MASON CITY – The Mason City Park Board met Monday to discuss capital improvement projects for the 2013-2014 year. After discussion, a preliminary list goes as follows, to be voted on at next Park & Recreation Board Meeting on November 13th, 2012.
Trail Maintenance … $50,000
Soccer Complex – Ray Rorick … $25,000
Golf Cart Shed – Highland Park … $60,000
Parkers Woods Playground Equip. … $25,000 ($50,000)
Ground Cart – Frederick Hanford Complex … $13,000
6’ Mower – Highland Park … $25,000
Recreation Mini Van – stow & go … $18,000
Georgia Hanford ball diamond fence … $10,000
Central Park Mower w/bag … $16,000
Muse Norris Playground … $15,000 ($40,000)
Dog Park – fence … $40,000 ($80,000)
East Park Stone Bridge – Eng. Study … $10,000
Pool Lift Station … $30,000
East Park Band Shell … $20,000
Finishing Mower … $20,000
Park road maintenance … $23,000
___________
$400,000
8 thoughts on “Mason City Park Board to vote on capital improvement projects”
Golf course is a lost cause to much competion for it to survive and make money. But with that said all parks and related activities are a money losers and we need to decide if we want to fund these activities and at what price.
I would disagree. You have to drive at least 30 minutes from Mason City to find another 18 hole public golf course. There are a lot of ok 9 hole courses around. But to say Highland is a lost cause is just not right.
Honestly I would rather have our tax dollars spent on park improvements and maintenance than on the stupid statues downtown.
This is all fine and good but I would ask a couple of questions seeing as how it is taxpayer money. What kind of a Central Parkmower with a bag are they getting for $16,000? It must have golden hub caps. They can mow the whole park with a hand mower in about 4 hours. 60K for a golf cart shed seems pretty priceywhen they are only spending 20K on the band shell. What is a finishihing Mower for 20K? It seems like if they spend 16K on a mower with a bag it should be able to finish what it started. Why are we paying 10K for a engineering study? Don’t we have engineers on staff that could do this?I am sure someone has answers to these questions but who decides where the money goes??
Sorry, but the city engineers couldn’t find their ass with both hands. It’s much less work for them to farm it out!!
You need to look at it from a overall perspective and include labor costs. Anyone who knows anything about business can tell you that the single greatest cost is labor. So if you can buy a tool that gets the job done in 30minutes or one that can do it in 4 hours, or a more realistic figure of 6-7 hours. (trust me that park is 4 times the size of my lawn and it takes me 4 hours to mow.) Well anyway lets run the numbers. I will assume a wage, because it doesn’t really matter what the wage is, of $16/hour. Lets say that we mow that park once per week during for 30 weeks out of the year. The cost in labor for one year would be $240/year or $2880/year. Lets assume the mowers both last 10 years (good luck getting that push mower to last 10 years) the costs for labor are now $2400 or $28800… I think you can see where I’m going with this now. It’s not a very large savings, but it is a savings.
John-I can see what you are driving at and you can massage the numbers anyway you like. But as a manufacturing engineer and manufacturing engineering manager I can assure you the numbers are something a accountant would use and not something that apply’s in real life. Most equipment has a 5 year life expectancy and these mowers won’t last that long.
I like where the money is going. I may finally have cart shed to store my new cart. I’d rather pay storage fee then hall my trailer everywhere. I know there are sheds available but not up to my standards.