The Sweet Home Kiwanis and Rotary club asked the District 55 School Board Monday night for land as they renew efforts to build a skate park.
With former Public Works Maintenance Supt. Dale Ivan’s resignation early last year, the driving force behind the effort left.
“We’ve had some inquiries from people in the community, wondering how it’s going,” Kiwanian Clint Sturdevant said. The effort has raised nearly $50,000, including city money committed to the project, a voluntary donation on water and sewer bills and donations in jars around town.
The Rotary Club joined forces with the Kiwanis recently to help bring the project to fruition, it’s starting to move forward now, Sturdevant said.
Estimates for the skate park have gone up to a cost of $200,000 to $250,000 to build a quality skate park, Sturdevant said. Skateboard enthusiasts travel quite a bit from park to park, and a good park in Sweet Home would bring visitors to town just to skate, but they’ll spend money in local businesses.
Representatives from the Kiwanis and Rotary clubs met with a representative of skate park builder Dreamline, Inc., Friday night to talk about possibilities. Roughly a dozen local skaters were at the meeting as well.
Having input from those youths is important, Sturdevant said. “We really need the kids’ input. We also want to attract people from around the state, and attract some business into the community.’
Ultimately, the clubs would like to see the skate park covered, so it could be used all year long, Sturdevant said. “There aren’t any I’m aware of in the entire state.”
As far as the skate park goes, “we want one that’s unique,” Sturdevant said. “If they’re constructed properly in a good design, you can really whip around them.”
The group will look toward grants to complete the project, Sturdevant said. Some funding in hand with the potential donation of land from the School District will help in pursuing grants.
“Different people have been looking for different properties for a long time,” Sturdevant said. The park shouldn’t be located in a residential area or on the north side where youths must cross the highway. It also needs to be visible so it doesn’t become a hang out with the wrong types of activities.
Sturdevant also envisions a place for BMX riders and in-line skaters.
“We want it to be multiple use as much as possible,” Sturdevant said. “We don’t want it to be a hang our for the unsavory. We don’t want kids to be scared to go there and use it.”
Initially, proponents of the skate park were looking at the lot to the east of the School District 55 Central Office, Sturdevant said, but the District has other uses in mind for that property, and now the clubs are looking at the property just to the south of the School District bus barn on 18th Avenue.
“Our objective is to get a tentative approval from the Board,” Sturdevant said, then the skate park coalition can begin looking for funding. “This area could expand into a real community area” with other proposals, including the School District’s bond measure.
“I’m really excited about it,” Sturdevant said. “This is an important project for the community. It was stalled, but we’re right on the edge of it taking off.”
During the Friday night meeting, skateboard enthusiast Andrew Volkers, 16, asked when he and other skaters could begin working on fund-raising efforts toward the skate park, and several adults also planned to help pursue the efforts. He also asked if the youths could get help in organizing events. Among them was Shane Douglas, who has tried many of the parks in the state.
The park would give kids a place where they wouldn’t be kicked out or need to feel guilty about skating, Tina Ritter said.
Dreamline representative Stefan Hauser said construction on a skate park would take between two and three months. He shared several designs of parks he and his company have constructed in Oregon. For more information, persons may contact City Manager Craig Martin at 367-8969 or Sturdevant at 367-2765.