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Photograph by Skye Dunlap
The empty grandstands at the city-run Sports Center are evidence that people aren't using the facility.
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Decrepit Sports Center targeted for demolition
The Cupertino Sports Center's days could be numbered. City officials have decided to stop pouring money into fixing the old building and begin plans to build a new one.
The plan to replace the aging building is still in the early stages, but councilmembers on March 20 decided to stop putting money into costly repairs. They also told city staff to report back with possible features to be incorporated in the new building.
The city in 1990 purchased the facility from the failing De Anza Racquet Club for $7.9 million. Parks and Recreation director Steve Dowling said the building needs more than $800,000 worth of upgrades to the heating and air conditioning system and the mandated improvements that would bring it up to ADA and seismic safety standards. Additionally, it would cost the city about $1.3 million to remodel and expand the facility to give it an efficient, usable layout.
But, for $2 million, Dowling said, the city could scrap the old 15,000-square-foot sports center and replace it with a smaller, 10,000-square-foot building.
Built in 1975, officials say the current building is a disaster. In terms of how it uses interior space, much of it is wasted on hundreds of lockers and a restaurant/bar area. Parts of the building are taken up by rarely-used racquetball courts and the aerobics and weight rooms have ceilings too low to accommodate their purposes.
"We've done the best we can to try to accommodate things, but it's still really inadequate," said Richard Gonzales, the complex's manager. Staff members, he said, continue to find construction problems with the building. "Every time we turn around we find something else they skimped on," he said.
Recent problems include a leaky roof that cost $100,000 to repair, a balcony plagued by dry rot, water damage around indoor spas, and other problems with the heating, ventilation and plumbing systems.
Problems like that, Dowling said, "forced us to take a hard look at what we have there. It's a really suspect building and it has been from day one. Every year, the building creates more and more maintenance challenges. It was designed as a private club, which doesn't work well for a public agency."
Dowling said the plan to replace the building wouldn't involve any of the other facilities at the complex. In addition to the main complex, there are 17 tennis courts and a mid-sized pool on the six-acre site.
Recreation Supervisor Don McCarthy said the next step for a new building will be to form a committee of city staff, councilmembers, sports center users and residents, to discuss what needs the new building should meet, and pick an architect to design it.
Dowling said he expects to have a preliminary report before the council by April or May. Any demolition, he said, would be at least a year off. Dowling said the city intends to operate the sports center for the foreseeable future.
After the De Anza Racquet Club went out of business in 1988, the sports center was leased briefly as a fitness center for Apple Computer employees for part of that year, while Apple's own fitness center was under construction. The center was empty and dormant for the next two years, until the city bought the property in March 1990.
After that, the city did not manage the center much, and it essentially functioned as a public tennis facility. A private contractor operated the club for the city, beginning in 1992, until the city took over operations in 1994.
The sports center operates in the black, with revenues of about $800,000 a year, slightly outpacing expenditures, city documents showed.
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Cupertino, California Since 1947
