Seniors want new center

Taking turns trying to knock down pins, the Michael E. Rodgers Seniors’ Center Wii Bowling Team has to be careful — there isn’t a lot of room.

With a pool table and two card tables pushed to one side, the room can accommodate the team members practicing Wednesday, about half of the team, but only until 11 a.m. — then the Mah-Jongg players come in.

“When we have all the people here for Wii Bowling, there isn’t enough room,” senior Ed Mazure said. “We’re falling all over each other.”

Space is one of the reasons many of the seniors are all for the new center on a 5-acre section of Huntington Central Park. The facility would have replaced the Michael E. Rodgers Seniors’ Center on Orange Avenue with a 45,000-square-foot, one-story center between the Shipley Nature Center and the disc golf course.

The center was expected to be completed in April 2011. The plans were ready to go, Makar Properties was going to develop the center, and the bids for grading the land were already out when the Orange County Superior Court ordered the city to stop the project.

Judge David C. Velasquez found the city to be in violation of its general plan, the California Environmental Quality Act and the Quimby Act.

The decision has many seniors upset and environmental activists celebrating. The new senior center would have given residents more than twice as much space and a dedicated dance and group fitness rooms and a new fitness center and computer lab, according to senior center staff.

The current center is out-of-date and too small, senior Roi Ann Duke said, and other seniors agree. The parking is also inadequate for the facility, many said.

“This one is obsolete, and not only that, but we’re way behind the other cities,” senior John Jankowski said.

For some of the seniors, using parkland for the center doesn’t matter — they just want a new facility. Jankowski, though, said there is no reason the park shouldn’t be used.

“That is what the park is for — to serve the citizens,” Jankowski said.

However, many residents feel exactly the opposite.

The Parks Legal Defense Fund filed a lawsuit against the city challenging the project and won.

The judge ordered the city to prepare a Supplemental Environmental Impact Report looking into alternative locations.

Mayor Keith Bohr said finding an alternative location would cost the city more money for the land and push the date back for the center, which is the main concern for many seniors.

Money is one of the big issues with the project, as the judge ruled the city can’t use the entire $22 million from Makar Properties.

Makar is developing Pacific City, a 31-acre site that would bring hotel, residential, retail and restaurant facilities together between Huntington and First streets on Pacific Coast Highway.

The city made an agreement with Makar to spend money from Pacific City on developing the new center. The money is part of the Quimby Act, which requires developers to pay a fee for projects that don’t create new open space.

The money must be used to preserve open space, establish recreational facilities or fund other facilities for future Pacific City residents’ use.

The judge ruled using all the funds from Makar for the senior center violates the Quimby Act.

Former Mayor Debbie Cook agrees with the judge’s ruling and said the money is supposed to be used for land acquisition and park development,

“In effect, this proposed project eliminates over five acres of existing park land and precludes the improvement of existing undeveloped parks such as Bartlett and Irby parks,” Cook said in an e-mail.

The city needs to get realistic about the services it can offer residents while the economy is still in a downturn and look into rehabilitating the facility it has, she said.

Rehabbing the facility would be a costly option, said Robert Dettloff, a member of the Huntington Beach Council on Aging and former president of the council.

The current site isn’t big enough to support an expansion and the needed parking without constructing an underground parking structure, Dettloff said.

The City Council held a study session on the issues and met in closed session Monday without making a decision, but Bohr said he would be “shocked” if the city didn’t appeal.

“We are not giving up on this site for the senior center,” Bohr said.

Whether the city appeals the decision or not, and whether it is built on the park or at another location, the seniors just want a new center.

“They are taking a long time. I don’t think we’ll ever get to see it,” Magnante said.