Park Numbers

posted 2005

2002 Park Costs Notebook

Unions involved: 416 for labourers: between 38.5 to 45% benefit load 79 for forepersons trades unions: benefit load: painters: 36% Trades wage rates: Electrical: $27.81 Plumbing $30.26 Carpentry: $28.79

Labourer wage rate: $25.78/ hr. plus 38% benefits

Each section is allowed to have 1 apprentice per trade. They are cheaper. (First year apprentice for plumber is $12.10/hr.)

Note: for park improvements, the capital budget is already scheduled through 2010.

Repairing benches on rain shelter: 10 hours at $27.15/hr plus 50% benefit load (carpenters): $407.25 not counting the materials. Plus the truck they

Rink power costs $12,000 to $15,000 in cold winter, $18,000 -$20,000 in a warm winter. [Maybe -- nobody knows for sure.] This winter that means about $1300 a week.

Board repair for all south district hockey rinks in winter 2001 season: $142,000. Plywood costs $65 a sheet; would have used 20 sheets on our rink. Rink operator: $20.19/hr. plus 33% markup. There’s a rink operator assigned to our park 60 hours a week even though there are only 7 shifts of 8 hours. (Union agreement.) So he cost $22,556.26 for the season. Plus forepersons cost $2804/wk = $42,074 per season (but divided among (?)_rinks.) This doesn’t tell about the cost of propane or gas to heat building or cost of Olympia. Cost of rec staff for rink (not counting learn-to-skate instructors): $18,234.40. That’s for 6 days of 13 hours and 1 day of 10 hours, sometimes on and sometimes 2 staff at a time (11 staff).

Rink operator costs about $134 for the five hours he sits on every shift. In a warm year it might cost about $185 to power the rink for 24 hours. Every week we could save $938 if there was no rink operator sitting around for 5 hours of every 8 hours. That means we could afford 5 more days of rink power.

Cost of ice resurfacer: $40/hr. x 56 x 13 hours is $29,120. Or: $16.28 x 40 x 13 = $8465.60

To repair green fence that’s falling down: not necessarily a parks fence. They’d have to search the original agreement. But it may be a safety issue. Not clear whose responsibility it is.

Picnic tables and benches: no new benches or tables being ordered right now. Dept. spent $36,000 last year repairing picnic tables.

Oven door: $910 was made up of 16 hours of labour by welder, 8 hours by assistant \ truck cost $153, plus welding machine (no cost puty on yet). Materials cost $65.

Doing the Forestry trimming: may have cost about $12,122 labour this year. Plus if they spend 10 days i.e. 80 hours x 3 people = 240 hours in the park then what would their wage have been? Plus cost of lift truck: $1434.40. Plus cost of chipper: $4.60 x 80 = $368. Or: pruners cost $20.22/hr., x 160 = $3304 plus foreperson costs $22.37/hr. x 80 = $1789.60. Add 23% plus 15% markup = $7029.16.

South fence to BB court costs $65 a foot. Fence is 40 feet, so $2,600. It costs $300 to scuff up the BB court.

From Tino, early on: Hi Jutta , here are the numbers that will help in determining the costs of operating dufferin. I also have a document that has prices to every item avaiable through stores. It is at Wallace , I could have Theresa drop it off, let me know. Tino

These rates are based on per Hour rate: Electrician - $28.69 Carpenter $28.06 Labourer- $17.68 Painter - $26.85 Plumber $30.26 RCO $18.55 Parks Truck Driver $18.93 HEO (Heavy Equipment Operator) $20.22 Senior Parks Labourer $18.09 Foreperson $21.44 Gardener $18.93 Senior Gardener $20.22

All vehicle costs per hour, based on a 40 Hour Week Olympia/Zamboni $16.28 Flying Squad Truck and Trailer $12.50 Pickup with Plow $10.50 Front End Loader - Articulated - $16.00 1. Stately truck I assume is a stake or open truck. $6.13 2. Cherry Picker can be either an aerial van $7.52 or an aerial truck (50 foot reach) $14.00 3. Plumbers truck is a van type unit $5.96 4. Regular Pickup Truck $4.28

Approximate cost of Driver laborer for Dufferin AIR is $15,680( does not include benefits burden)for 14 week season;

Grove Expenditures to date as per new Pcode 10503 -NAPKIN, LUNCH,WHT,11.5"X12.5",1 PLY,/CS. 05/07/2001 $165.62 -HOE, DUTCH, 05/07/2001 $45.51 -REC & EDUCT16/08/2001 $76.60 -PADLOCK, KEYED ALIKE, #1 MASTER,

1. A-297 04/06/2001 $144.39

-PADLOCK, KEYED ALIKE, #1 MASTER, #2359 04/06/2001 $230.70 -PAPER REC & EDUCT'N SUPPLS BOOTH STORES 16/08/2001 $12.60 -PEST CONTROL 06/09/2001 $81.68 -NEWSLETTER 16/08/2001 $120.28 -DUFFERIN GROVE NEWSLETTER 21/08/2001 $86.28 DUFFERIN GROVE NEWSLETTER 25/09/2001 $103.28 DUFFERIN GROVE NEWSLETTER 25/10/2001 $103.02

Recreation staff; rink staff (rink season 01-02) $18,234 Entire year including all spring summer fall staffing: $46,120. Note that in this case the staff were also taking over some maintenance functions especially clean-up, some graffiti removal, some park furniture repair. Total of year: $64,354.

