Lisbon City Council approved changes to the language of the lease with the Lisbon School Board for the Lisbon City Park.
The council and school board will hold a joint meeting in late April, but changes to the park lease were being made to clean up language lease changes.
City administrator Brandon Siggins said the park lease will definitely change after the completion of the sports complex, and could change when the two ball diamonds are built in the park.
The lease will begin May 1, and will be an annual renewal.
Mayor Doug O’Connor questioned why the scoreboard would be moved if the school were to move to a baseball or softball diamonds elsewhere.
“It’s always operated that everything installed in the park stays at the park and becomes property of the city,” O’Connor said.
Council member Sara Nost said her concern with the language was the amount of water and electricity costs currently covered by the lease, as well as the maintenance costs. The school pays $5,000 for maintenance and $5,000 for electricity and water usage during the three months of the baseball and softball seasons.
With the city having upgraded to LED lighting for the park, there is a possibility that the electrical costs will be reduced.
Nost feels that the city spends more than $5,000 for maintenance for the parks.
Siggins said the city has put several improvements into the park, for items like repairs to sprinklers, dugouts and the lights, but many of those repairs also benefit the city.
“The work we spend on items like seeding and fertilizing to the fields are things we also see benefit from, as we use those fields for flag football and soccer,” Siggins said. “We don’t need to do as much seeding for our usage.”
Council member Nathan Smith said while he sees Nost’s issues and concerns, the city also benefits from the usage of basketball courts during the winter for parks and recreation programs.
“If we were renting this for fair market value, it definitely could be much more,” Smith said. “We provide the ball fields to the schools because it adds value to the schools and communities for this partnership. They can’t afford to build their own baseball diamonds, and we can’t afford to build a building to house basketball courts for our program needs.”