'Sticker Shock': $50M Estimates for Community Center Surprise SLP Council

Presented with designs for a new community center costing between $45 million and $50 million, the St. Louis Park city council expressed strong concerns about the price of the project but asked staff to come back with more information about the “Park View” option adjacent to the city’s Recreation Center.

The cost “is higher than we ever thought,” mayor Jeff Jacobs said. “The analogy for me is eating that piece of pizza, and you go to bite it and the whole thing falls down on your chin.”

Other council members said they had “sticker shock” and that the “numbers do scare me.”

A city consulting firm, Hammel, Green and Abrahamson, Inc., presented three designs to the council Monday night at two different sites.

Council members were most enthusiastic about the Park View design, which would bring a gym, pool, track, community room, offices and more to a building directly south of the St. Louis Park Rec Center, at Monterey Drive and Beltline Boulevard.

The Park View option, estimated to cost $45.3 million, would give the community center scenic views of Wolfe Park. But initial plans called for a large, three-story parking structure at the current location of the Rec Center parking lot.

“My initial response to having these huge parking structures is a little bit anathema,” said council member Anne Mavity, asking staff to look into the possibility of more green space.

The other two options presented Monday evening were more expensive and less appetizing to the council.

A plan for a four-story community center at the site of the American Legion building, near Highway 100 and West 36th Street, Sue Santa said, “felt like seven pounds of stuff in a five pound bag, and my first thought was, ‘We can never expand it.’”

The third option, which called for a $2.5 million skyway to link a community room which would be built north of Monterey Drive with the main site, was also distasteful to the council.

“I don’t like having the programming split,” Santa said.

Council members said they were hoping a community center would last for 50 years and asked staff for numbers about the expected tax impact of creating the center, which would cost almost $2 million a year to run.