sometimes do), but you can't make a bad decision because you didn't ask for the information up front and get it. Frankly, there should be nothing about the MV project that shouldn't be shared with the community at large. Unfortunately over the past 15 years that idea of transparency has been kind of shuffled off to Buffalo. It's this simple; we want to see a theater; we want to know how big it is; we want to know what else actually fits on the footprint of Mountainview so we know if you were serious about phase 3 or if you were just blowing smoke up our ass.
It is fascinating to consider where exactly we are as a community. The scenario i posted above regarding the Mountainview project is just of one many on the board's table. What's happening with Viewpoint lake? Is it still going to be done this year? They have the a million dollars slotted in the long range plan for the softball building and lighting project, is that still a go? And let's not forget the sorry state of affairs regarding all things technology wise...if anything, that should be first and foremost. Is it? It should be interesting to see the agenda they will post on Monday for the February 14 board meeting. Odd isn't it, to think the "reveal" of an agenda is even anything anyone would or should care about. Unfortunately, these days we are paying attention and making sure others are as well. Those good old days of 20 "card holders" in the room are long gone. Now we can look forward to all kinds of members showing up and speaking out.
RCSC should be using a Project Management System to define, schedule, set completion dates, and manage major projects. It could be posted on the website for all members to see.