Comparison for rec staffing: Alex Duff pool: $110,000 for part-time in June, full time in July and August (note that this is still restricted use – if all pools were staffed and open, it would cost $165,000 per season.

Maintenance supervisor's numbers:

Garbage truck, to remove external garbage bags 1 hour a week x 52 weeks (I.e. twice a week, takes half an hour each time) – truck driver and senior labourer: $1928.68/ $2662.57 counting benefits Cutting and maintaining turf: 8 hours x ten times, 1 foreperson, one truck driver and 2 labourers: $6064 plus burden = $8368.32 Picking litter: 1 hour x 52 weeks : Mike calculated $1577.16; I calculated senior labourer $940.68 ($1297.45 if you count benefit burden) he says it’s a heavy equipment operator who does it, at $20.22/hr = $1051.44 plus 38% benefits = $1451.44. (HEO has real hourly cost to city of $27.90). “Other stuff” foreperson plus 2 labourers x 5 days (i.e. $1182 for FP, $1997 for labourers, all this counts benefits). Leaf clean-up: truck driver x 5 days = $757.20 plus burden is $1044.73 counting benefits, plus foreperson and 2 labourers x 5 days is: foreperson: $857.60 plus burden is $1183.48 plus labourers: $1447.20 plus burden = $1997.13. Supervision is $1560 plus burden is $2152.80. Total non-winter = $20,855.99

Winter:

This year four snow ploughs: 2 hours x $27.90 (HEO) each time is $223.20 Case loader: $16 x 8 = $128 4 snow falls, cleaning sidewalks: foreperson and 2 labourers x 16 hours: $343.04 plus $578.88 = $921.92 plus benefit burden of 38% = $1272.24

Plus daily checks for icy sidewalks, 20 minutes each time x 100 days [sic] = $1975.40 (M.H.) x 38% = $2726.05.

Total winter: $4349.49

Total maintenance: $25,199.48 plus trucks and lawn-mowers

What does it cost to run our park?

Sports field: The soccer field has an irrigation system which automatically sets its watering schedule according to the weather – is very low maintenance, costs about $333 a year not counting cost of water. Looked after by plumbers (technical services).

Field House and club house: Regular maintenance (turning water on and off in field house bathrooms, checking and changing light bulbs, monitoring building conditions, fixing problems that are found during monitoring): 2000: $989.12. 2001: $1337.35. Expenditures linked to rink house from 2001: $5896. (Special problems involving work orders). When Mimo plugs the field house toilets: costs between $160-$190 each time. If painters repaint the field house: about $1600 plus $140 for truck plus (unknown) cost of paint (minor compared to labour). Note there is no regular maintenance inspection: they depend on information from Mike Hindle and Tino. Looked after by property department.

Playground and wading pool: There is no regular maintenance schedule. They depend on Mike Hindle or Tino for information. Fixing defective benches on rain shelter last year: 10 hours carpenter labour plus 50% benefit load: $407.25 not counting the materials. Plus $5.50/hr. for the truck when in use. Looked after by technical services.

Repairing the seams on the wading pool: takes 8-20 hours, may use one labourer or two. Cost is $240 to $700 not counting materials. Looked after by technical services.

Painting over graffiti on green pool shed: 8 hours at $27.35 plus benefit burden of 36% = $297.56 not counting the paint. Looked after by technical services.

Fixing the drinking fountain at the wading pool: if a new line has to be laid, that would cost $5500 (assuming the waterline would be 300 feet.) Looked after by technical services.

Repairing the wooden fence that separates the playground from the houses: no cost because it’s no one’s job. The house owners may be required to pay for it if it falls down.

Picnic tables and benches (park furniture): no new ones are being bought at the moment. Technical services spend $36,000 last year fixing picnic tables in the whole of South district. . Small repairs are made by maintenance staff.

Trees: They get a major overhaul once in 5 –10 years in a big way, otherwise as problems are reported. Last summer two pruners and a foreperson spent about 2 weeks in the park pruning: cost was between $7029.16 and $12,122 (estimate because Forestry doesn’t track individual sites). The lift truck cost $1434.40 plus the chipper cost $368. Looked after by Forestry.

