By Alisa Boswell-Gore

Nearly four dozen parents and Portales Recreation Center employees showed up to Tuesday night’s Portales City Council meeting to protest the closure of the recreation center program for children.

City officials recently sent a letter to the parents with children in the program to announce that the program would likely close come August due to liability issues.

Several parents approached the podium to ask councilors what the liability issues were and to say that the city would be “misplacing” 80 children if they close the program.

City officials told those gathered that the liability issues with the recreation center fall under the Child Care Licensing Act and regard the center not having all of the certifications it should have in place for such a facility, as well as the building not being up to safety codes for such a facility.

Resident Marissa Duran told councilors that most parents couldn’t afford private daycares and even if they could, daycares are filled to maximum capacity and don’t take children over 5 years old.

“The city is absolutely not responsible for your child care,” Mayor Ron Jackson responded, adding that when the facility was started in 1999, the plan envisioned for it was not as an all-day child care program but “a center that was for all of our citizens.”

“We want a recreation facility to be available to all of our citizens, not a certain age group, not what it’s turned into now. It has not been said that that program is completely stopping,” he said. “And (whatever it is) it’s going to be privately owned, not city operated. The city’s not responsible for that.”

City Councilor Jessica Smith reassures Portales residents Tuesday that the city is not trying to “replace one thing with another” but rather build a recreation program that makes sense for everyone.

One resident new to Portales told councilors that one of the reasons his family chose to live in Portales instead of Clovis was the rec center program, while others talked about the benefits it has brought to their children’s lives.

Brenden Peterson, 14, told city councilors that he benefitted from the rec center program for many years, and he was terrified of the water due to having almost drowned as a small child, but rec center Director Jodi Diaz helped him overcome his fear and become a good swimmer.

“It’s not a cause and effect situation where we’re closing the rec center to bring in an entertainment venue,” Councilor Jessica Smith told parents. “With the rec center, there are some liability issues and concerns that we have as a city council that we have to address as a public safety concern, along with wanting to provide a rec center that is truer to the original plan for a rec center where there can be a facility that incorporates programs for all ages. So, it’s not that one thing is going to go away and we’re replacing it with an entertainment venue.”

Smith said the city would likely not turn away anyone who wants to invest in opening an entertainment venue in Portales, because they always encourage economic development, but that is a completely separate issue from the rec center itself.

“Yes, they may end up in the same building, but that doesn’t mean that we’re getting rid of our plans for developing recreation in our city. I would hope to see us looking into private investors for entertainment and also to build or refurbish a building to get a recreation center that is actually suited to the purpose of a recreation center. And that can happen a lot sooner than you guys think, but we have to make sure that funding is available, that we know what our funding sources are; we have to make sure we have a plan in place, that it’s realistic. But us wanting to do that is not the only reason why for the time being, some of the programs at the rec center need to be ceased. There are other reasons, and liability is a huge one. The liability has to be stopped immediately, whether we have a plan in place or not.”

Parents pleaded with councilors to try to find a way to keep the current program open as they pursue other options.

Jackson said councilors have plans to form a committee of citizens and council members “that we can take in a direction that’s going to enhance our ability to reach all the citizens of Portales in the recreation and entertainment area.”