County Commissioners Draw a Line in the Sand on After-School Programs

The Hillsborough County Commissioners voted unanimously to support some form of after-school care at its recreation centers, and to keep more of those centers open, but the glass is half-empty for those who fought the hardest to keep the centers open and the program alive.

At their Aug. 24 budget workshop, the commissioners spent about three hours discussing and debating the merits of the so-called “Hagan Hybrid” plan put forth by commissioner Ken Hagan.

Plan Particulars

The hybrid plan calls for moving forward with the regional model for Hillsborough County recreation centers drawn up by Mark Thornton, director of the Hillsborough County Parks, Recreation and Conservation Department.

That model called for stiff cuts in staff and closing all but nine recreation centers, which along with two additional centers yet to be built, including one in FishHawk, would become regional recreation centers.

Also under the hybrid plan, some of the centers remaining open, including the Brandon Recreation Center on East Sadie Street, would be expanded, with gyms, but that construction has not yet been funded and is not expected in the near future.

In addition, the hybrid plan would keep an additional 19 neighborhood facilities open. An after-school program, run by part-time employees at reduced fees, would be installed at the combined 30 centers.

Site-based programs would be reviewed throughout the school year but would be given the duration of the school year to prove their viability. They would be closed, individually or collectively, if enrollment in those programs fell below a determined threshold, which Commissioner Sandra Murman, in an amendment to the hybrid plan, placed at 25.

The rates for the program would be decreased from the current $48 a week to $38 a week. Families qualifying for reduced-price lunches would pay $30 a week; those qualifying for free lunches would pay $20 a week.

The O’Grady Reaction

The approved plan fell short of the expectations of Terry O’Grady and his brother, Jack, who said they spent “hundreds of hours” crunching numbers and meeting with several commissioners and their staffs, putting forward a plan that at one time they believed would be the basis of the so-called Hagan Hybrid proposal.

Terry O’Grady has a long tenure as a volunteer with parks and recreation. that he used the same budget parameters and operating expenses, line items and personnel earmarked to draw up a plan that would retain 30 parks and the after-school program at those centers.

Moreover, he contended that his plan allowed for the same number of allocated full- and part-time employees and included enrollment thresholds, fee structures and contingencies that could end up saving the county money.

Terry O’Grady was out of town on business Aug. 24, but his brother, Jack, was at the proceedings at the Fred B. Karl County Center.

“You ask me to comment? I don’t know,” Jack O’Grady said. "This is not even what they said they wanted. They said make it based on what parents expect the program to be, make it feasible, and we did. We said you didn’t have to cut that many parks and programs and we gave them a way to do that. And now they’re going to do that but they’re going to do it in a different way, which I don’t think is going to work.”

“I’m not happy with the political process,” Jack O’Grady added. “They asked for our help and they used us. I’d be reluctant to ever volunteer any of my services for a politician like that again, the way they played it. They asked for our help and then basically used us in the political process but didn’t use what we gave them.”

Points and Counterpoints

Indeed, the day’s discussion and debate focused on a whole series of points and counterpoints as the commissioner concluded with a plan that they said in their respective comments showed their commitment to children and families.

Hagan went to the podium to discuss his hybrid plan, opening with his assertion that “much of the blame and criticisms on the future of after-school programs were leveled on Mr. Thornton.”

“Not to defend all his decisions,” Hagan added, but Thornton at times was “following the orders from the county administrator,” Mike Merrill.

Hagan posited that declining enrollment over the years in after-school programs run by the county’s parks and recreation department could be attributed not only to greater competition from other offerings but also to increased tuition (from $30 to $48) and to the elimination of transportation services from area schools.

He implored his colleagues to consider that if they felt strongly that after-school care is “a luxury we can no longer afford” and that the “county should not be in the after-school business,” then they should stand up to that contention and vote to “scrap the whole program and close all of our regional centers.”

If, however, the decision is to maintain recreation offerings, then Hagan said it is incumbent upon the board to “give this our best shot.”

Toward that end, he proposed keeping open and additional 19 neighborhood park locations and reducing after-school care fees.

Enrollment Is Down — But Why?

Meanwhile, after-school programs at some county recreation centers have been in operation since the school year opened.

Deputy County Administrator Sharon Subadan noted that as of Aug. 23, about 186 children had been enrolled at some of these programs.

But Commissioner Lesley “Les” Miller Jr. said he was not surprised at the low number given that county recreation officials had mailed a letter to parents, weeks in advance of the Aug. 24 meeting, saying the program no longer was in operation.

Reading from the letter, dated July 29, Miller said it noted that the Hillsborough County Parks, Recreation and Conservation Department “will no longer provide after-school care” and that this change would “be effective with the beginning of the 2011-12 school year.”

Miller asked that county officials, given the new vote, ensure that parents, who were “up the river without a paddle,” be contacted again and given the news that the program is back on. He also asked for the reduction in fees for families with lower-incomes that qualify for free and reduced-price lunches.

“Part of the problem of the current enrollment is directly related to parents confused about what’s going on, and they can’t afford it,” Hagan said.

"I talk with parents every day,” he added at another point in the discussion. "Once they understand we’re going to have a program and lower fees they’re going to come back and they’re going to come back in droves.”

