The City of Lisbon and Lisbon School District will make minor changes to the language of their current sharing contract when it comes up for renewal this year.
The changes were to language which identified the year the contract was originally entered into. Lisbon superintendent Autumn Pino noted that the contract has a date and year stipulated in it, but she was wondering if the year could be removed from the contract.
“If the goal is the rough deadline of May 1 through the end of July for baseball and softball season, the year isn’t needed,” Pino said.
Lisbon Schools transportation and grounds manager Rod Kelley noted there was also some language that identified buildings at the park that no longer existed that should be cleaned up in the contract.
Lisbon city administrator Brandon Siggins said the spring weather sometimes impacts when the city can give the field over to Lisbon Schools.
“There is a small window of time between the end of youth soccer and when the baseball and softball season begins,” Siggins said. “We give the fields over as soon as those youth have their last game.”
That issue will be changing in the fall of 2023, with the first phase of the sports complex being completed and hosting play for soccer and other sports.
Siggins noted that the contract and sharing has gone very smoothly from the city’s perspective.
Lisbon parks and recreation director Drayton Kamberling and Kelley agreed.
“Prepping the fields and giving them proper care the past few years has worked very well,” Kelley said. “The facilities really looked great this year and our efforts in the past really shined.”
Lisbon activities director Brandon Horman said that right now the space at Lisbon Schools is very tight for winter activities, but with the construction of the new school wing, one of the items in the contract is refurbishing the floor in the old gymnasium to allow it to function as a gym once more.
“We get really tight on gymnasium space during the winter,” Horman said. “There are people or organizations who reach out that we have to turn down. That’s why getting the gymnasium floor refurbished as part of the CTE project is important, as that will give us more gym space to use.”
Horman noted that is definitely needed because the parks and recreation numbers continually grow.
Both the city and school will review the contracts in March and have the language approved before the next joint meeting in April.
Accomplishments of cityThe new sports complex phase one was among the major accomplishments tackled by the City of Lisbon since the last joint meeting of the council and school board.
“All the infrastructure for the park in phase one has been completed,” said Lisbon city administrator Brandon Siggins. “The roads and parking are all in, and the field has been seeded.”
Siggins said there is hope to install a pavilion at the new sports complex sometime next year, and the city will be putting bids out for the two ball diamonds later this winter. The soccer fields will hopefully be playable next fall, 2023.
Siggins said the hope is the two ball diamonds will be able to cater to athletes of all types and they are looking at how Triple Play complex in Cedar Rapids allowed multiple pegs for bases at the correct level to allow the field to be used for different age levels.
“We will be trying to get the biggest bang for our buck in allowing the field to work for multiple age groups,” Siggins said.
The well project is another big upcoming one for the city. The well will be located north of the pond at Nature Park. That well will cater to the northern portion of town, including residents on Washington, Jackson, Monroe and Market Streets, as well as some areas around the school.
“The vast majority of the work for the new well project will be completed during this summer,” Siggins said.
The other work that will be happening this coming summer is repair to a water main in Lisbon. Contractors are doing work now to locate impacted lines, and the work will begin next summer.
Accomplishments of school Lisbon school’s big accomplishment is the work on the Career and Technical Education (CTE) expansion, hoping it will be bid by March and have most work completed next summer.
“We’re in the process of meeting with impacted stakeholders on the project,” said Lisbon superintendent Autumn Pino.
Along with the CTE offerings, the project will see additional classroom space, address some issues at the elementary school playgrounds and add a new wrestling room that will serve as a safe room for the district in case of severe weather. That will allow the old wrestling room to become a weight room, and allow the old gymnasium floor to be restored so it can be used as a gymnasium once more.
Pino is also excited about enrollment for the district being up this year, with a positive nine additional students for Lisbon.
School board president Jen Caspers explained being up nine students in Lisbon after a negative enrollment within the past decade, is a huge accomplishment and benefits the district financially.
Council member Ricky Scott asked why the CTE wing was not addressed in the recent bond construction a couple years ago.
School board member Allan Mallie explained that it became a point of the district maxing out what they could spend at the time to bring the auditorium and track to the school.
“It was definitely something we knew was missing with that last bond project, and it’s very important to have people support this,” Mallie said.
School board member John Prasil noted that the facilities committee had long discussions on what to pursue, and CTE offerings were just outside of what could be tackled with the bond issue that passed.
With the district having significant SAVE dollars, the opportunity to address something former principal Aaron Becker pressured the district to begin was available.
School board member Abbe Stensland reminded city council members – by using SAVE dollars, no one’s taxes will increase.
“SAVE does not increase taxes,” Stensland said. “It’s sales tax monies we’re already receiving, and the construction isn’t something we need to take to voters because of this. It allows us to levy against future SAVE dollars and allows us to build the CTE center.”
Scott was also wondering why a bus barn hasn’t been pursued.
The district does have that on a list of future projects to be completed, but the CTE improvements were the most important to address.
“Items that we’ve identified as priorities still exist,” Caspers said. “We try to make decisions with the limited dollars we have to have the greatest impact to our students and district.”
Pino said one of the other challenges facing the district – Mount Vernon and Lisbon being named as childcare deserts. She is involved in the ongoing discussions on how to address these concerns, recently attending a joint discussion between the League of Women Voters and Iowa Women’s Foundation and community leaders on the ongoing issue. Conversations will continue in the future.