Leader of Tennis Community at Arcadia Park asks County Some Tough Questions

Leader of Tennis Community at Arcadia Park asks County Some Tough Questions – Meeting Slated for 6pm Thursday Night
Public Park vs. Private Tennis Club – Alleges Wrongful disclosure and misleading information

Since Andy Chang went to the public hearing a month ago ( Re: Tennis Court entry fees), he has sent certified letters to express team feelings and feedback to both County Supervisors and Commissioner of Parks and Recreation to express his discontent.

Now the county has posted a Community Meeting Thursday on the Tennis Court Entry Gate, to explain their position regarding the new potential operator (John Letts) on public land and facility.

If the county approves the new operator, his proposal could be accepted and this is what Arcadia tennis players might expect in 2012:

If you want to play tennis, you must be a member of $50/mo or $600 a year as one person, family is $70 @ $840 a year.

If you like to just play per hour , it will be $12 an hour, now is $4.00 of 300% increase .

The community meeting is Thursday Jan 12.

Chang has lived in Arcadia since 1983, paying my prop.tax of $12,000 or more for last 28 years, of $336,000 to County of Los Angeles Tax Collector Office. He says if this going to be a private tennis club rules, meaning , we can only stare at the open courts , and we cannot be given access to play unless you pay $600 a year.

By Chang’s calculations of the proposal, for the membership fee and courts fees, he will collect over $400,000 a year on the public land and facility of yours and mine, – “ County will create a new millionaires in less than 3 years.” According to Chang.

County meeting takes place on Jan 12, Thursday 6pm at the Arcadia Park Tennis Courts; the meeting room is located by the grass bowling alley.

Here is the letter to Antonovich

Honorable Supervisor Mr.Antonivich:

We have been your humble supporters of your district for last 20 years , and realized you have been working diligently hard for our local community , we are appreciated, until this issue now have hit our community hard and strong where we cannot take it silence anymore, so we took pains to write you this letter, hoping you can read it.

Part I:

Arcadia Park has been the property of LA County ever since we knew, and has been operating as a public park for ages, anyone can freely play tennis as they wish as they follow the rules and regulations, just about 3 years ago, County has set the rules that if you pay for $4/hr of court reservation, you have priority to take the court, this now has been accepted nicely with all of our community, and this reservation will still allow public, family, to play when the courts are open , you can walk in anytime to play as you wish.

Until 3-4 weeks ago, we learned that County of LA has accepted a individual operating proposal to change the County Park into a “Private Tennis Club”.
Here are his proposal which County accepted:(attached)

For those who wish to use the court has to be either a member of $50/mo($600 a year) family member $70/mo ($840 a year) or you must pay $12 /hr per hour. If a tournament is held on, they will charge by person of $10 per person.

So, if no one reserves, courts sit open, you can only stare at, you are not allowed into County Park to play, this will be the new policy , we wonder if you knew.

By taking in this person, just by court reservation fees, membership fees and tournament fee alone, without counting the teaching class fee income, you are looking at this individual can pocket income at most conservatively of excess $451,000 a year , see attached table 1.

County Park has always been part of most important livelihood for our community, local residents who pays most of savings every year of L.A. County Property Tax, who goes to park every Sunday afternoon to play with their children and have fun with their friends, relatives, to enjoy what government has offered them, now this right of people’s will be taken away by a “Private Tennis Club” method, situated on PUBLIC LAND and FACILITY which belongs to the people of Los Angeles, their right to enjoyment should not and cannot be deprived by anything , anyone , Not to mention this is to profit some individual from such foolish act of the County if passed.

I can understand if such business minded individual would like to developed a Private tennis park , to buy his own land , build his own facilities, to invest millions of dollars like many country clubs do, to profit from it, But clearly this is PUBLIC LAND and PUBLIC FACILITY, How can you reject PUBLIC to have access to their own park ?

My wife and I have lived in Arcadia since 1983, 28 years now, we have been paying increased amount of property taxes from our savings to County of LA for 28 years, which amounts are over $350,000 in last 28 years, this investment we could have built our own tennis court with, and like many other homeowners and tennis players, we use Arcadia Tennis Park, as part of our local amenities of our community, this amenity means a lot to all of us, it is our Joy center and exercise gym, our life depends on it and cannot do without it. Please do take away from us , the people who always support you when you need them.

Part II:

I have been the Captain of USTA Tennis Team of Arcadia since 2002, we have been closely working with current concessionary Mr. Miller, until year of 2008, there was a opening bidding process for new contract of the park, so my partner Dave Hagler and I have spent 3 months time to study and collect references and making detail 50+ pages of proposal to County, with our hard works and willing to sacrifice, our bids to County was accepted and we won the bid. The joy of winning did not last more than a month, when County took away from us because someone complained of County contract has defective languages in it, so they did cancel our successful bid, but very strangely, County did not cancel the bidding contract of other two County Parks at the same time of bidding.

So, this bidding came back again , in summer of 2010, we were doing some background homework again, in the requirement is to show up in the tour of the facility, we did, and asked the County coordinator Jim Norwood if this is a public court, or can concessionary collect membership fee, his answer was firmly a :No!”. then we asked him the court fee, he said the current is at $4/court /hr, it is best to keep this way for one or two years, if you like to increase , you must have County approve first, the increase has to be reasonable, then later he had exchanged such info via e mails with all of us to confirm our thoughts, this gave us the basis to calculate the potential income and we did, and decided not to pursue at that time.

Surprisingly; when we heard the result of this bidding, the winner County was trying to approve to go with , was the man who complained the defective contract County used when I won our bid 2008.
But the worse thing we saw is County would consider to accept a proposal that will turn a PUBLIC PARK into a PRIVATE TENNIS CLUB !

As I have stated above in Part I, that he has proposed and County accepted;

Individual membership $50 a month $600 a year.
Family membership $70 a month $840 a year.
Per Court fee $12 a hour
For tournament $10 per person, double match is $40

This will gross him a $451,000 a year just from PUBLIC LAND and PUBLIC FACILITY, for his personal gains, which County has been using our Tax contribution to maintain the courts, and we are NOT allowed to use any more unless we pay this man.

If we knew this, that County would accept such membership, private tennis club philosophy to operate the PUBLIC PARK with, then all the bidding process should be ACCURATELY and FULLY DISCLOSED, not let all bidder be MISLED so far, which created a very UNFAIR COMPETITION, we all bid on a “APPLE”, not we knew that actually was an “ORANGE”.

We hereby demand the bidding process to be reopen for new bid, and we request County to clearly state County PUBLIC Position and Policy weather to allow a Private Tennis Club in PUBLIC PARK or Not.

Thank you for your time and patience.

Sincerely Yours;

Andrew Chang

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