Is Bourne Community Center gym too hot for kids? Officials concerned with AC woes

Paul Gately
·2 min read

BUZZARDS BAY — How warm is it in this summer scorcher?  Some of the Bourne Veteran's Memorial Community Center trustees think it is far too hot some afternoons for kids with basketballs and summer campers to use the gym at the Main Street facility.

Trustees also deal with failing air-conditioning systems in the entire inter-generational center that opened two decades ago.

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There is no gym air-conditioning with temperatures expected in the high 80s later this week. Box fans generate some air transfer from open doors. Notably, the mugginess hasn't causedcondensation that could affect the new gym floor.

Bourne officials raised concern about lack of air conditioning in Bourne Veteran's Memorial Community Center, show above.
Bourne officials raised concern about lack of air conditioning in Bourne Veteran's Memorial Community Center, show above.

AC a concern with summer heat

The unrelenting drought, persistently high temperatures and myriad systemic failures influence activities inside the building with a history of air-conditioning problems and blocked toilets with clogged sewer connections.

Recreation Director Krissanne Caron, the center's de facto director, said July 26 most gyms are not air-conditioned and kids don’t especially mind the heat. This, she said, does not mean the issue isn’t being monitored.

Trustee Gary Maloney said uneven AC distribution throughout the building is unsettling and he doesn't want his daughter in the gym on a hot day.

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One end of the building, to the west side of the structure, has workable air conditioning, Trustees Chair Joseph Gordon said, but the AC isn't functioning where the Council on Aging operates.

“It’s hot and humid down there,” he said on a Tuesday afternoon after visiting the gym. “It’s terrible and frustrating.”

Facilities Manager Sean Feeney said varying air-conditioning systems in the center have long been a problem with faulty chillers on the roof and distribution of cool air.

Council on Aging Director Debora Oilivere-Llanes said portable air conditioners are placed in windows to offset the problems. So far, she said, programs are still operating.

Bourne Select Board Chair Peter Meier
Bourne Select Board Chair Peter Meier

Longtime building problems

“Some areas are like sweatboxes,” Select Board Chair Peter Meier, liaison to center trustees, said.

The trustees "are concerned long-term," he said. "This building has never been right from the day it opened.”

Center problems, including electrical, plumbing and flooding, have become part of the trustee board’s continuing narrative. The elected members hold legal "care, custody and control" of the building. They are the center overseers, but they have no fiduciary responsibilities and no operating budget. They are not involved in day-to-day activities, such as dealing with the homeless this past winter.

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The trustees can approve layout changes, discuss building problems, address system inadequacies and seek solutions via Town Administrator Marlene McCollem and the Select Board through the capital outlay committee’s list of spending priorities.

This article originally appeared on Cape Cod Times: Bourne Community Center feels the heat as AC problems continue