Metro

2nd look at rec centers

The Parks Department is rethinking its decision to double entry fees at 32 neighborhood recreation centers after losing 50,000 memberships in a single year, The Post has learned.

Officials said that Parks Commissioner Veronica White ordered a “comprehensive” review of the centers after she took over in June, about a year after the fee hikes turned into an embarrassing fiasco.

First Deputy Commissioner Liam Kavanagh said a rollback is “definitely a possibility . . . It’s one of the things we’re looking at.”

As The Post first reported, half of 36,153 senior members bailed between July 1, 2011, and June 30, 2012, when their annual fees jumped from $10 to $25. The qualifying age was also raised from 55 to 62.

The 79,357 adults on the rolls plummeted to 44,877 in response to a hike from $50 to $100.

Annual membership fees allow entry into any of the recreation centers. Those with pools cost more, $150 a year for an adult. The fees don’t cover tennis or other outdoor sports run by Parks, which imposes separate charges.

With so many members hightailing it, the agency actually took in $212,579 less in revenues from the centers last year than in the previous 12-month period.

White has undertaken a study to learn what it will take to draw back cost-conscious consumers.

Fees are obviously a big issue. But so are the conditions of some of the facilities and equipment.

“We heard that women who come to a center for the first time would like a little more hands-on orientation and instruction on the equipment,” said Kavanagh.

More free programs would almost certainly get the lines forming again.

White had served earlier as head of the mayor’s Center for Economic Opportunity, which came up with innovative programs to help people beat the cycle of poverty.

Perhaps that’s why she’s taking a broader view of Parks’ mission.

“We’re losing money on the rec centers anyway,” said one insider. “Does it really matter if we lose a little more?”