Marsh garden: Needed a new pump for the fountain last year. Pump cost $375; labour cost $929.42. Looked after by technical services (plumbers).

Basketball court: New fence on the south to keep balls from rolling down the hill: $65 a foot x 40 feet = $2,600. Cost of roughing up concrete so players don’t slip so much: $300 each time it gets slick again. Contracted out by technical services.

Oven: new iron door on smaller oven, measures 21 inches by 16 inches: 16 hours welder plus 8 hours assistant plus truck cost plus welding machine: $910. Done by technical services.

Paths: new interlock path at south end cost $3300. No other new hard paths have been put into the park in Mike Hindle’s memory. Cost of paving is: concrete: $7/sq.ft.; asphalt: $3.50 sq.ft.; interlock: $9 sq./ft. Park staff can do concrete and interlock but not asphalt. New paths looked after through capital budget.

Christmas tree lights: this year it took two staff two days to string the four trees. Cost was at least $1183.26 plus cost of lift truck $286.88. Councillor Silva pays for the actual lights.

New “city within a park” signs for park: $750 plus $250 installation. We had two so it cost about $2000. Reason for getting new park signs when the other ones were less than ten years old and in good condition: a new vision statement developed by the megacity top park staff: “Toronto will be known by the world as the ‘City within a park,’ ….The world will envy and seek to emulate the healthy, productive and balanced lives the people of Toronto have achieved.”

Routine park maintenance: Removing garbage from the perimeter of the park, truck driver and senior labourer 1 hour/week x 52 weeks: $2662.57 Picking up litter: heavy equipment operator, 1 hour/wk. X 52 weeks: $1451.44 (this worker costs $27.90 counting benefits) Cutting and maintaining grass: one foreperson, one truck driver, two senior labourers, 10 times a season: $8368.32. Miscellaneous tasks: 1 foreperson plus 2 labourers, 5 days a year: $1182 plus $1997. Leaf clean-up in fall: truck driver plus foreperson plus two labourers x five days is $1044.73 plus $1183.48 plus $1997.13 = $4225.34 Supervision: 1 hour x 52 weeks = $2152.80. Total spring-summer-fall maintenance, per year: $22,039.47 Winter maintenance: This year four visits by the snow ploughs to rink: $223.20 plus caseloader: $128 Four snowfalls, clearing park perimeter sidewalks: foreperson plus two labourers 16 hours in total: $1272.24 Daily 20-minute checks for ice on sidewalks, x 100 days: $2726.05. Total winter maintenance: $4,349.49. Total year’s maintenance: $26,382.96

Rink: Rink operator: 60 hours a week at $20.19/hr. plus 33% benefit burden: $22,556.26 per winter. Rink forepersons: $4674 per winter. Electrical power to run rink: warm winter = $18,000 to $20,000 per winter, cold winter = $12,000 to $15,000 a winter. Olympia (ice cleaning machine): estimates vary from low of $8465.60 to high of $29,120. Propane (fuel to run Olympia): cost unknown. Recreation staff: $18,234 (not counting learn-to-skate program, only running rink). Repair of boards, installation of lift gates, repair of damaged swing gates etc.: unknown.

Recreation staff: spring-summer-fall: $46,120. Total cost of Dufferin Grove Park recreation staff in four seasons: $64,354. Comparison: reduced Alex Duff Pool staff for 2.5 months: $110,000.

WHAT DOES IT COST TO RUN OUR PARK?

Dufferin Grove Park covers 14.2 acres. That means it’s larger than Christie Pits (12.7 acres) but considerably smaller than Trinity-Bellwoods Park (22 acres). It has a soccer field, a small-scale baseball diamond, a basketball court, a playground, a campfire circle, a wading pool, a sand pit, two outdoor wood-fired community bake-ovens, an artificial ice rink, and space remaining for volleyball, badminton, ball hockey, touch football, cricket, frisbee, theatre, dance, music, and picnics. There are three buildings with a roof: the rain shelter by the playground, built in 2000 (no walls), the field house, built in 1913 (with the park’s main public washrooms), and the rink house, built in 1992. Our park also has 13 garden areas, some small, some medium-sized, some with native plants, some with mixed perennials/ annuals, and some with vegetables. One of these gardens is a little marsh, with a small fountain. These garden areas were added by various gardeners from the neighbourhood in the years after 1993 (that year the last parks department flower bed was covered over with grass by the parks staff).

BUILDINGS.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: The rink house and the field house come under the jurisdiction of the City Property department. That means that standard maintenance and any repairs are the responsibility of Property supervisor Don Eastwood. Don was able to track the cost of maintaining our buildings, although he said he used to be able to do this much more easily before the last city computer upgrade.

WORKERS: Mainly trades (electricians, painters, carpenters, plumbers). Union: specific trade-linked unions (electrical, carpenter, etc.)

