With the new Menlo Park Community Campus in Belle Haven opening in mid-2024, the City Council, mindful of the city’s $1 million budget deficit, wants to contain personnel costs.
THE Menlo Park Community Campus (MPCC) opens at 100 Terminal Ave., replacing the former Onetta Harris Community Center in the Belle Haven neighborhood. Five main services will be offered at the center: an aquatic center, a library, a youth center, a seniors’ center and a recreational center.
City staff presented council with three staffing options to operate the new community center, with annual costs ranging from nearly $2 million to just over $1 million. Staff recommended the most expensive position, which includes six new full-time positions as well as seven temporary positions, for a total of $1.99 million after adding operating costs such as IT support, supplies, repairs and maintenance, utilities and training. The new positions are Librarian, Library Assistant, Recreation Coordinator, Senior Program Assistant, Nutrition Services Coordinator and Library and Community Services Supervisor.
The least expensive option would reduce the number of new positions to three, eliminating a permanent library assistant, a senior program assistant and a library and community services coordinator, but would add two temporary employees, for $1.5 million. dollars per year. The cheapest option, which city staff does not recommend, would be to hire just nine temporary employees and create no new positions, at a cost of $1.1 million. All unfilled positions would be temporarily taken over by current municipal employees.
Due to budgetary concerns, the board chose to take a closer look at the mid-cost option. While the city expects to see $715,000 in annual revenue from things like user fees, rentals and donations to the MPCC to offset costs, the council is looking to minimize expenses after passing the budget of $76 million this year with a projected budget of $76 million. A deficit of 1 million dollars.
Three residents spoke at the meeting, urging the city to hire local residents to staff the MPCC, saying they would best understand the needs of the community.
Although no votes were taken at the council meeting, members asked staff to focus on equity for Belle Haven, a top concern among council members. Council member Maria Doerr said the city has a library, recreation center and swimming pool at Burgess Park on the city’s west side, and it is important to ensure that all Services are equitable throughout Menlo Park, a commonly heard concern among Belle Shelter residents.
The city plans to use money from Fund 111, or One-Time Developer Payment Fund, to support MPCC staff, but those funds cannot be used in perpetuity. Fund 111 has about $2.8 million on hand, with another $1.5 million in revenue expected this fiscal year. The council can authorize the fund to be used to finance a portion of early childhood operating costs, and city staff said they have sufficient funds to support staffing costs for several years.
“We want to make sure we’re not hiring people for two or three years and then having to talk about downsizing,” Doerr said. “That’s the last thing I hope for, given what an important resource this community center is.”
Council member Betsy Nash said the city is in a different financial situation than it was when the community center project was granted approval. green light in 2021.
“In the short term, you kind of do what you need to do,” said Library and Community Services Director Sean Reinhart, who cautioned against relying on current city staff for too long to take on additional duties at MPCC before hiring dedicated employees for the new one. Belle Haven campus. “In the long term, it has deleterious effects, just like it does on the human body. You can go without certain nutrients for a while, but if it goes on for too long, you start to have longer-term problems,” he said. he declared to the council. .
Mayor Jen Wolosin said the council should find a solution that doesn’t burn out employees because they are the city’s “most important resource.”
City staff members will return to the City Council at an upcoming meeting with a proposal to hire four MPCC employees that also offers the possibility of reducing that number to three, and said they would try to find savings additional.
