More recreation is always a great idea for a community such as ours. I'd love to see the city with three recreation/community centers, one in the First Ward (M&M), one in the center of the city (perhaps an expansion of Union Street Park?), and one somewhere in the Fairmount Section.
And then I woke up. State laws dictate that city budgets cannot increase more than 2.5% per year. However, energy and insurance costs increase more than 2.5%, and the major constituent of the budget is salaries ---- they go up much more than that. As a result, the budget is squeezed more and more every year. It's now impossibly squeezed, and the thought of adding any new expense simply can't be considered because the Mayor & Council are struggling to keep the current programs running. The 2.5% cap has created a crisis situation in most of the 566 municipalities in New Jersey. It simply cannot go on much longer.
Something will probably happen legislatively within 5 years to remedy the crisis caused by the 2.5% budget cap, and then Hackensack should immediately consider adding more recreation/community centers. In addition to athletics, recreation/community centers should have a computer room, at least one large multi-purpose room, ADA-compliant bathrooms, several small meeting rooms, as well as office cubicles for neighborhood and community organizations.
Edgewater built something really nice for only $7,000,000, and Teaneck's is even more extravagant. Bonded over 20 years, seven million would cost about $375,000 a year, including interest. For a city the size of Hackensack, that's actually a small line item, almost invisibly absorbed into the budget.