COST OF REGULAR MAINTENANCE: $989.12 in 2000 and $1,337.35 in 2001.

COST OF RINK HOUSE REPAIRS: $5,896 in extra repairs in 2001, which Don says is about standard for a public building of that size, that gets used so much and contains a lot of vibrating machinery.

COST OF FIELD HOUSE REPAIRS: Painting last year: $1600 in labour (a city painter earns $27.35 an hour, plus 36% in benefits) , plus $140 for the truck. The city buys paint in such quantity that Don didn’t know the separate cost for our field house paint, but he said it’s peanuts compared to labour costs.

MIMO REPAIRS: $850 last summer: $160 and $190 each time to bring in a plumber (a city plumber earns $30.26 an hour, plus 38% benefits) to come and fix the toilet. Mimo the homeless man hears voices telling him to plug the toilets so tightly with his cardboard pieces that the plumber usually has to unbolt the whole toilet to fix it.

NOTE TO MIKE HINDLE: HOW MANY HOURS AND HOW MANY STAFF DOES IT TAKE TO DO ROUTINE SERVICING OF THE FIELD HOUSE WASHROOMS? Again as I have said before please DO NOT quote these figures as gospel but these are approximate numbers for the washroom maintenance based on an average visit length to clean and restock . For a 26 Wk season .

Truck $ 304.20

Supplies $ 350.00

Labour $ 2781.40 ( includes closing W /C's at night )

There are a number of other areas where your wording bothers me but It's only because you don't understand our operations and many jobs are combined so costs are I feel not very representative of our operations . Mike..

PLAYGROUND.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: Day-to-day maintenance: Mike Hindle, supervisor, works out of High Park Service Yard. Has a crew made up of laborers, truck drivers, and forepersons.

Damage repair: Technical Services. Bill Gaudet supervises the laborer repair crew, and Dominic Fantauzzi supervises the trades (for instance, if a painter is needed, or a carpenter). Both Gaudet and Fantauzzi work out of the Booth Avenue Yard, near Jones and Queen Street.

WORKERS: Laborers are members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), local 416, and the trades are each in their own trades union (electrical, plumbers’, carpenters’, etc.).

REPAIRS: carried out as problems are reported, but there is no staff person whose job it is to find the problems. That’s why a bench or a picnic table near the playground may be damaged for a long time without being repaired. There is one exception: the city employs a playground inspector, who goes around to all the parks and evaluates the safety of play equipment and whether it meets new playground standards. If he finds damage he will report it for repair.

COST OF REPAIRS: The Parks department can’t tell us how much our park costs for maintenance or repairs: they don’t track sites separately. But they can help us guess. For example:

RAIN SHELTER BENCH REPAIR: $462.25. When the rain shelter storage benches were built, the design called for very heavy hinged lids on the benches. After a few months of use, the lids began to break off their hinges. Also the lids closed with such a heavy bang that recreation staff feared people would have their hands crushed if a lid dropped when they were getting something from inside the storage bench. The repair crew had to replace the lids with lighter ones. Carpenter wages: $407.25. (City carpenters earn $28.79 an hour plus 50% benefits). Truck cost: $55. The cost of materials is unknown. Work done by Technical Services, Bill Gaudet, supervisor.

GRAFITTI REPAIR: $297.56 for painters, when some giant graffiti appeared all over the wading pool storage shed in the fall. Cost of the paint is unknown.

WADING POOL: $240 - $700 for labour if the asphalt seams on the wading pool have to be redone, that may take between 8 and 20 hours, depending on the damage. A senior laborer (most of Bill Gaudet’s staff) earns $18.09 per hour plus 36% benefits.

DRINKING FOUNTAIN: $5,500 if we need a new drinking fountain beside the wading pool. It’s not usable now (sediment) except if the wading pool is open (because there is then so much water flushing all the pipes). A new drinking fountain would need a new water line put in from the main water line on Havelock Street.

FENCE: $0. The wooden fence separating the houses from the playground is starting to fall over in several spots. There is no price on repairing it because no one knows whose responsibility it is. The fence may be the responsibility of the home owners bordering on the park. So the city may not pay at all. It is no-one’s job to look into this.

THIS SECTION IS FAR FROM COMPLETE

PLACES TO SIT: PICNIC TABLES AND PARK BENCHES.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: It is no-one’s job to monitor their condition. But if a park user or a grass cutter happens to notice broken slats or nails sticking out, they may be repaired by the maintenance workers (bench slats, protruding nails, leaning benches) or the technical services staff (painting, picnic table repair).

BASIC REPAIRS: $3179 for five days a year of trouble-shooting in our park by the maintenance crew (Mike Hindle, supervisor). That includes bench repair and other odds and ends. The cost covers one foreman ($1,182) and 2 labourers ($1,997).

