Tomas Settell considers the Inver Grove Heights community center the ideal spot to run his gymnastics school.
Over the past 14 years, Settell and his staff have taught more than 1,800 kids and adults through Bee Elite Gymnastics Academy, which takes up about 1,900 square feet of the city’s Veterans Memorial Community Center. His youngest student was 2 years old, his oldest 90.
“I’m the only gymnastics gym or trampoline club in Inver Grove Heights,” said Settell, a resident of the city for a dozen years.
The arrangement — made only verbally in 2006 — has worked out great for everyone, he said. Parents like the location because they can work out in the fitness center or swim while Settell teaches their kids. Settell gets to make a living as he teaches a sport he loves, while the city gets added community center revenue.
But now Settell’s future at the community center is up in the air. The city has told him they’d like him out, citing a need for more room for other community center programs because of the coronavirus pandemic and also that they want to bring in more income.
The threat of eviction came in mid-May during a phone conversation with Parks and Recreation director Eric Carlson, who told Settell he wanted him to move his gymnastics equipment out to make room for social distancing for other programs.
“I was quite shocked and surprised,” Settell told the city council at its meeting last week.
CITY TOUTS PROGRAM
Speaking during the council’s citizen comment period, Settell said he went to them for help. And he was prepared, showing up with documented proof to back up his claims and several parents who had his back.
Settell gave each council member a binder that included copies of the city’s summer parks and recreation programming booklet, which shows the gymnastics school as a program running through May 2021; copies of emails between him and Carlson and other city staff; copies of estimates from companies to move and store his gymnastics equipment; and a copy of the transcribed May 15 phone conversation with Carlson that Settell recorded.
“The whole city knows that I’m going to be there until May (2021), according to this brochure,” he said. “So I would like some consideration and your help in solving this problem. I’m a tenant, and do plan on opening on July 6” when the community center reopens.
City administrator Joe Lynch responded by saying the city council has “challenged” city staff to come up with additional revenue-generating space at the community center so that the city can cover at least 86 percent of operating costs.
‘HE HAS BEEN A GOOD TENANT’
Lynch said that Settell’s agreement with the city is not in writing and that Settell calculates the revenue that he generates and gives the city a check.
“So we rely completely on Tomas to give us that revenue,” Lynch said. “He has been a good tenant and we have enjoyed that benefit. But we are looking at the continued use of that space, which originally … was handball and racquetball courts.”
Lynch said they would like the gymnastics space in order to grow the city’s fitness center membership.
“It’s not immediate, but it is something that we would like to talk to Tomas about,” he said.
Mayor George Tourville said it was “troubling” to hear that Settell was told in May that he had to go.
“I guess it’s pretty final when you say we want you out of there,” Tourville said.
City council member Brenda Dietrich chimed in, saying this was the first they were hearing of the plan.
“None of us knew about it,” she said. “That’s a business leaving our community.”
20 PERCENT OF HIS REVENUE
In an interview last week, Carlson said he did indeed tell Settell that the space could be used for multiple recreation programs and that because “his program and the equipment he needs is hard to move and can only be used for gymnastics, I wanted to explore with him not being in that space any longer.”
Carlson said Settell pointed out “some good information” that the city already has advertised his programming through May 2021. “So I think the city has an obligation to honor that with him at a minimum and consider some extension potentially,” he said. “But only under the guise of a lease agreement that has a fixed rate that is consistent with what the market is.”
Carlson said that under the verbal agreement — which was made before he started working for the city — Settell gives the city 20 percent of his revenue. He said that from 2016 through 2019, the city has received an average of about $7,100 in revenue annually from Settell.
When asked about that number, Carlson said, “that’s not a lot” and added “this isn’t (Settell’s) fault. I’m the park and recreation director, so I will be responsible for the fact that we have not put an agreement in writing that had the city’s best interest in mind. And we now need to do that.”
A meeting between Settell and city staff is scheduled for this week.
“I don’t have any preconceived notions of what the outcome of that is going to be specifically,” Carlson said, “other than we’re going to have to have some type of an agreement in writing, because that’s what the city council directed us to do.”
‘KIDS ARE TRYING TO GROW UP’
A group of parents who spoke in support of Settell at last week’s city council meeting or sent council members emails urged them to keep him around for years down the road.
One of them was Amy Kaiser, whose son Garrett was on the Bee Elite Gymnastics team for many years before going on to be a member of the Simley High School swim and dive team. He broke school and pool records, placed in the top three at state in 2019 and 2020 and is a recruited college athlete for next year.
“His gymnastics training at Bee Elite was invaluable for somersaulting and twisting, and was key to his success at diving at such a young age,” Kaiser wrote in an email. She added that the way in which the city tried to kick Settell out of the space was “unprofessional” and that it could have “destroyed” his business.
The decision should go beyond money, said parent Samuel Adedeji, of Eagan. His son Ibukun excelled on Bee Elite’s Junior Olympics team before tragically dying of complications of a congenital defect while swimming in 2010. He was 11 years old.
“As much as the city is trying to make money, kids are trying to grow up, and this is part of their development,” Adedeji said. “And the opportunity that they have here, they might not be able to have somewhere else. My son had opportunity here.”