Who will drive U?

Mammoth Lakes Town Council continues to discuss the formation of a Measure U Steering Committee. It began discussing the topic at its Oct. 20 meeting, but held off on making a decision because there were only three members of the Council present at the time, plus Council members had several questions they asked staff to answer.

At Wednesday’s meeting there were again only three Council members at the dais. Staff reviewed its answers to Council’s questions regarding scope of work, retaining a facilitator, committee size, and naming specific individuals as members, but Council and the community had new and persisting questions that they still feel need to be answered.

The biggest concern is how Measure U, Measure R and RecStrats (see below) will integrate to provide a big picture for recreation, arts and culture, and mobility.

John Wentworth, Executive Director of MLTPA, explained that RecStrats lays out the vision, and that the Measure U steering committee process will be able to provide information on how things can be financed.

“We need to look at all the revenue streams for recreation and see how we can use them best,” Clark said.

Evan Russell, Executive Director of the Mammoth Lakes Foundation, also expressed concern that the group discussing the needs and integration should be broader than what it is today. He felt that the Public Arts Commission’s mission should be expanded in order for it to have a place in the process.

“It’s all designed to work together, we just have to figure out how to do it,” Wentworth added, referring to Measure U, Measure R and RecStrats.

With many questions still on the table, Council deferred forming the Measure U steering committee to its Nov. 17 meeting. Council did, however unanimously approve the RecStrats report.

What is RecStrats?

RecStrats is a vision for recreation in Mammoth and a strategic plan for its implementation, with the key element of the plan being integration. The plan was created by a local steering committee and facilitated by Carl Ribaudo of Strategic Marketing Group based in South Lake Tahoe and Danna Stroud, former Tourism and Recreation Director for TOML. The Mammoth Lakes Trails and Public Access Foundation funded the process that delivered RecStrats, which is part of the Town Council’s Recreation Reorganization. The RecStrats process was approved by the Council in July and completed the work that was started with the MRRC (Mammoth Region Recreation Council) and MLR (Mammoth Lakes Recreation) processes.

Ribaudo explained to the Council that the plan is meant to help create a sense of place for recreation by bringing governmental agencies, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), the private sector and user groups to the table, together. The ultimate goal is to make Mammoth the best alpine recreation community in the country. The plan includes seven core strategies that the steering committee believes cover anyone interested in any type of recreation in the Mammoth area.

The seven core strategies are: winter recreation activities, non-winter recreation activities, municipal sports and recreation, trails, special events, high altitude training, and arts and culture. Each strategy has a series of implementation steps, according to Ribaudo.

Jeff Marsolais spoke on behalf of the Inyo National Forest to commend the steering committee on this process.

“It is brave to be looking at a vision of recreation during down economic times,” he said. “The Inyo Forest thinks this is a great idea. The document brings forward great opportunities with strategic focus. We want to be here to partner with you on this effort.”

Now that the plan has been approved by Council the Recreation Commission will be in charge of its management.