A NEW Community Center FOR NORTHSHORE

While this project focuses primarily on the needs of youth, we want to include the needs and priorities of the entire community. NPRSA and ARC Architects are working with representative members of the community, including youth, to narrow down the focus of what this center could be and how it could best serve our community’s needs and provide its desired programming and amenities.

The NPRSA is approaching this study with all options and outcomes in mind, and holding no preconceptions about the type of services or facilities that youth in the district may want or need. This is why the study is for a “community center,” rather than for something more specific like an aquatics or athletics facility. The NPRSA might consider a center suited to any or all possible needs, as recommended by the findings of this study. It’s possible that the study could find that facilities and programming for youth are needed, but that they are not the top priority for district residents. If so, the NPRSA might consider those other needs in a later study, as it’s unlikely we could design a center that includes everything.

A preliminary funding strategy is one of ARC Architects’ deliverables as part of this Needs Assessment and Feasibility Study. Based on that strategy, the NPRSA may ask a levy consultant to assess the levy/bonding capacity of the district. This evaluation would help determine if a levy or bond measure to finance the construction of a facility is likely to pass. The levy consultant may also help craft ballot measure language, educate voters about the measure, and organize support.

• A pool is a basic facility, generally with a shallower end for recreational swimming and a deeper end for diving, which can be separated into lanes for competitions.

• An aquatics center is more elaborate and includes multiple amenities, such as several pools for different kinds of swimming, a lazy river, waterslides, and splash pads. But it still has a specific purpose: namely, aquatics.

• The NRPSA intends to conduct a broader study that acknowledges the potential need for multipurpose spaces that can support a wider variety of programming and activities, of which aquatics or other athletics may be only one component. A “community center” is a convenient, recognizable term for this sort of multifunction facility.

• While other cities have not successfully passed pool or community center levies recently, the studies prepared in support of those levies have consistently shown both a growing need and community interest in the construction of such a facility.

• As a multi-municipality taxing district, the NPRSA is uniquely positioned to build a facility by spreading the tax burden across a larger area, lessening the impact to individual taxpayers (and potentially allowing the construction of a larger facility than any of the member agencies would be able to afford on their own).