Reply to Arlington proposing to close county gymnastics program

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]$13/class is absolute insanity.  DPR could easily increase that and still meet demand.  Also, I agree about higher fees for out of county residents.[/quote]The same is true of AAC.  If youth sports that don't recover fees were looked at holistically, there's a way to spread this out more fairly.[/quote]

Why should costs for a competitive gymnastics team be spread out more fairly?  What's fair about that?

AAC and competitive gymnastics shouldn't be run out of the County at all.

The role of a parks and rec department is in the title.  Rec.[/quote]

This. Why can't the county JUST run a rec gymnastics program. If there is a coaching shortage, why not have all the coaches teach rec. If there is interest in competitive gymnastics in the county,[b] then people can start a private gym.[/b] It's never been explained why, if there's so much interest in competitive gymnastics, that's not an option.

[/quote]

Note to readers, when you see this comment know that the writer doesn't really have a suggestion b/c it's not the same as you can just start create a new soccer league.  Read the letter from another local gym owner about what goes into starting a new gym.  The facility alone makes the bar very high and means a long lead time.  There is no need to start a new gym when a perfectly good faclity exists.  While I will concede that turning the left gym back into basketball is apotible path forward, leaving it empty for a year is beyond idiotic and makes me wonder why anyone would think that's a good idea.  [/quote]

The gymnastics gym is already not in use much of the time. The program regularly cancels classes and refunds fees because it can't find instructors. And it's not the only recreational gymnastics program having this issue -- DC also has a gymnastics facility in NE DC that sits empty and unused much of the time because it can't find instructors. They have tried outsourcing instruction to another group and that didn't work either.

If you have a facility getting very low utilization, it sometimes really is cheaper to simply close it than to keep it open at a low utilization rate. Organizations make this sort of decision about offices, warehouses, retail stores, schools, etc., all the time. Yes it always impacts the group of people who are still using the under-utilized facility, and sometimes that's too bad. But it is bad management to maintain facilities that are not being utilized, to benefit a tiny number of people, at the expense of everyone else.[/quote]

The purpose built gymnastics space is only a portion of Barcroft though. I am here on the pro-gymnastics side but I understand the financials and I can understand going back to original space, going to only Xcel, even ending team.

But I agree with the board member who said closing for a year at this point is a long time if they intend to utilize the space again. It seems like those ideas could have already been generated. It makes me think back to the discussion we had pages ago about the possibility of selling Barcroft. I initially was on the side of “that’s crazy” but beginning to wonder especially since they called out the interest on the debt in the original proposal. Perhaps they have had some offers. I could see the county manager approaching parks and rec with the idea in the sense of “what are the biggest obstacles in terms of programming” and parks and rec saying “gymnastics.” The year is to move everything else and then say there’s nothing left for Barcroft.

If that’s the plan and the only thing financially viable then I will concede that. Maybe it is.  However, if that’s not it and Barcroft will eventually reopen I’m confused about why there could be no viable plan for gymnastics to return to the original space and make some basic changes to operate again as it did for 15ish years. My other thought is that part of returning to 2005-2015 is shedding the full time staff, and it’s much easier to do so this way. They terminate everyone, close for a year, and come back with rec and Xcel teams in the original space at some point after rehiring new staff who are all part time/temp and the gymnastics coordinator is probably within parks and rec. To be fair, I kind of get it. Obviously on a personal note I feel very bad for those people (who I know) who will be affected by it but I can understand the financial aspect too since it seems like current operations are not fiscally viable.

But this explanation doesn’t do a lot for the debt and interest issue. I do not think they’ll be able to run any programs out of Barcroft at this time and generate enough profit while remaining compliant with all laws and equity issues to make a dent in that (cover all operational costs plus the debt). When the county originally decided to build Barcroft, the financial outlook was very different. So maybe it’s become somewhat of an albatross for those trying to manage the budget. [/quote]

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