Indoor pickleball, commercial kitchen part of $13.7M project named for former Wichita mayor

The Wichita City Council has approved a major expansion of the Carl G. Brewer Community Center at McAdams Park, bringing the project cost from an initial estimate of $8 million to $13.7 million.

The expanded recreation center at 17th Street and Wabash will include a nearly 25,000-square-feet addition to the existing 10,800-square-feet building recently renamed to honor Brewer, Wichita’s first African American mayor elected by a citywide vote (A. Price Woodard, Wichita’s first African American mayor, was elected by city commissioners in 1970).

The expansion will include a 11,000-square-foot gymnasium with a full-sized basketball court that can be converted to two cross-courts for basketball games, multiple volleyball courts or six indoor pickleball courts. It will also include a multi-purpose room that could be used for activities like yoga, a commercial kitchen and a large dining area.

Council member Jeff Blubaugh, who was friends with Brewer and served with him on the council from 2013 to 2015, noticed a fairly large omission in the plans presented on Tuesday.

“I didn’t see any barbecue grills — is there a grill there,” Blubaugh said. “And I’m being serious.”

Brewer built a reputation as a barbecue chef, launching his own line of sauces in 2012.

“We can definitely get one in there,” Troy Houtman, director of parks and recreation, said. “It’s something we talked a lot about. It would be on the back patio. We would have some barbecue grills there for some of our special events.”

Mayor Brandon Whipple said the community center’s commercial kitchen could honor Brewer’s legacy not only as a mayor but as an entrepreneur.

“I just do want to acknowledge the professional-grade kitchen and how that is not just an asset for the community but also an economic development tool where, as was just mentioned, we know that the late Mayor Brewer had his own line of barbecue sauce, and by having a kitchen like this, folks can actually go in and create their own product and have it be up to legal standards because the kitchen gets certified as a . . . professional kitchen. So really appreciate you guys adding that into this.”

Houtman agreed that the kitchen could serve as a business incubator for restaurant start-ups.

“This space will be available for folks to start up some of their businesses,” Houtman said. “And we will find ways to work with them to provide services to our programs and our facilities but also an opportunity for them to work out of (the kitchen) and go to different locations.”

The construction schedule for the upgraded Brewer Center has also been pushed back significantly. The project was initially scheduled to be funded in 2022 by the city’s capital improvement budget with an estimated completion date in the fall of 2023. Now, construction is not anticipated to begin until early next year. It is expected to take up to 18 months to build.

The causes of the price increase include inflation and logistical hurdles caused by some of the property being located in a FEMA floodplain.

The proposal did garner additional questions from Blubaugh about how the price increase would affect the city budget, which is expected to face a deficit in 2025. The city is planning to offset that deficit by stashing away a $12 million surplus from this year and an additional $14 million surplus in 2024.

“Is this what’s causing us to go over because this wasn’t planned out in the CIP?” Blubaugh asked.

City Manager Robert Layton said the project is not to blame. The first $10 million of the project is included in the city’s capital improvement plan presented last week, which is expected to be approved in August.

“The CIP is covered as far as our debt service,” Layton said. “We don’t show a deficit there. On the operating budget, that’s where the deficit would occur. So they’re not directly related.”

The CIP, or capital improvement plan, is a budget document that outlines how the city plans to fund new buildings and infrastructure for the next 10 years. A majority of the projects similar to the Brewer Center are funded through general obligation bonds, which are ultimately funded by the general fund, which also covers many of the city’s operations.

An increase in cost of one project can affect how much the city has to spend on other projects, departments, salaries and other services.

“The recommended budget does show a surplus in 2024, and then deficits in ‘25, ‘26 and ‘27 that would be covered through reserves, and that’s about $5- to $5.5-million a year each of those three years,” Layton said.

Council member Bryan Frye asked whether a $10 million loan from Fidelity Bank, which would be interest-free for the first four years of repayment, came with any naming rights or other sponsorship agreements at the community center.

Houtman said Fidelity Bank did not want to have any naming rights at the community center in exchange for the loan. The city already named a baseball field at McAdams Park Fidelity Bank Field after the bank’s foundation donated $135,000 to help fund the Leslie Rudd Learning Center for League 42, a nonprofit youth baseball league that operates at McAdams.

The City Council voted unanimously to approve the project and increase its budget.

“This project really embodies a lot of what we set out to do to honor the former mayor,” council member Brandon Johnson said. “And the kitchen is one of those things. We did talk about a grill as well but the culinary piece was probably the most important. And providing an opportunity center, not just (a place to) play basketball.”