Island Rec Community Letter

Island Rec’s Revenue Reversal

San Juan Island Park and Recreation District, locally known as Island Rec, was established in 1984 to provide parks and recreation for San Juan Islanders. Island Rec’s primary funding is limited to a six year levy. Every six years Island Rec must seek a new levy to continue to operate. In 2009 voters approved a 17 cent per year levy for Island Rec, designed to last for 6 years. Ten cents of this levy was for Island Rec’s operations, and seven cents went directly to the school district to pay for high school sports. Without this seven cents of support, high school sports would have to be eliminated due to serious shortfalls within the school budget.

What Happened?

Island Rec and the San Juan Island School District are understandably disappointed that our County Assessor and the WA. State Auditor did not properly apply a very unique levy law that pertains to Park and Recreation Districts and property assessments. This error resulted in payments totaling over $377,000 over a three year period, unauthorized under this law, to be collected for Island Rec. Forty one percent (41%) of these dollars were destined to go for high school sports. It is important to understand that our anticipated revenue that was voter approved did not increase. As is common with almost all other taxing districts, levy rates increase to maintain the originally voter approved dollar amounts, but this is not allowed under this unique, and so far, unexplainable levy law. This action created a new 24 cent collection rate to be applied so the same amount of tax dollar could be collected. Island Rec correctly relied on the Assessors unintentional and unfortunate interpretation and actions throughout this time period. The law is clear in stating that Island Rec and the school district must ‘return’ this money and revert to original 17 cent tax levy rate. This, of course, means the total dollar amount the voters approved 4 years ago will be substantially less due to the drop in property values. The requirement of ‘returning’ this money, and the substantially lower amount that will now be collected at the 17 cent rate has resulted in a very serious financial crisis for the Island Rec Board of Commissioners and the high school sports budget. The question is now, how are we going to proceed?

Looking at 2015

The Island Rec Commissioners have met as a board twice since being informed of this error. Our first meeting was with the Assessor who explained the law and consequences of this error. Our second meeting was to discuss what options we have and to begin formulating our budget for 2015 and beyond. Our goal is to maintain, with few exceptions, our current programing and parks that our citizens want and need. Through careful planning and good stewardship of our tax dollars and other monies over many years, Island Rec and the school district have created reserve funds for our capital projects and for the schools unanticipated costs for post season expenses. Funds designated for Lafarge Park (gravel pit), future replacement of our van, a planned playground at the Carter Street fields, and new programing for children during school breaks and expanded summer camps will be taken and used in the 2015 budget to help meet these goals of maintaining the status quo. We will work with the county, town , FANS (Friends and Neighbors Support Island Rec) and possibly state offices to secure additional funding to meet these goals. Our staff will be subject to a wage freeze and will not receive any cost of living adjustments (COLAs), and will have some hours reduced as we eliminate or reduce certain selected programs. This will allow us to ‘get by’ in 2015, but our future beyond that needs to be addressed by the voters.

Island Rec Levy 2015

While there are many details to be identified and decided upon we do know that we will be asking voters to approve a new levy sometime in 2015 which will produce revenues for 2016 and beyond. We will once again ask for funding for our basic recreation programming (Music on the Lawn, STAR, Camp Eagle Rock, Family Open Skate and Youth Basketball, swimming lessons, etc), and our parks (Eddie and Friends Dog Park, the Family Park and Skatepark at the Fairgrounds and Lafarge Open Space), continued support for all our school sports teams, and new to this levy, a Maintenance and Operations budget for the very impressive Friday Harbor Fields located on Carter St., where construction is fully underway. Construction costs are being paid by private donations through Friday Harbor Athletic Association (FHAA). We highly recommend that you take a moment to visit this exciting facility and see all that it promises for our community, both for today and for years to come.

Our Promise

As stewards of of your tax dollars we promise to continue to be frugal in our expenditures, to listen to you for programming ideas and needs, and to always provide professional and courteous staffing at all of our events. Thank you for supporting Island Rec these past 30 years!

Bill Cumming, Island Rec Commissioner
Scott Zehner, Island Rec Commissioner
Rod Turnbull, SJISD Athletic Director

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