Donations to decide skate park size

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WILMINGTON — In a Parks & Recreation donation drive, money will be raised the rest of the year in support of building a larger concrete skate park than can now be paid for.

“We want to give ourselves every shot to get to that $250,000 skate park,” Wilmington Parks & Recreation Director Lori Kersey Williams told county commissioners on Monday.

“It’s going to happen [skate park]. It’s a matter of [which] size,” she said during an update report about the planned skate and splash parks, as well as other information about the city parks system.

Currently, via a combination of grants and donations, a $150,000 skate park can be constructed. But a $250,000 skate park in Wilmington, said Williams, “is the size that makes sense to most people.”

An adult advocate of skateboarding who lives near Wilmington, Wendy Adkins, will head the fundraising initiative. The fund drive will wrap up at year’s end, Williams said, because skate park grant dollars already in hand have to be spent in 2017 at the latest.

A $250,000 skate park would be “much more satisfying to everybody,” said Williams.

If desired, donations may be sent to: City of Wilmington Parks and Recreation, David Williams Completion Project, 69 N. South St., Wilmington, OH 45177, or online at http://goo.gl/xDFuHo .

Meanwhile, the building of a splash park, where young children can cool off with sprayed water, will start this summer. The completion date, however, is uncertain because some things are outside the control of local parks staff, she said.

“We are very close to a final design for the splash park. We’ve moved it nearer to the wooden [castle] playground,” said the Parks & Recreation director.

She announced that students in Wilmington High School’s new pre-engineering classes will work on three park projects: a “rain garden” (retention pond), a pump track for bikes, and a redesign of the old playground near the J.W. Denver Williams Jr. Memorial Park shelter houses.

The students will do design work for the rain garden, the function of which is to take the water runoff from the splash and skate parks.

A pump track can be utilized to learn mountain bike safety, or it can be used by youngsters on no-pedal balance bikes — training bikes that help children learn to ride on two wheels.

Williams said the pump track would be a nice parks amenity, “without a lot of cost” associated with it. She would like to see it built near the 4-C Bicentennial Trail, which has its eastern trail head on Fife Avenue across the street from David Williams Memorial Park.

The WHS pre-engineering students’ third project involves re-imagining and re-inventing the decades-old Denver Williams Park playground at the top of the hill above the pond.

While she had the ears of elected officials, Williams said she plans on adding “some serious speed bumps” to the motorist areas of J.W. Denver Williams Jr. Memorial Park. Some drivers, she said, regard the active park as a “short-cut” between Rombach and Fife avenues.

In other matters:

A rezoning hearing for Melvin Liquid Fertilizer was set for 10 a.m. Wednesday, April 27 in the commissioners office at the courthouse.

Commissioners held an executive session to discuss the appointment of a public official.

National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week was observed by commissioners who in a resolution formally recognized the work dispatchers do at the Clinton County Sheriff’s Office facility.

Reach Gary Huffenberger at 937-556-5768 or on Twitter @GHuffenberger.

Wilmington Parks & Recreation Director Lori Kersey Williams updates Clinton County commissioners Monday regarding the planned skate and splash parks.
http://aimmedianetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/22/2016/04/web1_l_williams_p_f.jpgWilmington Parks & Recreation Director Lori Kersey Williams updates Clinton County commissioners Monday regarding the planned skate and splash parks.

National Public Safety Telecommunicators Week is observed Monday in the upgraded dispatch center at the Clinton County Sheriff’s Office. Clinton County Commissioner President Mike Curry, left, presents an official resolution to Rhonda Bailey, the communications supervisor. There are a dozen employees for the county’s public-safety dispatch operations.
http://aimmedianetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/22/2016/04/web1_nat_tele_p_f.jpgNational Public Safety Telecommunicators Week is observed Monday in the upgraded dispatch center at the Clinton County Sheriff’s Office. Clinton County Commissioner President Mike Curry, left, presents an official resolution to Rhonda Bailey, the communications supervisor. There are a dozen employees for the county’s public-safety dispatch operations.
Fund drive effort through remainder of 2016

By Gary Huffenberger

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