NEW BENCHES AND PICNIC TABLES: $0. Supervisor Dominic Fantauzzi warned that no new picnic tables or benches are being bought at the moment. He spent $36,000 across the old city of Toronto last year, repairing picnic tables. But as the tables and benches age and rot and crumble, they may not be repaired. He said that park furniture damage needs to be reported and fixed fast, before the whole bench or table are too damaged to save.

GARDENING.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: Maintenance, Mike Hindle, supervisor.

COST: $0. Although there are still three Parks Department shrub beds, there is no gardening budget for Dufferin Grove Park. The last Parks Department flower bed was taken out in 1992. The community gardens that have been put in by neighbourhood gardeners get the following help from the city: a yearly supply of leaf compost and sometimes some manure from High Park Zoo, and 29 flats of annuals from the High Park greenhouse in spring. All planting, weeding, and watering is done by neighbourhood gardeners. Picking up garden waste is contentious: city workers sometimes do it. They do not pick litter from any community garden area that is fenced, and not usually from the unfenced gardens either.

MARSH FOUNTAIN REPAIR COST: $1304.42 for a new pump. The original fountain pump (paid for by a Canada Trust grant) wore out after three years, running 8 months a year. The new pump cost $375, installation cost $929.42 in labour. Work done by Technical Services, Dominic Fantauzzi, supervisor.

DOMINIC, WHAT’S THE COST OF THE PLUMBERS TURNING ON THE WATER ALL OVER THE PARK EVERY SPRING, THEN TURNING IT OFF AGAIN IN THE FALL, PLUS SERVICING THE MARSH FOUNTAIN?

GRASS AND LEAVES.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: Maintenance, Mike Hindle, supervisor.

CUTTING AND MAINTAINING GRASS: $8,368.32. This requires one foreperson (who earns $21.44 plus 36% benefits/ hour), one truck driver to drive the large mower (s/he earns $18.93 plus 38% benefits/ hour) and two labourers. Ten cuts a year.

LEAF CLEAN-UP IN FALL: $4,225.34. One foreperson plus one truck driver plus two labourers (five days every fall).

TREES.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: Forestry, Regina Gudelis, supervisor.

PLANTING: there is no allocated budget for tree planting at specific parks.

PRUNING AND CUTTING, COST: $8,832.40 (low estimate, in 2001) or $13,924.40 (high estimate). There’s some confusion because Forestry doesn’t track specific sites. Tree pruning and cutting of rotten trees is done as needed (e.g. when a branch or a tree comes down or looks rotten). At irregular intervals more pruning and cutting are done. Last summer, two pruners (they earn $20.22/ hour plus 38% benefits) and their foreman (who earns $22.37/ hour plus 38% benefits) spent about 2 weeks in the park pruning. In addition to the labour, the use of the lift truck cost $1,434.40 and the chipper cost $368.

WALKWAYS.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: Maintenance (Mike Hindle, supervisor) for commissioning the work, and Technical Services (Bill Gaudet), for doing the job.

COST: $0. There is no budget for walkways. That is why two of the three main park walkways are rutted dirt paths for part or all of their length.

COST OF LAST WALKWAY PAVED: $3,300. City Councillor Mario Silva was able to arrange for park staff to use up an existing store of interlock bricks (so cost was only for labour, materials were free) at the southwest end of the park , in 1999.

COST OF OTHER PAVED WALKWAYS IN OUR PARK: No one can remember, it was too long ago. There are some older interlock walkways as well as short pieces of asphalt paths, which have held up well. But the main north-south public walkway connecting the two ends of Gladstone is entirely dirt. The diagonal walkway connecting lower Havelock to the Dufferin Mall main entrance is rutted dirt east of the Gladstone walkway. West of there, it is paved partly with asphalt, partly with interlock. The north walkway connecting the two sections of Dufferin Park Avenue is asphalt, with one section narrowing from erosion. North, east and south parkway entrances are particularly rutted and eroded, making it difficult or impossible for park users with wheelchairs or strollers to get into and around the park in winter, early spring, or at rainy times in other seasons. West entry points are paved.

CAPITAL BUDGET MONEY: Walkway improvements come under the capital budget, which at this moment has a waiting list of between 10 and 12 years for big-ticket items. Once you’re at the top of the list, you’re in good shape, though: McCormick Rec Centre needed a $300,000 mechanical upgrade and instead they’re getting a $3 million overhaul.

COST OF PAVING OUR DIRT WALKWAYS: $14,700 for the main walkway, connecting Gladstone north and south (700 feet long, 6 feet wide, asphalt), $7,720 for the diagonal walkway from Havelock to the park mid-point where the paving starts (320 feet long, 6 feet wide, asphalt). Concrete paving costs $7 a square foot, interlock paving costs $9 a square foot, and asphalt paving costs $3.50 a square foot. It is sometimes possible to jump the capital budget queue; in this case, it may be necessary to try, since the park walkways are getting worse every year, at the same time as park foot traffic is steadily increasing.

