Shuttle services to the downhill trails at Lake Leatherwood Park in Eureka Springs will now be outsourced to an outside vendor.

At its regular meeting June 20 at The Auditorium, the Eureka Springs Parks and Recreation Commission approved a contract with Rogers- based Slaughter Trail Guides to run shuttle services for the Lake Leatherwood Gravity Project.

The parks department had been running the shuttles in the past.

“It’s been sort of a weird mixture hodgepodge of how we’ve been doing it for the last couple of years, which it sort of worked,” said Sam Dudley, parks director. “But, I think it’s time to switch it up and kind of let someone else take the reins. It’s just a lot of issues with staffing and maintenance of the vehicles and upkeep of the vehicles and management … so, we’re going to put it in their hands and let them run it and see how they do.”

The financial part of the contract, which initially is for 18 months, wasn’t disclosed at the meeting or during the vote, nor was a timeline for when the services will officially switch hands.

“If it doesn’t work out we can always switch it up or rethink it,” Dudley said.

The contract gives Slaughter Trail Guides exclusive rights to operate shuttles to the trails. Dudley solicited for bids for the service using a request for proposal with Slaughter being the only company to respond, he said.

According to the RFP packet used to request bids, the commission required a company to have a minimum of two shuttles with a minimum of 14 seats available for “operations on weekends and high visitation days or during events.”

The request also stated that the parks commission “owns two mountain bike specific trailers” and the contract “will require the vendor to lease both shuttle trailers for a monthly fee.”

“Any required maintenance on the trailers will also be the responsibility of the contractor,” the request reads.

The request for proposal also requires the winning vendor to provide online booking and scheduling, a proper insurance policy and volunteerr “a minimum of 780 hours of light-duty trail maintenance over the course of a calendar year on [Lake Leatherwood Gravity Project] trails.”

“Permitted maintenance includes but is not limited to: trail checks, raking, pruning, rock armoring. Use of power equipment and/or heavy machinery will be allowed at the discretion of the [parks] Director,” the proposal packet reads.

Dudley told commissioners that one of the employees of Slaughter Trail Guides owns Topo Motel, located at 14582 Highway 62 in Eureka Springs, at the top of the trail next door to the Upper Lake Leatherwood Trailhead.

Using an outside contractor will allow certain specials that couldn’t be offered if the services were run by the city, such as offering discounts to local residents, Dudley told commissioners.

“We can’t do that as a public entity,” he said. “We can’t offer discounts based off location, which seems odd, but we just can’t do that. But, if you’re contracting it out, they are legally allowed to offer things like season passes, 10-punch passes and discounts for locals.”

Commission chair Ruth Hager liked that flexibility.

“That’s nice because they are a private enterprise,” she said. “They can do all sorts of cool things out there that we wouldn’t be able to do.”

OTHER ITEMS

With the approval of outsourcing the shuttle services, the commission also authorized Dudley to sell the department’s two shuttle vehicles.

“I’ll definitely make sure we make more than we owe,” he said, adding he planned to use the government bid site to sell the shuttles.

The commission also approved memorializing a donated bench for longtime parks employee Stephanie Huffman, who recently passed away.

Dudley said the bench will be placed at the dock at Lake Leatherwood so it can be bolted down and will overlook the lake.

Other discussions with no action included ideas for the department to outsource more services.

“It would just take weight off our shoulders and we can focus on coming up with more events …,” Dudley said.

The commission also discussed researching best practices for private boats at Lake Leatherwood.

People bring in fishing boats that may have been used at other lakes that can spread invasive species, Dudley said.

“The curly pond weed [currently at Lake Leatherwood] is vicious and a lot of studies have shown that people bring stuff from lake to lake,” he said.

Commissioners said they want to look into practices at area lakes of similar size — such as Lake Fayetteville — to get ideas to tackle the issue.

In his director’s report, Dudley reported that two broken benches at Basin Park had been repaired.

Also, new directional signage has been installed at Lake Leatherwood.

“So, when you drive down to Leatherwood you know where to go,” he said.

The department also recently fixed, cleaned and installed gutters on a number of cabins at the park, Dudley said.