Standards, Outcomes and Deliverables

Commissioner Victor Crist, who called Hagan’s proposal “a brilliant plan,” asked for a set of “standards, outcomes and deliverables” that would measure the program against the lofty objectives of improving school grades and decreasing teen pregnancy and crime.

Murman responded that what Crist proposed was “so way over the top” in requiring such things as a check of “school grades and information,” which set off an angry retort from her after Crist responded that he wanted more than to “say we’re only going to babysit.”

“Take that back,” Murman said. “You said I said that,” to which Crist responded that he had not intended to cast that aspersion.

Their exchange illustrated the broad strokes with which the commissioners were attempting to both save and shape a program under trying economic times by both reining it in and casting a wider net.

Available Options

Commissioner Kevin Beckner contended that there were 256 available options for after-school programs countywide, according to his staff’s assessment. He proposed repurposing $2 million from the money earmarked for parks and recreation to fund a scholarship program “to give parents and families the choice of where to send their children.”

In asking if there were a “more efficient way to do this than the hybrid plan,” Beckner said it might be wiser, using the remaining proposed dollars, to “go back to our core roots” and focus on developing programs in areas not being served adequately.

Beckner distributed a map showing and listing detailing the 256 locations, which included YMCA and Boys & Girls Club facilities as well as all Hillsborough elementary and middle public schools. The school system offers a program called HOST, an acronym for the “Hillsborough County Public Schools Out-of-School Time” program.

“That’s a significant number,” said Commissioner Mark Sharpe.

A quick review of the 256 locations, however, shows that the number is not accurate because not every school has a HOST program. Moreover, at least one of the non-school facilities, the Brandon Family YMCA, is not able to provide after-school programming, as noted in a recent Brandon Patch article.

The HOST homepage on the Hillsborough County School District’s website, as of Aug. 25, notes that there are no HOST programs at Mann and McLane middle schools in Brandon, as well as at Coleman, Dowdell, Madisoin, Memorial, Monroe, Pierce and Webb middle schools.

Beckner’s contention is that a line needs to be drawn despite the emotions surrounding the issue. “We have run a class-act program since 1965,” he said. “It served a purpose when there were no other choices out there.”

Now, he added, “times have changed and so the debate is, where do we draw the line when we, as a government, say there are other people out there who can provide a more efficient and cost-effective program?”

That led to discussion as well as to a major issue surrounding the after-school care question for working parents: transportation, although no solutions were offered in that regard.

According to the school district’s website, a number of elementary schools in close proximity to YMCA facilities partner with the YMCA to provide after-school care there, as is the case with Alafia Elementary and the Campo Family YMCA and Seffner Elementary School and the Brandon Family YMCA.

Viability and Sustainability

Commissioner Al Higginbotham, whose district encompasses the Greater Brandon area, said he was concerned about a duplication of services. He also spoke to the need for periodic assessments of viability and sustainability.

“If the program is not supporting itself, we start notifying parents and advocates for those employees and the change” will be made, Higginbotham said.

Hagan agreed to the assessment but was successful in getting the board not to agree to a mid-term change and to agree to let the program run the course of a full school year “to determine the success of the program."

“At what point do we consider this business model broken?” Beckner asked. “How long do you operate at a loss before you pull the plug?” 

Added Higginbotham: “It’s not a comfortable decision because of the emotion. And all of us will be on the ballot in 2012. I’m going to make the correct decision [based on]the fiscal model . . . and not threats. At some point you have to say this model is not working.”

Hagan agreed, but stood firm that decision should not be made until the end of the school year.

“If the program is not working,” he added, “I’ll be the first one to say we pull the plug. [But] we owe it to children and families to give it our best shot to make it work.”

Employee Discontent?

Merrill, like Higginbotham, alluded to his belief that employee discontent was behind the drive to press the community to fight against the July vote that closed recreation centers and disbanded the after-school program.

That the program will be run with part-time, and not full-time employees, is an issue on which he asked the board to stand firm.

“So employees who have been in the forefront, and causing some of the confusion about the program because of concerns about their jobs,” will realize there “absolutely” will be no full-time positions.

He added that his plan and, by association, himself, have come across as “unreasonable, uncaring and uncompassionate."

Hagan responded that he did not want to “micromanage” the issue and that he believed “strongly there should be a combination."

“There should be flexibility there,” he said, and particularly at larger facilities. 

Oversight and Program Particulars

Terry O’Grady had proposed in his plan an independent, oversight committee be established to help assess the program. Murman asked that the oversight be handled by the county’s Citizens Advisory Board, while Higginbotham asked that parks officials “have a direct hand in that.”

In the end, it was decided that oversight would rest with the parks and recreation board.

Merrill, again, asked for clear direction from the board to stave off any community outcry.

“We will carry out the board’s decision, whatever you direct us to do,” he said. “Any suggestion we’re trying to undermine this [program] will not be the case. I would like us to bring back to this board for your consent what this program is going to look like, the services that are going to be offered, so that it’s clear to you all what we plan to offer.”

The board reached consensus in asking for an after-school program that would, as Higginbotham put it, be “strictly recreational programming, with standards.”

Thornton agreed that a plan to that effect would be brought before the board for consideration at its Sept. 8 meeting.

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