Parks and Rec request — Colchester Document Library

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Parks; Recreation

To whom it may concern,

Colchester Recreation relies on the generosity of the Board of Education to offer community
programs, activities and events. Unlike other service based town departments, we do not have
our own dedicated facilities or program space.

Our funding is different than other town departments. The town budget does not support any of
our programs, events, activities- or any expenses associated with these programs. We rely on
program revenue, participant fees, donations, sponsorships and fundraisers to cover the expenses
of our camps (staffing, training, field trips, buses, supplies, etc.), programs (instructors,
supplies), events, software fees ($16,000 annually), Recreation Specialist salary and benefits, and
more.

We make fiscally conscious decisions based on need and community impact to stretch our
resources and limit our expenses. We evaluate, and re-evaluate, all that we do to ensure that our
decisions are based on community needs not “what we have always done”.

We find that many of our adult community programs struggle with continuity and our instructors
feel they lose participants due to the lack of consistency. We really appreciate the school space
and we recognize that we use quite a bit of it. We lack affordable program space on weekends
and during the school holidays. In order to use the schools during these times, we would have to
pay a school use fee, which includes the expense of a custodian at an overtime rate of pay. We
feel that adding an additional fee to our program fee would make the programs unaffordable for
most. We would love to increase community programming and activities at times that work best
for them- including weekends and evenings, and including summer vacation and school holidays.

We would like to work together with the Board of Education to allow Colchester Recreation
community programs the use of JJIS rooms 96, 98 and 100 under the supervision of a Town of
Colchester employee, if a custodian is not scheduled to work. These 3 rooms have exterior
access from the night entrance walkway and can be segregated from the rest of the school. We
recognize that this is a new proposal and we are willing to work together in stages to build a
relationship that meets the needs of all involved.

Thank you for your consideration,
Tiffany Quinn
Recreation Director, Town of Colchester