MUTH’S TRUTHS

Something smells fishy in Carson City, and it’s not Kim Lee’s sushi bar.

I’m talking about the proposed $20 million Wal-Mart-sized SUPER recreation center that some folks want to build out on land adjacent to the Western Nevada Community College (WNCC) – which, by the way, is so proud of its community ties to the people in Carson City that it’s petitioning the University Board of Regents to drop the word “community” from its name. But I digress.

For $20 million, Carson City residents in the upper-middle class neighborhoods surrounding WNCC will gain, according to Super-Rec’s leading proponent, Parks and Recreation Commissioner Roger Moellendorf, “a large gym that can host a variety of events such as basketball, indoor soccer, volleyball and community events,” as well as “a fitness area, classrooms, an indoor walking and jogging track, a weight area, multi-purpose meeting rooms, a leisure pool, locker rooms, offices and quite possibly a climbing wall.”

In other words, with the exception of the climbing wall, pretty much the same facilities which are already available five minutes away in the center of town at the Community Center where, get this, the Parks and Recreation Commission meets every month. I mean, it’s not like these folks have never seen the place.

OK, to be fair, I don’t think the Community Center has a fitness center…but that’s probably because Carson City already has a number of privately-owned and operated fitness centers which people may choose to belong to. After all, why should taxpayers pick up the tab for Flabby Johnson to work out on the ol’ Stairmaster?

But adding insult to potential injury, project proponents are actually trying to sell the idea that a government-funded state-of-the-art fitness facility at Super Rec won’t compete with the likes of Eagle Fitness and Gold’s Gym. “I want to assure you that it is not our intention to compete directly with the private sector,” Mr. Moellendorf wrote in an email to Patrick Winchell, owner of Eagle Fitness, last December – making expert use of the weasel-word “intention.” Yet one sentence later Moellendorf admits that “there will be some indirect competition between the city’s facilities and private clubs though.”

Now try this one on for chutzpah: Not only does Moellendorf claim - with a straight face, mind you – that taxpayer-funded Super Rec’s state-of-the-art fitness center won’t “directly” compete against private fitness centers, but the Super Rec fitness center will actually be doing the private fitness centers a FAVOR.

That’s right. According to Moellendorf, people will come into the Super Rec fitness center, find out how cool it is to use a treadmill or a weight machine, and then run right out to buy a membership in the private fitness clubs around town. You see, says Moellendorf, Super Rec would be serving as a “gateway” to new health conscious citizens who otherwise would have no idea what benefits private fitness clubs provide.

Roger Moellendorf could well land a starring role in a George Orwell novel.

So could Pete Livermore. The Carson City Supervisor recently penned a guest column in the Nevada Appeal in which he seconds Mr. Moellendorf’s emotion, writing – again with a straight face, mind you – that “it is not the city’s intent through the development of our proposed indoor recreation center to directly compete with local private-sector fitness clubs.” Livermore adds, “Many times, public facilities become a ‘gateway’ to the private clubs for those individuals who desire ‘higher-end’ services or for empty-nesters who many not want to use a facility that receives heavy use from youth.”

Gee, do you think Pete and Roger might be coordinating their sales pitches?

Aside from the absurd claim that Super Rec’s proposed fitness center won’t compete with private fitness centers – and would actually be “good” for the private centers – there’s a lot more to this proposal to concern Carson City taxpayers.

Let’s start with the fact that Super Rec proponents are making an outrageous claim that a ballot advisory question calling for a “multi-use” gym from over a decade ago equates to the approval of a $20 million Super Rec facility with, as Livermore noted in his op/ed, a leisure pool, a “lazy river,” classrooms and a rock-climbing wall.

Mr. Livermore also disingenuously points to a public opinion poll which purportedly shows that 57 percent of Carson City residents are “not at all satisfied” with the availability of indoor recreation opportunities. Knowing a little something about how polling data can be manipulated to reach a pre-ordained conclusion, let’s nevertheless accept Mr. Livermore’s contention. However, saying that over half of respondents aren’t satisfied with current “indoor recreation opportunities” isn’t the same as saying they want a $20 million Super Rec located inconveniently on the tony Upper West Side of town.

