By Zach Hagadone
Reader Staff
The city of Sandpoint and consultants Green Play LLC, have begun work on planning and design for four sites: War Memorial Field, City Beach and downtown waterfront, sports complex (including Travers, Centennial and Great Northern fields) and city watershed property as the next phase to its Parks and Recreation Master Plan, which kicked off in April.
The public is invited to an open house on Wednesday, Aug. 15 at the City Council chambers in Sandpoint City Hall, 1123 Lake St., to review the results of Green Play’s initial site observations and analysis, and provide input on each of the specific locations.
Images will be on display with initial options for public consideration and feedback on current and future activities and amenities at the various sites. Members of the public are welcome to drop in anytime from 10 a.m.-4:30 p.m.
An open public meeting at The Hive, 207 N. First Ave., will follow the open house from 6:30-8 p.m. There, Green Play consultants will again present initial site concepts, summarize the feedback received throughout the day during the open house and take additional input and comments. Information gathered at the events will be used to make changes to the initial concepts and develop alternative options. These will be presented at another public session to take place in late September, when the final preferred alternatives will be decided in preparation of a final concept master plan for each site.
The public still has an opportunity to weigh in on priorities, satisfaction and needs for the overall Parks & Rec Plan, including parks, trails, open space and recreation programming. An online survey at sandpointsurvey.org is open through Friday, Aug. 16.
The city has budgeted $2.7 million in revenues from the voter-approved 1% Resort City sales tax in its proposed 2020 budget to support re-surfacing at Memorial Field and improvements at the other sites with any funds left over. Funding from the Parks Capital Improvement Fund, Recreation Fund and Impact Fees dedicated to Parks & Rec have also been budgeted to support priorities and projects identified in the final Parks Master Plan.
Green Play will develop an overall cost and revenue plan as part of the Master Plan, which will include review and analysis of Parks fees and revenues and grant opportunities.