WHO WOULD BE IN CHARGE OF GETTING US ON THE CAPITAL BUDGET LIST?

FENCES:

WHO’S IN CHARGE: Iron fences and chain link fences: Technical Services, Dominic Fantauzzi, supervisor. Iron fences cost $60 a section to replace, plus the labour costs. But the fences don’t break often. The chain link fences cost $65 a foot. Those around the ice rink have not needed replacing since they were installed in 1993, except for one of the gates, which was taken down several times by the zamboni driver. The cedar rail fences are repaired by maintenance, Mike Hindle, supervisor. They cost $9 per rail. About 15 rails a year need replacement when they break (usually because of vandalism).

GARBAGE AND LITTER.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: maintenance, Mike Hindle, supervisor. COST OF GARBAGE PICK-UP: $3,494.57 a year. Garbage bags (from the garbage baskets) are picked up twice a week. It takes a truck driver and a labourer half an hour each time: $2,662.57 for labour plus $832 for the truck.

COST OF LITTER-PICKING: $1451.54 a year. This pays for litter-picking for one hour a week. The person who mainly picks up the litter is classified as a heavy equipment operator, so he earns $20.22 an hour plus 38% benefits.

SPORTS FIELDS.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: maintenance, Mike Hindle, supervisor, for sod; technical services, supervisor, Dominic Fantauzzi, for repairs/monitoring involving the trades.

SOCCER FIELD, COST OF REPAIR: $??? The soccer field was partly re-sodded and the baseball back-stop was reduced in size last year. New Soccer goal posts were installed. The cost of these improvements is unknown.

MIKE – ANY IDEA HOW MUCH IT COST TO SOD THE TWO PARTS OF THE SOCCER FIELD? DOMINIC – HOW MUCH DID IT COST TO SHRINK THE BASEBALL BACKSTOP? The cost to shrink the backstop was $500.00. Bill

SOCCER IRRIGATION SYSTEM, COST: $333 per year. There is an irrigation system buried just under the soccer field, which works well and requires little repair. The watering schedule is set according to the weather, and a plumber does yearly maintenance.

BASKETBALL COURT IMPROVEMENTS AND REPAIR: $2600 for a new backstop for the south side last year, to keep the ball from rolling down the hill all the time. (The fence measures 40 feet and it costs $65 a foot (ten feet high).) $300 for the machine/plus operator to rough up the concrete when it gets too slippery and they players wipe out. Contracted out.

SPECIAL COSTS:

OVEN DOOR REPLACEMENT: $910. One of the outdoor park ovens had a defective oven door. The city welder came and removed that door, and made a new one, which he also installed. The door measures 21 inches by 16 inches. Materials cost $65, welder plus assistant plus use of welding truck cost another $845 (16 hours of welder plus 8 hours of assistant). Really. Technical services.

CHRISTMAS TREE LIGHTS: $1470.14. The light strings are paid for by Councillor Silva’s office. Installation, involving two park staff for two days (including an electrician) costs $1,183.26, plus $286.88 for the use of the lift truck. Technical services.

NEW PARK SIGNS: $2000. The Parks and Recreation events and programs handbook, called the “Toronto Fun Guide,” contains a vision statement developed at the top level of Parks and Recreation after amalgamation: “Toronto will be known by the world as the ‘City within a park’…..The world will envy and seek to emulate the healthy, productive and balanced lives the people of Toronto have achieved.”

Perhaps to promote this envy and emulation, the Parks Department removed existing Dufferin Grove Park signs (less than 10 years old and in very good shape) and replaced them with new “City within a Park” signs. The cost was $750 for each sign and $250 in labour to install it. We got two.

ARTIFICIAL ICE RINK

WHO’S IN CHARGE: For the staffing of the rink: Recreation, Tino DeCastro, supervisor. For ice maintenance: Brian Green, supervisor (this year -- usually a different supervisor every year). For the operating of the rink compressors: Dave Dermott, supervisor.

POWER TO RUN THE RINK, COST: $12,000 to $15,000 in a cold winter, $18,000 to $20,000 in a warm winter.

ZAMBONI, COST OF USE (responsibility: Brian Green): $8,465.60 (low estimate) to $29,210 (high estimate) a winter. Since our zambonis are inevitably aging cast-offs that are no longer wanted at City Hall or North York, we suspect the lower amount is maybe still too high. (The use-of-vehicle cost is supposed to reflect maintenance and replacement value.)

RINK OPERATOR, COST (responsibility: Brian Green): $22,556.26 per season. Although the most we would use a rink operator is 3 hours in one shift (plus one hour in the morning), we were again assigned a full-time operator this past winter. During his two days a week off, we were assigned another 20 hours (union contract), so that we ended up with a rink operator for 60 hours a week when we were only using him a maximum of 21 hours a week (often less). The pay rate is $20.19/ hour plus 33% benefits, for 14 weeks counting their training time.

