Stroller class, city at odds

**CORRECTION: The story incorrectly reported the percentage of money the Newport Beach Recreation and Senior Services department takes from class instructors. The city takes a 30% cut of business from instructors who operate classes through the department.

Local mom Zoe Bertoia thought she had found an ideal way to earn money while still staying home with her children when she bought the Newport Beach franchise of Stroller Strides, a popular exercise program for new mothers, in 2006.

“It was great to work out and meet other moms in my situation,” Bertoia said. “I could create that community of moms around myself, and it allowed me to have a small business so I didn’t have to work full time.”

The classes allow moms to exercise outdoors with their young children in strollers. But Bertoia’s small business has run afoul of the Newport Beach Recreation and Senior Services Department.

Stroller Strides instructors claim city park workers have watched their classes through binoculars and threatened to have them arrested for trespassing for setting foot in public parks.

“It’s embarrassing. We’re trying to represent ourselves as a professional, clean, fun organization, and then to have these people approach us like this,” said Cherie Sharp, a fitness instructor for Stroller Strides. “I think they’ve been trying to scare us.”

City officials contend Bertoia can’t run her business in city parks without giving the city a cut of the profits or paying for a permit.

The city has had ongoing issues with Stroller Strides because the business is not authorized to use city parks and has not obtained the proper permits, said Laura Detweiler, Newport Beach Recreation and Senior Services director.

“We’ve spoken to them, but I would not use the word harassing,” Detweiler said. “They have to come into compliance if they are going to use parks for business.”

Bertoia has racked up more than a dozen administrative citations from the city over the past year, ranging from $100 to $500.

The situation came to a head one Saturday a few weeks ago when city parks workers called the police on a Stroller Strides class that was meeting in Bob Henry Park and threatened to have the fitness instructor arrested for trespassing.

“When the city behaves in this manner, it just clouds the whole situation,” Sharp said.

City parks workers also have surveilled the fitness classes with binoculars, as part of an independent audit of the classes, Bertoia contends.

Part of the problem stems from the different types of permits the city offers to use its parks, Bertoia said.

“I hope to work out a reasonable way we can coexist,” Bertoia said. “I’m perfectly willing to pay to use the park. I understand that’s a requirement.”

City officials told Bertoia she would have to run her Stroller Strides classes through the city’s recreation department — with the city taking a 30% cut of her business, or pay $300 an hour for a commercial permit to use the parks.

“We really are a small business, not a big commercial venture profiting from the parks,” Bertoia said.

Reporter BRIANNA BAILEY may be reached at (714) 966-4625 or at brianna.bailey@latimes.com.