LTUSD pulls out of Community Play Consortium JPA

Citing concern over their role in the new playfield proposal, the Lake Tahoe Unified School District (LTUSD) has pulled out of the Community Play Consortium Joint Powers Authority.

After an announcement just 10 days ago about the City of South Lake Tahoe, Lake Tahoe Community College (LTCC) and LTUSD joining together to create a community play fields plan which expands the fields in the Community Play Field area, the school district started to feel uncomfortable about their participation.

During last week's LTUSD Board meeting, Superintendent Dr. James Tarwater expressed concern over their staffing levels being able to handle to increased work load as well as no guarantee that a baseball field would be built.

"The scope has gotten too complex," Tarwater said at that meeting. He said their having to control scoreboards, field lights and grandstands was beyond what they wanted to do.

"The One Stop Shop concept made sense at the beginning," said Tarwater. "The expanded scope changes and with no guarantee of a baseball field would make it irresponsible for us if it gets too hard to manage."

The "One Stop Shop" he was referring to is one person who would be hired to manager play time on all of the South Lake Tahoe fields. LTUSD currently owns 90% of the field space in town so it made sense at the beginning that they'd control who plays on which field, and when.

"It's not just about grass anymore," said Tarwater.

"LTUSD was the agency that threw the need for a baseball field on the table," said LTCC President Dr. Kindred Murillo. "It was never discussed before between the City and the college, so I was surprised that by the notion of a guarantee. Nancy Kerry at the City never promised there would be enough funding to build a baseball field. It was actually put on the table as a fundraising opportunity for the agencies by LTUSD."

Brought up at both the City Council meeting and LTUSD Board meeting was the term "priority" on the JPA agreement. It states that LTCC would get scheduling priority on the fields located on, and adjacent to, the college. Both wanted to make sure the word was changed to be more user friendly for all parties and that games take priority over practices.

The decision for LTUSD to pull out of the JPA caught both SLT City Manager Nancy Kerry and LTCC President Dr. Kindred Murrillo by surprise since the three groups have been in discussions for awhile, though Kerry said she knew Tarwater had some concerns.

Both of them did say the JPA will still go forward with the community fields plan, just without LTUSD as part of the consortium. Tarwaters assistant, Shannon Chandler, told South Tahoe Now that the district did not feel that their participation was a necessary party for the success of the JPA plan. She released this statement from the district office: "LTUSD supports the vision of the JPA and feels that the community sports complex is a very worthwhile and exciting project for kids and families of this community."

The JPA is relying on a one-acre parcel of land from LTUSD to be able to add two new soccer fields and one soccer field/possible baseball field.

"LTUSD will show its support of the project by fulfilling its promise to manage facility reservations, attract tournament play, and, if the baseball field is realized, LTUSD will donate its one acre portion of land to the construction of the baseball field," according to the LTUSD statement. "All maintenance and operations will be managed under the JPA, which as we understand at this time, consists of the City and LTCC only."

"We support LTUSD in any way they think is best," said Kerry.

"The College is moving forward with the JPA and will be investing Measure F funds in the existing Field per our bond language," said Murillo.

LTUSD Board President Barbara Bannar was also concerned with LTUSD being in charge of scheduling field time where the Snow Globe Festival was concerned though other Board members supported being a part of the JPA with some little tweaks.

"We need to think of the community and make this work," new LTUSD board member Ginger Nicolay-Davis said during the meeting. "How can we make this make sense, and how can we make this benefit all of this?"

"We all want to do what's best for the community," said LTCC Dean Dr. Virginia Boyer. "There are three very different entities that need to work out the details"

Those details and adjustments to the JPA agreement were discussed at a teleconference between lawyers for LTUSD, LTCC and the City on October 28.

LTUSD was concerned for their financial interests according to Bannar. She said, that at this time, it was just too much of a financial risk for them to participate.

"The result from the conference call was that LTUSD will not be part of the Community Play Consortium (JPA) and the JPA will contract with LTUSD to do the scheduling to provide one stop scheduling services into the community," Murillo told South Tahoe Now. "I think we all agree that is a good thing for South Lake Tahoe, and since LTUSD has approximately 89% of the fields in the area, it makes good sense."

The SLT City Council has the JPA agreement on their consent agenda Tuesday since they had already approved the City's participation during their last meeting.