65 people turned out for the city’s second Community Conversation

The general sentiment from the 65 people who came out to Sedona City Council’s second Community Conversation at Community Library Sedona on Wednesday, Sept. 9, is that residents would like an indoor pool if a future recreation center is built.

In place of a typical Wednesday work session, council held a listening session, the second half of which was hearing from residents about what amenities that they would like to see in a potential city recreation center.

The first half of the meeting saw the seven council members ask for feedback on the city’s new Fire Safe Sedona Program and wildfire evacuation preparedness.

Residents leaned heavily toward aquatics at the end when they were given several stickers to indicate their preferences among the ideas that were generated.

An indoor pool drew far more interest than anything else with athletic courts, a sauna or hot tub, on-site child care and fitness space being distant seconds. Resident enthusiasm tapered from there for amenities such as an indoor running track, a dance studio and café space, before a long tail of lower-voted ideas: Classrooms, rentable event space and a scattering of one-off suggestions that included a music room, a teen center and a shooting range.

No formal action from council came out of either half of the listening session, per statute for work sessions.

“Clearly, there’s interest from the community in having a rec center,” Sedona Vice Mayor and Mayor-Elect Brian Fultz said to the NEWS. “I think the stops and starts in years past probably had something to do with lack of funding sources, and the city is clearly in a better position now to strategize how to provide a rec center, given the resources that are available today that simply weren’t there prior to COVID and prior to [Senate Bill] 1350,” the statewide short-term rental bill signed into law in 2016.

The idea of a municipal recreation center has been floated in the city for decades but it has never come to fruition.

However, the conversation about such a facility has come up again following this spring’s public opinion poll of 1,620 Sedona voters about what residents would like to see the city do with the Western Gateway that the city purchased for more than $23 million in 2022.

In the survey on a scale of 1 being low to 5 being high, residents on average rated a community recreation center at 3.58, putting it in second place behind a community gathering space, which had a score of 3.82. The other scores were an event lawn at 3.50, an amphitheater at 3.05, housing at 2.51, apartments and townhomes at 2.50, restaurants at 2.39, retail at 2.11, and commercial space rated lowest at 2.

A potential location, or cost of a recreation center was not discussed during the listening session; council members only asked residents what amenities they would like to see at one.

One thing that will not be going into the Western Gateway is housing, following 61% of voters who passed Proposition 403 during the July 21 Primary Election that barring the city from doing so at the former Sedona Cultural Park.

The Cottonwood Recreation Center’s cost was just under $20 million, and was built in 2010 when it opened. Morenci’s was just about $30 million, and that was 2013, when it was built, Sedona Parks and Recreation Director Josh Frewin said in response to an audience question.

The city has had several challenges over the last several months opening its largest capital project the $28.25 million Uptown Parking Garage, from a nearly $1.2 million settlement agreement with McCarthy Building Companies Inc. that council approved on Aug. 11, along with ongoing litigation with Fann Contracting Inc., over water pressure issues that prompted City Council to approve a Memorandum of Understanding with Arizona Water Co. and the Sedona Fire District to replace 6-inch watermains with 10-inch piping.

“If a recreation center moves forward, it’s not something that we’re going to run blindly into,” Fultz said. “I would expect to incorporate many learnings from our existing major capital projects before embarking on another one.”