City: Local sales tax is grandstands' final option

SANDPOINT — It’s a community icon that has hosted generations of spectators who watched players go forth on the field of battle.

But that field, and especially the aging and dilapidated grandstands at War Memorial Field, are at the end of their usable life.

There is no choice, according to an engineering report: it’s time for the wooden grandstands to be rebuilt — or be demolished.

“It is advisable that the bleachers be replaced at the earliest possible time,” a report published last month by Newport engineering firm James A. Sewell & Associates concluded.

“This is our opportunity to remedy the situation,” city Parks and Recreation Director Kim Woodruff said. “Or take it down and then, I guess, sit on lawn chairs.”

The opportunity Woodruff speaks of is the consideration of a resolution by the City Council to place a five-year, 1 percent sales tax measure on the November ballot.

If approved, the tax measure — and the future of the Memorial Field grandstands — will be in the hands of Sandpoint voters.

The tax would fund reconstruction of the wooden grandstand, plus improvements to the fields turf and drainage, other park infrastructure, and would generate a maintenance and operations fund for the field. It will also fund an additional part- or full-time staff position in the Finance Department to assist with tax collections.

Woodruff estimated Monday that reconstruction costs would run between $2.8 and $3 million. However, the city is hiring a consultant to generate a more comprehensive estimate, and expects to have “a firmer number within next couple of months,” Woodruff said.

“We’ve been working on this for a long, long time,” Woodruff said. “Nobody’s jumping up and down about … more sales tax, but without it there really is no other mechanism for funding.”

A local group, Friends of Memorial Field, Inc., has been working for nearly three years to find a way to fund the cost of replacing the dilapidated bleachers. In a letter to the City Council, FOMF President Bill Berg outlined the history of the group’s efforts to fund the reconstruction effort. It hasn’t been without its successes, but neither has the group gone without setbacks.

Started in 2012, contributions to FOMF helped fund over 30 percent of a $272,000 lighting project at the field. The city and the Lake Pend Oreille School District funded the remaining balance.

A 2013 reorganization of FOMF — including 501(c)(3) nonprofit status — and a refocus of the group included the “lofty” goal of raising enough money to fund the entire grandstands reconstruction project without resorting to a tax increase. The group began looking for “lead level” corporate sponsors from among local heavy hitters like Coldwater Creek, Litehouse Foods and Panhandle State Bank. Naming opportunities were tossed about. Smaller donation efforts, including “second level “sponsors, were considered.

Then the floor dropped out from beneath the group’s corporate fundraising efforts. Coldwater Creek fell. Panhandle merged with Columbia Bank and “local control was lost.” Litehouse was sold to its employees and subsequent donation amounts decreased, according to the letter.

Today, FOMF thinks it “reasonable” that the group can expect to generate $200,000 in revenue.

And now a tax measure is unavoidable.

Woodruff points out the relative benefits of a temporary sales tax versus a property tax. First, the tax will end in five years. Second, instead of Sandpoint taxpayers carrying the entire burden of paying for the multi-use facility themselves, a sales tax will spread the tax burden to others — tourists and those who live outside the city limits — who will help fund the field when they make purchases in Sandpoint. It’s either a tax — or no grandstand.

“We can’t put a whole bunch of money into a continual patch,” Woodruff said.

The city invested $67,739 to maintain the field in 2014. It budgeted $78,999 for this year, according to Woodruff. Between the cost and the increasingly unsafe conditions of the grandstand, the city’s maintenance effort is becoming both a liability issue and one of diminishing returns financially. Passage of a tax funding mechanism is the final solution, Woodruff said. If the tax measure fails at the ballot, the city will be left without options.

“It will be my recommendation that the grandstands be removed immediately,” he said.

The City Council will consider the tax ballot resolution at its regular meeting Wednesday, 5:30 p.m. in council chambers, 1123 Lake St.