Willoughby Hills Community Center to remain open

Contrary to Mayor Robert Weger’s announcement that he would be closing the Willoughby Hills Community Center, the center remains open.

The mayor, who made the announcement during the April 26 city council meeting, said that council’s decision to eliminate positions has created a challenge with the community center.

“Council has eliminated the part-time clerk stenographer in the recreation department and six members who monitor the events, do the set-ups and clean the rooms for rentals,” Weger said. “This leaves absolutely no one to attend the building. I have no option but to close the building with the exception of the library,”

The Willoughby Hills Public Library will open and close the building within its operating hours, the mayor said.

Weger also said the city would be tasked with notifying all classes and parties who have rented the facility that the building would be closed until council decides to bring the workers back.

An email went out April 27 from the mayor, notifying people of his decision to close the building. The mayor said he would be constructing a wall in the lobby blocking access to the community center rooms and changing locks to the building.

The mayor also acknowledged that this decision would pose the risk of lawsuits from those he described as irate renters. But as safety director, he said he does not want renters in the building and to have an emergency that could be handled by trained staff if present.

Council President Nancy Fellows said she and the mayor received numerous phone calls from renters and businesses who were contracted to cater events and convinced the mayor to not follow through on his decision to close the building.

Fellows also said the mayor’s statement that council eliminated the recreation coordinator positions isn’t quite true. She explained that the city had two part-time recreation coordinator positions for a long time. They eliminated only one of the positions and that position is not part of the union, so the position is available to be filled.

The person who currently fills the role as recreation coordinator was hired under the position of clerk-stenographer, a union position.

Weger said he will be posting and looking to fill the position of the recreation coordinator.

As of April 30, one company who had an event scheduled at the center relocated its function to another facility because of the announced closing.

An employee working at the building on April 30 was not willing to comment. She said that she was not comfortable commenting on the decisions involving the community center because there were still decisions to be made.

The Willoughby-Eastlake Public Library, which operates the Willoughby Hills Library branch located inside the community center ,was concerned that it would have to cancel library programs that were planned there. Those programs are held in community center rooms separate from the library branch.

“The Willoughby-Eastlake Public Library is relieved to hear that the Willoughby Hills Community Center will remain open, although Willoughby Hills Public Library operations would not have been affected,” said Lori Caszatt, Willoughby-Eastlake Public Library communications and development manager. “The closing of the Community Center would have meant that the library would need to find an alternate location for all of our scheduled programming.”

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