Clubhouse and Tennis Are Served By Council

By Barbara Henry, North County Times

Proponents of proposals to build more tennis courts and a clubhouse for the Boys & Girls Club emerged from Tuesday night's City Council meeting with broad grins on their faces.

"We persevered," declared Doren Curtiss, a member of the Carlsbad Senior Tennis Club, after the council informally agreed to move up the construction timeline for seven tennis courts at Poinsettia Park.  The change won't give the tennis-court proponents everything they wanted now -- they also sought a stadium court and a clubhouse building -- but the courts will be built in the coming year rather than in 2010 as originally planned.

Leaders of the non-profit Boys & Girls Clubs of Carlsbad also had something to celebrate after Tuesday's budget meeting.  "It's a fantastic gift," said Ron Sipiora, the organization's Chief Professional Officer, after the council indicated it will give the club $500,000 over a two-year period.

The money will help pay for the construction of a $5 million clubhouse southeast of the intersection of El Camino Real and Palomar Airport Road.  Club members had sought nearly $1 million from the city, but $500,000 is large when compared with what any other group has ever received from the council, Sipiora said.  "We were really facing an uphill battle here," he said.

Another funding proposal -- a planned $17 million city swim complex in southern Carlsbad -- came out mostly unscathed.  Council members unanimously agreed they could support all three pools planned for the complex, and agreed to a compromise on the planned water play area.  The play area will include the two water slides and the children's splash zone, but not a proposed "lazy river' that would have encircled the play area.

While the tennis and clubhouse supporters left the meeting in high spirits, other people emerged from the meeting empty-handed.  Most residents who spoke on budget issues urged the council to buy more open-space habitat and dump a long-planned golf course project.  Council members in an  informal 4-1, thumbs-up vote endorsed the golf course.  The lone dissenter, Councilwoman Norine Sigafoose, said she thought the project ought to go back for a public vote.

Before they voted, council members also told the open-space proponents that progress on land purchases won't happen until the environmental group Preserve Calavera resolves a lawsuit it has filed against a construction project in the city.  That didn't please the open-space activists.  Several said they weren't members of that group and asked why one group's activities should bar preservation efforts in the city.

Also unsuccessful in its lobbying efforts was the non-profit League of Women Voters, North Coast San Diego County.  The group's president, Jackie Stone, had urged the council to be "compassionate" and use general fund money to make up for a $408,000 federal cut in the Section 8 low-income housing program.  City officials plan to pass the extra cost on to the low-income residents who use the program.  Council members, with Mayor Bud Lewis dissenting, said if they stepped in now, they'd have to do it every year.

While part of the pool complex is already in the budget, most of the items discussed Tuesday night were extra requests -- things not in the city's proposed budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1.  The main $244.4 million budget, which includes large capital projects and general expenditures, passed unanimously with little comment.

As proposed, the general fund -- the section of the budget that pays for everything from park employees to police officers -- will spend $96.5 million and take in $104.8 million, leaving Carlsbad with $8.3 million to add to its well-stocked reserve fund.  By July 1, the city expects to have $68.9 million in reserve.  That doesn't include $35 million that city leaders have set aside for several projects, including the pool complex.

Carlsbad's proposed expenditures are up 6.7 percent from the current year's budget figure of $90.46 million.  So far this year, the city is operating under budget -- its actual expenses are forecast to be $89.7 million, while revenue is estimated at $99.54 million.

In fiscal year 2003-04, the city spent $80.35 million and took in $93 million.