By KIRSTEN LASKEY
Los Alamos Daily Post
kirsten@ladailypost.com
Representatives from the Los Alamos County Little League and Los Alamos County reported during Tuesday night’s Los Alamos County Council meeting that resolution is being reached regarding the County’s updated policy for renting recreational facilities.
The discussion was in response to a bonfire of reactions toward the increase in rental fees, particularly for Los Alamos County Little League. It was reported during the council meeting that miscommunication and misunderstanding were the culprits.
During public comment, Los Alamos County Little League President Jose Rodriguez thanked the County for speaking with him about the rental policy.
“We do have a meeting scheduled with the Community Services Department coming up next week,” Rodriguez said. “I plan on being in attendance at the meeting along with my board of directors. I apologize for any confusion upon reading the policy; it is not very clear that users are granted the ability to utilize volunteer hours they use during their organization’s preparation for their season and volunteer hours during their season … that the time can be allotted to their volunteer efforts.”
“Conversations with the Community Services Department staff in the past indicated that we were not allowed to use that volunteer time that benefited our organization … to take credit for that time, meaning what I was told, and I believe what other youth organizations have also been told, is that the time we spend organizing our leagues and volunteering our time to ensuring our children … or the children within the leagues … that opportunities are available to them – my understanding was that was not time that we would be able to count towards the volunteer effort,” Rodriguez added. “I also understand that after a conversation with Mr. Steven Lynne that I may have filled out the paperwork inappropriately and I hope to get that rectified …”
In his report, County Manager Steven Lynne said there were communication delays on the County’s side.
“…I can tell you from the County’s part there were some communication delays and for that I want to apologize to the Little League,” Lynne said. “But I am confident that in their meeting on the fourth (April 4) that we will reach an understanding of how our current program does operate … (it is not) expected to be vastly different than last year or prior years …”
Community Services Department Director Cory Styron spoke about the updated policy.
“The policy has been around for decades but has not been updated since 2006,” Styron said. “Staff presented the updated policy to council in August 2021 and the new policy went into effect October 2021. The 2006 policy set a $15 per hour rental rate for ballfields and based on a recent market study that was presented in August, the rental rate was raised to $20 per hour.”
Styron said that the update of this policy was not intended to vastly change the impact.
“Staff has discussed this issue of the Little League president and we now understand it was not the intent of the league to have all fees waived but rather that volunteers’ efforts be given appropriate credit as part of the work credit mechanism,” he said. “This is very similar to what has occurred in prior years, and we expect that after we sit down and discuss the details with the league that the outcome will be similar to prior years.”
Styron explained explained that is largely because the work credit hourly rate also has increased from $15 per hour to $28.54 per hour. As part of the Feb. 9 work credit discussion between user groups and staff, all leagues … were provided documents with their total requested rental hours for use and the associated costs for those rentals.
“It appears the Little League mistakenly presumed that this courtesy notice was an invoice (for $41,000),” Styron said. “The purpose of the notice was to show each user their potential costs of service and for them to plan accordingly for the season … leagues were surprised and unaware of the total number of hours that they used our facilities.”
Styron added that he and his staff are committed to working with all the facilities users including the Los Alamos County Little League to explore options to offset expenses.
“We value our youth and members of the community, and we are committed to providing quality facilities for our users,” Styron said.
