Bayfront meeting focuses on what's inside

Bayfront Park Recreation Center’s activities run six days a week during season and include fitness classes, dance instruction and bridge games. But it isn’t the type of place where residents can gather just because.

“A lot of times, you’re coming to this space to do this activity and then leave,” said Jason Jensen, of the St. Petersburg-based Wannemacher Jensen Architects, which designed a prospectus for a community center concept at Bayfront Park. “You probably don’t come here to hang out at the community center.”

Jensen described the concept for a 17,000- to 19,000-square-foot community center at a Feb. 6 public meeting, which drew a smaller crowd — just more than 30 — than the Jan. 18 meeting, which more than 50 residents attended, and focused mostly on uses of the overall park site.

The two largest rooms proposed for the facility are an activity room and a community room, each 3,000 square feet. The activity room was conceptualized to be a gym-like setting, while the community room could hold events such as lectures, theater, musical events and movies, Mayor Jim Brown told the audience. The community-center concept also includes a rooftop terrace that could include an area for coffee and possibly a small café.

Many attendees raised questions about the center, including its programming, operational costs and usage.

In response to a question from Longboat Key Center for the Arts Executive Director Jane Buckman about whether the town would subsidize programming, Brown said that outside vendors, such as a Pilates instructor, would rent out the space for his programs.

“The town isn’t going into the business of programming,” Brown said. “It’s going into the business of providing the space to bring the people together.”

As residents discussed possible uses for the property, Brown stressed that the drawings are strictly conceptual.

“There are no hard walls or fine lines,” he said. “Everything is flexible at this time.”

Brown said at the meeting that the possibility of private funding has come up, but he declined to elaborate further. But during a presentation to the Longboat Key Town Commission meeting held later that day, Roxie Jerde, president and CEO of the Community Foundation of Sarasota County, confirmed that discussions about funding through the foundation have taken place.

Brown said that meetings were held only to gather public feedback. Wannemacher Jensen Architects will make a presentation to the Longboat Key Town Commission about its prospectus plan, most likely in March.