Question for Danny

[columbus_RHstar]

Danny, when will your video on how to get your parks and rec dept. to build a rink come out? Our rink is closing, they are putting ice in, and if the ownersa cant find a building we might have to turn to the parks and rec dept. Thanks!

[missionhockey21]

Columbus can you email about whats all going up there at CORH? Thanks

[DannyG]

I apologize that we won't have the video, and the materials that will go with it, ready until the third week in August.

We will be skating onto the new floor in our new facility the first week in July, and it wouldn't make any sense to produce the video without some footage of our usage of the new rink as the 'culminating' event of the program.

I assure you that this information and material will enable you to make a very cogent presentation to your municipal 'powers-that-be...'

You will be able to give them several reasons to say, "yes" to the proposal. It will be more difficult to say, "no" than "yes."



<font color=purple>DannyG</font color=purple>

[columbus_RHstar]

Danny, it's alright, there are otiher places to play, its just..they suck. But hey playing is playing.

Out of curiousity, how long did it take for them to build your guys rink?

[DannyG]

The time frames...for a municipality in Texas, which has multiple specific, mandated steps that the design and construction must go through when municipal funds are expended...

1. The municipality, or other governing body, must commit the money to build the thing first, obviously.

In our case, this was accomplished through the sale of municipal bonds, which had to be approved by the voters. In our case this was a horrendous process, because an oversight committee took two and one half years to develop public input, go through three levels of imagination and re-development, and then put a full-blown presentation of quality of life issues campaign before the voters...our building was just $1.7 million out of $75 million of Parks Bonds that were voted on out of $144 million total...If there is another way that the gov't can get the money then go for it, but a voter-approved bond issue is one way to avoid the "we ain't got the money" excuse...the voters gave 'em permission to sell the bonds to get the money!


2. Once the bond election passed the voters, and the money was available, which is the starting point, the design contract was bid: 45-60 day process...

3. The design time was 144 days, with dictated time frames for environmental studies, engineering phases of information gathering, production of the preliminary design, discussion and ammendation, re-design, and final design...

4. The construction bid process was another 75 days...

5. The construction time line was 12 months, or so...the "order to proceed" was issued to the prime contractor on June 15, 2002, and the "date of substantial completion was contractually dictated as July 2, 2003. There were other "components of improvements in the same park that the Center was in, so there were additional time frames included in the 12 months that had nothing to do with the rink/facility.

We imagine that the building will actually be "ready" mid-June (ahead of schedule). The City will perform a series of final inspections, and dictate "corrections" in stuff done wrong, etc...which usually takes another 10-15 days.

I am holding my breath and scheduling our first game to be in our Premier Division, at 7:00 p.m., Friday, July 11, 2003. I guarantee that I will drop the first puck.

We'll let you know how it goes...

Hopefully, your municipality/County/State will have less restrictive regulations governing all this process, but hey, you asked...

I have the front page of The El Paso Hockey News from February 8, 1997, that first announced the Parks Department' commitment to us to build this thing...you can do the math...

Last word: when we skate out onto the blue floor in this (to me, anyway) spectacular, new, inline skating facility every minute of the five year wait will have been worth it...

<font color=purple>DannyG</font color=purple>