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'One-stop shopping,' fitness facilities top JCC priorities
Valley residents offer wish list in center survey
RANDI BAROCAS
Staff Writer
The majority of respondents to a recent Jewish Community Campus Needs Assess-
ment Survey want a single location where Jews of all ages can gather to socialize and access a variety of religious and educational programs.
And building the right fitness facilities could make or break the new Valley of the Sun Jewish Community Center.
Those were among the findings contained in a report of the results of the survey conducted by Chicago-based Levenberg Marketing Group, said Fred Zeidman, director of planning and allocations for the Jewish Federation of Greater Phoenix.
Topping respondents' priority list is a campus that offers "one-stop shopping" for families, said Zeidman, explaining that those surveyed want a place where every member of the family - from preschooler and teenager, to mother and father - can go for different programs of interest.
The survey also revealed that recreational resources, such as a swimming pool and state-of-the-art fitness facility, are top priorities among potential center members. A swimming pool and swimming lessons, in fact, were of the greatest interest to families with children. Eighty-six percent of families surveyed are likely to enroll their children in swimming lessons at the center, with that number jumping to 99 percent for families with children under the age of 6, according to the report.
Seventy-seven percent of those surveyed listed a fitness facility as important; sixty percent said they want an aerobics/dance studio, and 59 percent want sauna/steam/whirlpool facilities at the center.
The thing that became apparent in examining the survey results, according to the report, is that "building the right (or wrong) fitness facilities at this time (maybe more than any other JCC facility component) can mean success or failure for the new JCC."
The survey was sent to 4,500 homes in the Greater Phoenix area, with 594 - or 13 percent - "useable responses received." Of the respondents, 77 percent identified themselves as Jewish, 8 percent as belonging to intermarried households, and 14 percent did not respond to the question.
"The rate of response for similar surveys in other communities has ranged from 10 percent to 25 percent," the marketing firm's report notes. "Considering that the majority of the prospective respondents have no current connections with the JCC and its services, 13 percent is an excellent response rate."
JCC and federation leaders are still studying whether the 10-acre plot of land at 40th Street and Shea Boulevard, which has been designated as the future site for the JCC facility, can accommodate a structure large enough to include all the agencies and organizations interested in relocating there.
Because of the size of the plot, the structure is limited to somewhere between 85,000 and 95,000 square feet, according to the conceptual design plan presented to the federation by architect Mo Stein in July 1997.
Given those limits on useable space, organizers are doing their research to determine how to best serve the agencies that want to be housed at the campus. They are looking at ways in which the various agencies could potentially share resources, Zeidman said.
Agencies that have demonstrated an interest in calling the new site home each have given a presentation to Langdon Wilson architects, the firm now designing the structure. The presentations were made in order to give the architects information on how much space would have to be allocated to each organization at the site. Langdon Wilson presently is drawing up a report that it will present to federation and JCC Task Force leaders sometime this month, said Mark Shore, executive director of the JCC.
The architectural firm's report will include schematic information and recommendations on how to best accommodate the agencies that are interested in moving their offices and programs to the new facility.
"At this point in time, there are no priorities (as to who will be housed at the campus)," Shore said. "After we listen to the space budget, the JCC Task Force will sit down and probably establish the priorities, and the survey results will be a major guiding factor."
So far, only federation constituent agencies are being considered as potential tenants at the site, Zeidman said. In addition to the Valley of the Sun JCC and the federation, other possible inhabitants include the Bureau of Jewish Education, Solomon Schechter Day School, Phoenix Hebrew Academy, Council for Jews with Special Needs and the proposed Jewish community high school.
One thing to note, Zeidman said, is that the organizers of the Jewish community high school are presently members of an independent group of concerned parents and community leaders who simply are using federation resources for research purposes. It has yet to be determined whether the school, if it ever comes to be, will actually become a constituent agency of federation.
Although many elements must still be addressed before actual Jewish community campus ground-breaking can occur, Ron Bookbinder, chairman of the JCC Task Force, said in a statement issued by the federation that Levenberg Marketing Group's report is "a green light to proceed."
"It demonstrates strong community support for the campus," Bookbinder said, "and it provides us with vital data for making space and program decisions."
Despite that green light, the target date for a finished facility has been pushed back from January 2000 to the end of that year, or possibly even January 2001, Zeidman said.
Capital campaign efforts, however, are expected to begin sometime before the end of 1998, said Zeidman, adding that the total cost of the facility now is estimated at $12 million to $18 million.
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