RINK FOREPERSON, COST (responsibility: Brian Green): $4674 per season, for our share. Twice-daily visits. At our rink, the foreman often cleaned our ice in mid-morning, so we had an extra benefit from his visits. (Other rinks did not get this service.)

RINK REPAIRS, COST (responsibility: Dominic Fantauzzi): $????? The cost of seasonal repairs to lift gates, swing gates, hockey boards, and the zamboni is unknown.

RINK RECREATION STAFF, COST (responsibility: Tino DeCastro): $18,334 per season. 8 part-time staff (one person from 9-3, then two or occasionally three, in the evenings and on weekend shifts). The breakdown is: the person in charge of the building earns $9.27/ hour and the person assisting (e.g. the rink guards) earns $7.55. The benefits for recreation workers amount to 15%. (* Compare e.g. to litter-picking, $20.22 plus 38% benefits.)

PLEASE ADD OR CHANGE ANY DETAILS THAT ARE MISSING OR WRONG

So the rink operator, working three hours and being paid for 8, costs the city more than all the other on-site rink staff put together. In addition, if the cost of four daily idle hours were subtracted (still allowing a paid hour for the operator to eat a leisurely lunch, in addition to 3 hours of work), the city would save $11,278.13 a season, at our rink – enough to return the rink season to its traditional length (third week of November to the end of February, perhaps even adding on a reduced service in the first half of a cold March). We think the time for one rink operator to be shared between two rinks is long overdue.

SNOW CLEARING.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: Maintenance, Mike Hindle, Supervisor.

RINK SNOW CLEARING, COST: $351.20. This past year, there were four visits to the rink to clear snow, costing $223.20 in labour plus $128 for the use of the snow plow.

SIDEWALK SNOW CLEARING, CHECKING, AND SALTING, COST: $3998.24. The clearing of the park perimeter sidewalks during four snow falls, requiring one foreperson plus two labourers, working 16 hours: $1272.24. Two labourers doing daily 20-minute checks for ice on the park perimeter sidewalks, for 100 days: $2726.05.

RECREATION STAFF FOR ALL NON-WINTER PARK ACTIVITIES.

WHO’S IN CHARGE: Recreation, Tino DeCastro, Supervisor.

COST OF SPRING, SUMMER, FALL: $46,120 (mainly at $7.55/ hour plus 15% benefits. Highest recreation wage: $15.91/ hour -- very rare). Casual or part-time staff, members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees, (CUPE), Local 79.

Tino,

The approximate cost for this graffiti removal is $180.00 This includes all labour, material & vehicles charges.

I hope this meets Jutta's needs.

Don

>>> Tino DeCastro 03/25/02 11:49am >>> Hi, Don is it possible to raise a work order for the attached and obtain the necessary information , as per attachment.

tino

Message from Bob Crump:

PLACES TO SIT: PICNIC TABLES AND PARK BENCHES.

WHO'S IN CHARGE: It is no-one's job to monitor their condition. (Bob) Jutta - I question this statement - It is the responsibility of the Parks Maintenance operations to conduct inspections of their parks and to notify Technical Services regarding any work which is required to be performed on these items . Parks regularly delivers picnic tables and benches which are badly in need of repair to our carpentry shop for this work to be carried out. However, it is not the responsibility of Technical Services to conduct inspect all the benches and picnic tables in all of the parks in the former City of Toronto and East York. We rely on the inspections conducted by staff who are in these parks on a regular basis to flag these items for us. But if a park user or a grass cutter happens to notice broken slats or nails sticking out, they may be repaired by the maintenance workers (bench slats, protruding nails, leaning benches) or the technical services staff (painting, picnic table repair).

NEW BENCHES AND PICNIC TABLES: $0. Supervisor Dominic Fantauzzi warned that no new picnic tables or benches are being bought at the moment. Funds have been budgeted in 2002 for the repair of benches and picnic tables which have fallen into disrepair, and limited funds have been budgeted City wide for the purchase of benches to acccommodate requests from previous years which have not yet been installed. He spent $36,000 across the old city of Toronto last year, repairing picnic tables. But as the tables and benches age and rot and crumble, they may not be repaired. He said that park furniture damage needs to be reported and fixed fast, before the whole bench or table are too damaged to save. The City does have a Commemmorative bench program whereby citizens can sponsor the purchase and installation of a park bench on a concrete pad and have a plaque installed on the bench to comemmorate that passing of a loved one or any other significant event. Cost for a park bench with cast iron ends and hardwood slats is $2,140.00.

