Hoping to get a clearer picture of the recreational needs of Princeton Borough and Township, the Princeton Recreation Department is set to put into a motion a survey that, if effective, will serve as master plan for the next 10 to 15 years.
The $68,000 study, to be implemented by Brandstetter Carroll Inc. of Cincinnati and Lexington, Ky., will be the first full, up-and-down assessment in nearly 18 years, and could offer a better look at the department's needs, resulting in better planning, the lessening of related costs associated with potential new facilities and programs, and improving ways to find new funding.
"Strategic planning is something we never do enough of, and we hope by the end of this year, we will again be able to have a good 10-year plan of what's needed," said Jack Roberts, executive director of the Recreation Department, adding that this type of assessment was long overdue.
A public hearing, the first of two workshops in the informational phase of the assessment, will take place next Wednesday at Township Hall at 7 p.m., with the goal, Mr. Roberts said, of "turning concepts into action.
"If there's anything to say about recreation, even if 'it doesn't touch my life at all,' we want to hear it," Mr. Roberts said Monday in an interview. "All that type of information is stuff we need to hear, and hopefully that will come out in the survey."
The needs of the community, most particularly, are what are to be determined by this multi-month survey, whose findings will then be presented to Borough Council and Township Committee for further review. In the meantime, the department has assembled a resident-based steering committee to attend the public workshops.
"There's a huge amount of stuff to go through, and we hope to talk about organizational dynamics," Mr. Roberts said, adding that he hopes to see Borough parks more involved in organized recreational activities. The governing bodies are likely to be interested in a capital plan that would outline specific projects, something of a wish list that it could embrace, Mr. Roberts said. These range from the obvious — the 40-year-old Community Park Pool — to the lesser known outside organized sports circles, like synthetic turf on municipal playing fields.
Financing, Mr. Roberts said, will be crucial to outline; otherwise, support for some projects could cool. "We don't get a chance to have this conversation as much as we probably should," he said, encouraging a joint-municipal hearing on recreation. "It could be the precursor to our whole budget process for 2008."
The Recreation Department's combined tax-supported municipal budget for 2006 was just over $1.12 million, nearly three-and-half times the cost of the department's 1989 budget — the last time it considered a reevaluation of its master plan, which resulted in the developing of Grover and Hilltop parks. That assessment, however, was strictly related to playing catch-up on field space. "We were way behind at that time, and we had to do a very simple master plan to look at locations to build fields in the future," Mr. Roberts said.
In addition to placing an indoor athletic facility on that wish list, Mr. Roberts, said to "be surprised" by what the study might offer, alluded to possible recommendations for a teen center, or even another senior center.
The study timeline indicates that physical planning and recommendations for current and proposed facilities could surface by June or July, and that a final recommended master plan could be conceived by late summer or early fall.
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The Princeton Recreation Department will host the first of two public workshops next Wednesday, March 7, from 7 to 9 p.m. at Princeton Township Hall.