Editor:
This is an open letter to residents and visitors of Sweet Home, the Sweet Home Park Board, Mayor James Gourley, Public Works Director Mike Adams, Planning Assistant Kathryn Wilcox, the Sweet Home City Council and Sweet Home City Staff.
It is directed to all above in expectation of the free and open discussion of the future of Sankey Park and other public properties in the City of Sweet Home.
I will restate my “credentials.”
I am a Sweet Home property owner and a Linn County taxpayer. I hold a bachelor of science in parks and recreation management from California State University and my interdisciplinary master’s work was is urban ethnoecololgy of place-based learning. I am early-retired and disabled. I hold distinction as a F.O.G.E. and Sweet Home Park Board Chairperson.
I submit this letter to the public for two reasons:
1. The scheduled discussion of the Scope of Work for the Sankey Park Concept Plan in an open public meeting, as required by law, was thwarted when that open public meeting was disrupted and had to be adjourned at 8:30 a.m. on June 20.
I would be delighted if my letter today encourages many others, amateur and professional, young and old, to come forward and share their recommendations for the Sankey Park planning process and the future development of our park lands.
2. My responsibility as a community member and as Parks Board chairperson motivates me to get important considerations to the community before action is taken by City Council, possibly on June 28, to approve the use of public funds.
The following are my professional and personal recommendations for creating a Sankey Park Concept Plan, as well as the reasons I had expected to discuss at open meeting with the perspectives of other for and against the approval of public funds to University of Oregon for a Sankey Park Concept Plan at the cost of $10,800.
My reasons for opposing the UO service contract are:
1. The length of time provided for the scope of work in the Request for Proposals is too short.
Sankey Park is a culturally and ecologically complex urban site. Six months is not enough time to get all the factual data and all the community input needed to make good long term plans of any kind, let alone one that will be used as a basis for many others.
2. The number of interactions with community members, the variety of interactions and the medium of interactions, as well as the actual number of people to be contacted described in the UO RFP are inadequate.
In an age of web-based information and survey, dissemination of public information, as well as the busy lives of so many residents and park users (including community groups), the number of meetings to gather information and opinions on the future of Sankey Park is adequate.
In addition, there were no accommodations met to survey specifically those in our community who are invisible and underrepresented: the disabled and the displaced.
Twenty-first-century media would be one of many possible ways to gather input from residents who have physical and cultural mobility issues and should have access to the planning process, especially about issues of access!
3. The cost, $10,800, of the UO Sankey Park is better spent elsewhere at this time.
My recommendations, for the Sankey Park Concept Plan, to the residents and visitors of Sweet Home, Mayor Gourley; Mr. Adams, Public Works Director; Ms. Wilcox, Planning Assistant; and Sweet Home City Council members follow:
1. Create a local volunteer two-year Task Group assigned to developing a Concept Plan for Sankey Park.
2. After cultural, historical and ecological information and input from enough people has been gathered in as many different ways as possible, compile and publish a Sankey Park Portfolio that lists all its assets and issues, expectations and potential online.
3. When the different criteria has been established in the online published Portfolio of Sankey Park, offer $10,000 in combined prize money (10 prizes of $1,000) for concept design options and detailed drawings from the community – amateurs and professionals alike.
Not only will local environmental, recreational, and landscape designers have enough information to come up with many good options, but local students at Sweet Home High School and Linn-Benton Community College would have reason to get involved and inspired by Sankey Park long-term planning.
They are the ones who will have to live with the decisions made today.
4. Present the 10 finalists’ designs to the community in a variety of venues including online web gallery with all the important features and do accurate and inclusive critique and suggestions for each design, as well as voting and polling online and at kiosk sites such as City Hall and the Public Library for those who do not have home access to internet.
5. The community voting will choose the Sankey Park Concept Plan from the online voting over a sufficient amount of time (minimum one (1) month).
Thank you for considering these recommendations.
I am extremely disappointed that others were not allowed to express their perspectives and ideas at the scheduled Park Board Public Meeting. I welcome any and all email in regards my recommendations above and the future inclusive locally based planning for Sankey Park and all our public properties.
We have modern and accessible tools now, that make everyone’s ideas and dreams welcome in the planning process if we take the time to do things right.
Sincerely,
Jane E. Hazen
Sweet Home