VENICE — Negotiations between the city of Venice and Sarasota County on a new agreement for parks maintenance officially broke down this week, after Venice City Manager Ed Lavallee rejected the offer of a five-year agreement worked out last week by staff members.
“As I got briefed on their proposal, as I understood it, it was going to be expensive for the city of Venice to accept those responsibilities,” Lavallee said. “The city was going to get back 100 percent of the operation of all the parks in transition, except for Wellfield.
“The implications are a significant increase in operating costs for the city,” he added.
Under an agreement that is scheduled to end Sept. 30, Sarasota County chips in up to $5,000 on maintenance of a dozen or so parks in Venice and handles scheduling of league games for Wellfield and Chuck Reiter parks, as well as the event scheduling for places like the Venice Community Center and Maxine Barritt Park.
A statement of principles, worked out and signed Friday by Assistant County Administrator Mark Cunningham and Assistant City Manager Len Bramble, called for Sarasota County to assume full responsibility and ownership of Wellfield Park, with the city of Venice assuming responsibility for everything else.
Venice’s responsibility would have been phased in. For example, effective Oct, 1, the city would have been responsible for Chauncy Howard, Hecksher, Higel and Legacy parks, as well as the Venice Myakka River Park and the west side of the Venetian Waterway Park.
Responsibility for other parks — including the beaches — would transition to Venice in ensuing years, allowing for a gradual build-up of some sort of city parks division.
Chuck Reiter Park, home of the Venice Little League, would be the last of those parks, with the city taking it over at the end of the five years — unless Sarasota County wanted to continue operating the park and provide Little League fields there.
Carolyn Brown, the director of parks, recreation and natural resources for Sarasota County, stressed that the county intends to continue to provide services for area youth leagues.
“We’ve got a proposal out there, and the county certainly has every intention of having a place for children to play — that’s our plan,” Brown said.
For almost nine months — since Venice first asked the county to take over Wellfield Park — representatives of area youth leagues have been concerned that the government squabble would leave their children without fields. That intensified last Nov. 30, when the county informed the cities of Sarasota, Venice and North Port that their agreements on parks maintenance would end on Oct. 1.
Those concerns escalated in late January, after parents became aware of a letter drafted by Venice Mayor John Holic — but not endorsed by the rest of the Venice City Council — urging the county to tell youth leagues they would be without facilities Oct. 1, since all their use agreements for Wellfied and Chuck Reiter are with Sarasota County.
Since then Rob Merlino, administrator of the “Save Wellfield and Chuck Reiter fields” Facebook page, and Michelle Accardi, a local parent, urged the County Commission, during its Jan. 30 meeting, to rescind the Nov. 30 letter until the cities and county reach new deals.
Organizers of area youth leagues are coalescing into one voice to hammer home that point.
On Monday, Lindsay Neeley, a Venice Vikings board member, sent the elected officials an email urging them to “please stop with the ‘blame game’ and just communicate with one another.”
Last summer, Neeley started a “Save Venice Youth Sports Complexes” petition at change.org that currently has more than 4,900 signatures.
The talks will continue — moving up the chain of command from staff to Lavallee and County Administrator Jonathan Lewis. According to a dispute-resolution clause in the current agreement, if the two administrators cannot come to terms, the next step would be for the two elected boards to negotiate, followed by mediation before any legal action.
For Venice, there are several sticking points, ranging from having to hire people to maintain the parks or lifeguards to supervise beaches, to the thought of signing over the deed to Wellfield Park to the county without compensation.
In contrast, Sarasota County is currently building a new Venice Public Library on land leased from the city for a token sum.
Brown said that if the county were to make significant improvements at Wellfield park, “it would be our desire to own it in its entirety.”
Cunningham, added, “it makes for a much cleaner process.”
He likened the situation to a tenant needing to get permission from a landlord before making changes to a home.
Cunningham didn’t rule out the county striking a long-term lease on the land but stressed, “it’s a much easier process when you own the property.”
Venice and Sarasota County are scheduled to conduct a joint meeting Feb. 28 at the Venice Community Center. Officials hope a final deal — or at least significant progress toward one — will be brought before both boards by then.
Sarasota County Commissioner Charles Hines said he is willing to wait for results from a meeting between Lavalle and Lewis rather than comment on the current statement of principles.
“Before we pick this one apart, let Ed and Jonathan sit down and … see what they come up with,” he said.