A full house of unhappy Sundre citizens at last week's two open houses gave the thumbs-down to the town's intention of selling off five pocket parks.
The open houses, held last Wednesday and Thursday, were held in response to a tumultuous council meeting in October, where more than two dozen angry Sundre citizens arrived to vehemently oppose the town's intention of selling the parks, a move that is now being denied by the town's chief administrative officer.
“It was reported that we were just going to sell these properties but that wasn't the truth. It was reported as our policy to sell, but we never had a policy to sell parkland, ever, it was never a policy,” said Sundre CAO Dean Pickering.
“It's a combination of the public having misinformation and the press exciting the misinformation and turning it into flaming inferno over a little issue that was essentially the process of looking at what should we do with town land. It got blown into something pretty big.”
During the Oct. 1 regular council meeting, first reading was held for seven separate motions on the parks the town intended to either sell or maintain for other uses, such as a future doctor's residence. Five separate motions for five pocket parks were brought forward as an “offer for sale.” The record of council's intention to these public properties is available for the public to view on the town's website in its minutes section.
Meanwhile, Pickering said the pocket parks were never actually meant to be parks, noting some are isolated in small cul-de-sacs where citizens don't even know they exist.
He added the current examination of the town's park system is to look at what the town owns and determine what is serviceable and what is not.
Pickering said the soccer pitch, for example, was never meant to be where it is and the town wants to move it elsewhere, which is part of the recreational master plan that is expected to be unveiled in 2013.
“The discussion was do we give this soccer group notice that in five years we hope to have a new soccer field built so we are going to abandon this one? That was the goal.”
At the open houses, the town displayed information on each of the parks being looked at, as well as comment boards where guests were invited to write how they felt about the issue.
As well, River Valley School students participated by creating posters with the percentage results of what each class in every grade thought of the issue. Every class was against the idea of eliminating any of the parks.
Coun. Cheri Funke, who was acclaimed to council this fall on a platform to fight against the town plan to unload the parks, said she still strongly feels that none of the parks should be sold.
“The parks mean a lot to my kids and my kids are everything,” said Funke. “I want everyone on council to know how the citizens feel…so that we can actually make a decision that doesn't make everyone mad.”
An overwhelming majority of Sundre citizens who attended the open houses said the parks should not be sold.
Sundre citizen Kathy Taylor called the plan a “terrible idea”, insisting parks draw people to town and if the community wants to flourish in the future then it needs to retain its green spaces.
“They should keep the green spaces the way they are. We want to attract people to our community, not turn them off,” said Debbie Reimert, citizen of Sundre.
Lee Smith, also a citizen of Sundre, said he wants to see the plan to sell the pocket parks vetoed. He added the town should then look at them with a goal to utilize them to their maximum potential.
“The idea of selling the properties is just not something that should even be on the agenda,” he said.
“I'm glad that the open house has happened but it was not because of the council's initiative. It was because of the meeting about a month ago where numerous people from the community came in and insisted that the process be altered so that there could be time for these open houses.”
Citizen Robert Ellithorpe added the parks should not be sold off for the “simple reason” that most were donated to the town.
However, one citizen who attended the open houses said he agreed with the town's initial plan to sell off the pocket parks.
“All these little pocket parks were great in their day…I don't have a problem with selling parks as long as they're turned into bigger and better parks,” said Roy Cummings.
Mayor Annette Clews said she was happy with the turnout of people at the open houses, adding she thought the school did an “excellent job on getting the kids engaged.
“I think it's very important that we get direction from our community on the future of all of our parks within our municipality…The community's direction that we're getting on the feedback tonight will guide us moving forward in our decision,” said Clews.
Jacci Hager, manager of community services, said if the decision is made by council to sell the parks then the money will be put into the community service recreation reserve to use for future capital recreation projects, or it will be put into another reserve.
“I received a lot of emails and phone calls from individuals that couldn't make it but wanted to provide their input,” said Hager. “It's been highly public right from the very beginning, which is fantastic because it's really important to get the public involvement in this manner.”
