Rexburg committee collecting signatures to get rec center on the ballot

REXBURG — A recreation center in Rexburg has been a hot topic for a few years now. It’s such a hot topic the city initiated a feasibility study because of the feedback it had been getting from residents. The purpose of the study was to help guide the development of a center and create financial strategies to fund the operation and management of the facility for five years. The study was completed last month.

Overall, the study found Madison County residents are in favor of an indoor recreation/aquatic facility. They feel there is a lack of indoor facilities that are open to the public.

PROS Consulting, the company that completed the study, recommends constructing a new building with indoor aquatics, a gymnasium, an indoor walking track, fitness space (for groups and individuals) and multi-purpose spaces the community can use.

Kayley Fryer is the chairman for the Recreation District Petition Campaign. She says the next step in this particular process is forming a committee and getting it on the ballot.

The committee, which is made up of volunteers, is putting in the leg work. They need signatures from 20% of the registered voters in Madison County — roughly 4,200 people — to put a rec center on the ballot. And they have until the end of March to do it.

“It’s all part of the process,” Kayley Fryer told EastIdahoNews.com.

This is the process to form any kind of district, Fryer explained, and although the city requested the feasibility study, the recreation district must be set up by the county. That means Sugar City and other outlying areas would be included in the recreation district.

“No one group will benefit more than any other,” Fryer continued. “I have been many places with a community rec center. You see all sorts of people there.”

If the project passes, the recreation district is established, the estimated to cost about $68 million. The average property owner would see an averages increase of $8.54 per month on their property taxes — about $102 per year.

That doesn’t include the cost per household to build the center, however. Building costs for the center are estimated at an additional $10/mo per $100,000 taxable value. With the average taxable value in Madison County being around $293,000, the average homeowner would see an increase in $41.78 per month in their property tax to fund both the recreation district and build the facility.

Operating costs would be more money on top of that.

Volunteers have spoken mostly with their friends and neighbors — folks they know will likely support the idea. But Fryer points out they are also property owners.

“We haven’t seen a lot of pushback,” Fryer said. “We want to show the opposition that this is what people want.”

The total population of Madison County is expected to grow at a rate of 3.3% annually, according to the feasibility study. It’s estimated the county will have just over 79,000 residents by 2035 (including Brigham Young University-Idaho students).

With the demographic in Rexburg changing so rapidly, Fryer and the other volunteers feel that a rec center just makes sense. They are hoping this will help spur on the efforts to get the project on the ballot and help it gain momentum.

“We are feeling great about getting it on the ballot,” Fryer said.

The Rexburg Multi-Generational Recreation Center Feasibility Study can be viewed here.