By Rebecca Dopp
Times-News Correspondent
Everybody has fond memories of the Old Gym in Nephi. Once used as the high school gymnasium up until 1980-81, it saw many sports events, dances, and other activities held there. It then went on to serve as a place for Friday night roller skating and would later be used as a place for kids to practice and play in recreational sports. It also housed the Juab County Food Bank which will be moving into the old county jail.
But, over the years it has suffered many ups and down. Many of the seats, windows and ceiling tiles in the gym are in disrepair. The heating has finally gone kaput. The city can no longer use it for recreational activities because it is too costly to remodel.
Because there is no heat in the portions of the building used by the recreation department, Nephi City has had to look for another place to house it. That's where Juab School District comes in.
JSD has a building located at approximately 800 North 400 East in Nephi, known as Old Nebo View Elementary, that they are only partially using for junior high classes. The west side of the building, including the gymnasium, is currently not being used.
JSD has decided to enter into an agreement with Nephi City to allow Nephi Recreation to move into the west wing of the building. Nephi Rec will have the use of the gymnasium, one classroom to serve as the rec director's office, and other spaces if needed. If additional space is needed, then the two parties will make an addendum to the agreement.
The city's use of the building will not interfere with scheduled school activities and the regular school day.
School board member Tracy Olsen asked about the availability of the gym and the batting cages for the high school teams to practice in during the wintertime. The agreement allows those teams to use those facilities from 3-5 p.m. from December 1st through February 28th and additionally, they could use it from 6-7 p.m. on scheduled school days. Official spring practices begin after February 28. In the event of weather or other emergency situations, the city would use best efforts to accommodate the district's use of the facilities.
"I don't want best efforts," Olsen said. "I want our baseball team to be able to use the batting cages when they need it."
The board decided to strike out "best efforts" and leave it as the city would accommodate the district's use of the facilities.
Nephi Rec will be able to utilize Red Cliffs Elementary's gymnasium for basketball practices and games. There is already an agreement between the parties for this use.
"That was part of the compromise to get to 100% of the utilities is that we try to find a way to accommodate practices," said Superintendent Dr. Rick Robins.
The city shall pay for all utility costs associated with operation of the building including sewer, electricity, water, and natural gas.
Nephi Rec will have use of the north bathrooms.
Access to the front doors on the south side of the building will be allowed so the rec director can back his vehicle up to the door to unload equipment easier. It will only be accessible by the rec director. Right now it is fenced off and the playground is in that area.
"We don't want that becoming a parking lot," Olsen said.
The rest of the agreement spells out who is responsible for what including damages, maintenance, appropriate supervision and leasing the building to a third party.
"I really appreciate the job that John [Bradley] has done with our rec programs," said Robins. "These are kids in our programs that feed our high school programs, and they need help. The Old Gym is done. There are some tough decisions to be made there. I would hate to see some of those programs go away because they don't have a place to go. I don't know what it will be; after a year they might come back and say the utilities are off the charts, we can't do this. Or maybe we say, hey, this isn't working out for us. I felt it was an amicable agreement that if either party wasn't happy then we could change it."
The agreement will be good for 10 years, but can be evaluated every year on a good faith effort. It will be reviewed and redone every 10 years, if need be.
Nephi City still needed to sign off on the agreement, but Nephi Recreation was slated to move into their new home as soon as possible.
