Recreation Obsession Continues
While the rest of New Jersey’s 560 municipalities are gearing up to battle with budgets that will be facing lower tax revenue, lower state aid, and increased costs, Oakland’s obsession with recreation appears to be taking center stage as appointments to the Recreation Commission loom.
The borough attorney explained a recent postponement of recreation commissioners due to the town council’s need to rectify how they stagger the terms, but a recent email campaign concerning the reappointment of Commissioner Guadagnino is causing concern amongst some members of the program and residents in general.
The uproar in November 2010 concerning the council’s push to hire a full-time recreation director at an annual cost of $103,000 led hundreds of residents to come out to express their opposition at a town council meeting. This resulted in a special December 2010 meeting between the full Recreation Commission and the town council where many believed the outstanding areas of contention between the two bodies were successfully reconciled.
That outcome now appears to be in doubt as numerous openings on the recreation commission may ultimately change many of the players and potentially put recreation back at square one. According to Steve Wagoner who presently chairs the Recreation Commission, “”Mike and Neil(Malmud) have led the charge in making sure all the paperwork is done. I can’t say what kind of setbacks replacing Mike at this point will have.” Questioning Wagoner on why the mayor & council might be seeking to replace Guadagnino at this point, he responded, “It’s speculation at this point. I usually confer with the mayor on appointments to the commission, and that’s not happened this year.”
Wagoner went on to describe Guadagnino as someone who’s kids have passed through the program, who has the leadership experience and procedural knowledge to move the program forward, and does not have a personal agenda. According to Wagoner, “Mike’s made some tough decisions that did not make him popular with some people. Take Travel Baseball for example, he requires Travel players to be a part of the Oakland rec program…this is to protect the Oakland Recreation program. He makes his decisions on what’s best for the town.”
As the mayor and council regularly reappoint people to serve additional 3 or 5 year terms on various commissions, Wagoner was asked if the failure to reappoint Guadagnino would be an apparent vote of no-confidence in his performance as commissioner. “No way”, Wagoner said, “He’s done a tremendous job with baseball bringing in more volunteers, new ideas, and added a great value to the town in terms of the sport and the feeling of community. And both the council and the CFO have given him credit for being thorough with all this mandatory paperwork that all our commissioners face. I should add, Mike moved to tone down some of the over indulgent parents who brought too much pressure to the game and the kids, and that might have angered some people…but he kept his focus on the kids…and that’s what the program is about.”
The last brouhaha concerning recreation, which occurred only a month ago, resulted in local chatter concerning Oakland’s recreation program going private. Some advocates pointed to tax savings by local residents, and other pointed to elimination of governmental bureaucracy. We asked Commissioner Wagoner his thoughts on Oakland following in the steps of towns like West Milford and Midland Park.
“I think it would work in Oakland”, said Wagoner, “We have the volunteer spirit, we know that, and it just makes sense. Having the borough administrator and the borough CFO have to review and approve every expenditure is a waste of time and talent. I would like to end what we call the recreation subsidy from the town’s budget and just ask that they assume costs for background checks, insurance, and safety training; this would cover the town in all areas of safety, liability and cost far less then what taxpayers are assuming now. ”
As the town’s municipal budget is due in a matter of weeks, the recent obsession with recreation will undoubtedly need to take a back seat to more pressing matters. It is expected that the new appointments to recreation will take place at the next town council meeting on January 26th.
So now we have Wagoner’s version of it all, will a version with the other side – mayor & council- be forthcoming? Is not good journalism to only present one side of the story. Remember there are 3 truths – your truth, my truth & the whole truth. Let’s hear what the other side has to say.
To be honest, it all seems likea squabbing over a ball in the sandbox. Both sides do not seem to be playing fair. Some of these commissioners have been in for years, some new blood would be nice to see.
And I wouldn’t call it an obsession – it is called being concerned about happenings in our home town. Aren’t we supposed to be concerned about things like this? It does affect our kids – saying it is an obession makes it sound like it is a bad thing.
Hi Elizabeth,
Most of the time when an article seems a little harsh, I’m actually being really nice….and the reason we wrote on this story is because we were contacted about it.
We publish 99% of the content that is submitted to us, and follow-up on topics as resources allow….We’ve reached out to the town council in the past and offered them space to publish unedited content, but they prefer not.
I think you’re correct that this whole thing is a squabble – that’s a good term that will likely appear in the follow-up article.
If the council was planning on replacing rec commissioners, fine – but why have the drama of a televised summit meeting, make people jump through hoops, and then a few weeks later change the players…..If that’s what’s happening, it doesn’t make sense.
Considering Oakland Rec overall is pretty good, and there are a lot of other important issues that need closer attention, I think it’s pretty fair to say that the order of events reflect an obsession rather than a logical restructuring.
I’m sure the appointments to the rec commission will make for an interesting town council meeting, as there were insinuations at the last M&C meeting that the council has its own problems with compliance, and we’ll offer a more rounded picture of the situation after they meet again.
The timing of this is just odd to me. I don’t understand why candidates for the commissioner terms weren’t interviewed before the year ended so they could be appointed now. If a commissioner wasn’t going to be reappointed, he should’ve been told before his term ended but instead, he’s twisting in the wind.
Seems to me the rec program has gotten far too political. This is not the way to encourage volunteerism in the town.
I don’t know from agendas or squables or anything else, I am too busy coaching multiple teams every sports season to worry about these things. But I will add that the “prime directive” of any recreation commisioner must be to put the recreation program ahead of the travel program AT ALL TIMES. For the majority of our kids the rec teams are their only outlet to gain the benefits of youth sports: overcoming adversity, teamwork, commitment, excercise. Travel sports are a luxury driven by civic pride and personal goals for parents who want their children to be in a more competitive environment. Noble causes perhaps but ones that benefit a select number of kids. Whether change is good in this case remains to be seen, buy any action that specifcally diminishes the Rec over Travel approach is wrong, and I hope the citizens of Oakland hold anyone who moves even an inch away from this principle ACCOUNTABLE.