COST OF LAST WALKWAY PAVED: $3,300. City Councillor Mario Silva was able to arrange for park staff to use up an existing store of interlock bricks (so cost was only for labour, materials were free) at the southwest end of the park , in 1999.

COST OF OTHER PAVED WALKWAYS IN OUR PARK: No one can remember, it was too long ago. There are some older interlock walkways as well as short pieces of asphalt paths, which have held up well. But the main north-south public walkway connecting the two ends of Gladstone is entirely dirt. The diagonal walkway connecting lower Havelock to the Dufferin Mall main entrance is rutted dirt east of the Gladstone walkway. West of there, it is paved partly with asphalt, partly with interlock. The north walkway connecting the two sections of Dufferin Park Avenue is asphalt, with one section narrowing from erosion. North, east and south parkway entrances are particularly rutted and eroded, making it difficult or impossible for park users with wheelchairs or strollers to get into and around the park in winter, early spring, or at rainy times in other seasons. West entry points are paved.

CAPITAL BUDGET MONEY: Walkway improvements come under the capital budget, which at this moment has a waiting list of between 10 and 12 years for big-ticket items. Once you're at the top of the list, you're in good shape, though: McCormick Rec Centre needed a $300,000 mechanical upgrade and instead they're getting a $3 million overhaul.

COST OF PAVING OUR DIRT WALKWAYS: $14,700 for the main walkway, connecting Gladstone north and south (700 feet long, 6 feet wide, asphalt), $7,720 for the diagonal walkway from Havelock to the park mid-point where the paving starts (320 feet long, 6 feet wide, asphalt). Concrete paving costs $7 a square foot, interlock paving costs $9 a square foot, and asphalt paving costs $3.50 a square foot. It is sometimes possible to jump the capital budget queue; in this case, it may be necessary to try, since the park walkways are getting worse every year, at the same time as park foot traffic is steadily increasing.

WHO WOULD BE IN CHARGE OF GETTING US ON THE CAPITAL BUDGET LIST? (Bob) Jutta, in 2002 I have been allocated $37,500 for Hard Surfaces Preservation from the Capital Budget. This is to fund projects (walkway improvements, tennis court resurfacings , interlocking paver repairs and concrete sidewalk repairs for the South District , which includes the former City of Toronto and East York) which would cost less than $50,000, the budget amount which would allow a project to qualify as a capital project in its own right.. Requests for use of these funds are sent to me from the 12 park supervisors in our District , and I try to distribute these funds as equitalbly as possible. Currently, I have a list of "urgent" requests for this funding which total over $365,000. Dufferin Grove is not on the list, but I can add it to the list of projects which I am currently not able to fund this year.

SOCCER IRRIGATION SYSTEM, COST: $333 per year. There is an irrigation system buried just under the soccer field, which works well and requires little repair. The watering schedule is set according to the weather, and a plumber does yearly maintenance and any repairs as required. The irrigation system controller communicates with a central computer at the South District's main Parks yard, which is connected to a weather station on its roof. The computer adjusts watering schedules based on evapotranspiration rates ( a calculation which combines the amount of rainfall which has recently fallen, any wind which has occurred and which would dry out the soil, and the prevalent temperatures which have been recorded) . The computer also notes any abberations in expected flow rates in any of the irrigation zones, and shuts down any irrigation zones which experience an unexpected spike - indicating a leak. A message ios left with the plumbing foreperson who monitors the system daily, so that he can dispatch a crew to investigate the cause of any such leaks and effect necessary repairs as quickly as possible.

ZAMBONI, COST OF USE (responsibility: Brian Green): $8,465.60 (low estimate) to $29,210 (high estimate) a winter. Since our zambonis are inevitably aging cast-offs that are no longer wanted at City Hall or North York, we suspect the lower amount is maybe still too high. (The use-of-vehicle cost is supposed to reflect maintenance and replacement value.) Jutta - annual cost to maintain the ice resurfacing machine which was used at Dufferin Grove this past winter (labour , parts and contracted services ) was $7,745.44 in 2001. This figure does not include depreciation of the machine, which costs around $61,000 to purchase new. If the machines last ten years, theoretically the City should be setting aside $6,100 annually in a reserve account to purchase a replacement for the machine when it eventually is beyond the point of economical repair, which would bring the annual cost of the machine to around $13,845. Unfortunately, we are currently unable to fund the replacement program to this level, so that many pieces of equipment are held onto longer than we would prefer to and replacements are more or less funded on the basis of greatest need from any funds which the Department can afford to budget for this purpose each year. the need to replace Zambonis is weighed against the need to replace all other vehicles and equipment in our fleet which support our operations. Just over $5,000,000 is available in 2002 to replace vehicles and equipment in a total City wide fleet worth over $68,000,000, of which $16,000,000 is overdue for replacement based on their estimated useful life spans.

Content last modified on May 22, 2009, at 09:11 PM EST