Indeed, if you went back and did a survey of those same respondents and asked them if they’d prefer a plain old ordinary neighborhood indoor basketball court/gymnasium for a fraction of the cost, I’m betting you’d get well over that 57 percent. And the fact is, many such neighborhood indoor facilities already exist. They’re called “schools.”

Get this. Our neighborhood public schools already have basketball courts and gymnasiums which can be utilized for “indoor recreation opportunities” after hours when school isn’t in session. Now why should our kids have to find transportation all way all the way up to Super Rec for a little pick-up game of hoops when they could walk just a few blocks to their neighborhood public school for the same purpose?

Perhaps Super Rec proponents should look at making better use of existing neighborhood facilities before asking us to shell out twenty mil for a new one.

Which, of course, brings us to the question of priorities. After all, taxpayers aren’t bottomless pits of cash. And according to Carson City Manager Linda Ritter, a recently-enacted property tax cap has resulted in a revenue drop of some $2 million (yeah, tax relief!). That, she says, is cutting into the city’s ability to provide long-term medical care to poor people. “Either we fund it or we end up with people out on the street,” she told the Nevada Appeal recently. Ritter says the cost to provide such assistance runs between $120,000 and $240,000 a year.

Ritter, of course, is engaging in typical bureaucratic rhetorical overkill, but her point is relevant to this debate. Aren’t there better, more critically-needed uses for the estimated $20 million Super Rec would cost taxpayers? Where, pray tell, are our priorities? Do we even have any? Shouldn’t limited tax dollars be used to fund government programs to help people who can’t help themselves, as opposed to helping upper-middle class residents save twenty bucks a month by providing a taxpayer-funded alternative to private fitness clubs?

All of which brings us to a final question (for now) about Super Rec: Why spend $20 million to locate the facility on the campus of WNCC rather than at Centennial Park, where the estimated cost would be HALF the amount?

Well, according to Roger Moellendorf, locating Super Rec at WNCC “will meet some of the educational and recreational needs of their students.”

Hello?

Why is the community college worrying about providing students with recreational activities? Shouldn’t they be worrying about, oh, say…educational needs? And why is the Parks & Recreation Department worrying about providing educational programs? Shouldn’t they be focusing on, oh, say, parks and recreation needs?

Of course, proponents of building Super Rec at WNCC are now trying to sell a scheme in which taxpayers statewide will be picking up half the tab for construction, with Carson City taxpayers getting stuck with “only” the other half. But that’s only for construction. Carson City residents will still be on the hook for operational costs, maintenance, utilities, upgrades and personnel costs (including health and generous retirement benefits) on an ongoing basis. And for that privilege, the state, not Carson City, will actually own the building.

What a deal.

So why is Mr. Moellendorf so intent on spending twice the amount of money otherwise needed in this one-sided deal just to locate Super Rec on the grounds of WNCC?

Can you say “conflict of interest,” boys and girls?

That’s right. Not only is Mr. Moellendorf a member of the Carson City Parks and Recreation Commission, he’s also listed as a member of the Board of Trustees for the Western Nevada Community College Foundation.

Hmmmm.

Yes. That does smell rather fishy. Peeee-yew!

The five-member Board of Supervisors is scheduled to vote on the WNCC/Super Rec proposal on February 15th.

Obviously, we already know how Supervisor Pete Livermore is going to vote. What we don’t know isn’t so much how Supervisors Shelly Aldean and Robin Williamson are going to vote, but how they even CAN vote, since both of them are ALSO listed as members of the WNCC Foundation Board of Trustees. I imagine they’ll be forced to abstain from this vote due to their obvious conflict of interest. That leaves just the Mayor and one other Supervisor.

Considering all of these questions, misleading information and conflicts of interest, this is no way to decide whether or not to spend $20 million on Super Rec. Instead, I propose a little shirts-vs.-skins, one-on-one basketball game to 21 at the Community Center between Supervisor Livermore and Eagle Fitness Center owner Patrick Winchell. The winner gets to decide. Lace ‘em up, boys.

Posted on January 30th, 2007 by Chuck Muth
Filed under: Carson City