Mayor Brent Lambert, right, looks over a map of the city with Michael Frixen of Southeast Tennessee Development District, Saturday, during a community involvement meeting dealing with recreation.
East Ridge officials gave citizens an opportunity to potentially shape the future of recreation in the city, Saturday morning, as they hosted a community involvement meeting at the Community Center.
City Manager Scott Miller said the purpose of the meeting was to get public input about what people wanted to see in East Ridge in terms of “anything to do with recreation.”
The City is partnering with Southeast Tennessee Development District to update its comprehensive recreation plan, a requirement in order to apply for state grants, said Michael Frixen, Director of Planning for the organization. The City’s current recreation plan was devised about five years ago. He said updating the plan gives assurance to state officials that when recreation grants are approved that state officials are “making a smart investment.”
Frixen had a large map showing the city with all city-owned property highlighted in green.
“We want to identify areas in the East Ridge where people would like to see more recreational opportunities,” Frixen said. “Of course, Camp Jordan is the behemoth. It’s a regional park that draws people from all over the area. But (the question is) what can we do for the rest of East Ridge?”
Mayor Brent Lambert reviewed the city map with Frixen and talked about the concept of “pocket parks” being developed throughout the city. He said the city owns some small parcels that could be equipped with playground equipment. Other small parcels of land, he said, could be acquired by the city for such purposes. In particular he mentioned a now defunct car wash on the corner of Truman Avenue and Ringgold Road, adjacent to a planned new development.
“You could kill two birds with one stone, there,” Lambert said. “You could get rid of something that is undesirable and replace it with something nice.”
Residents were given an opportunity to visit a couple of “idea walls” posted in the room. One of the boards on the “wall” asked “what is your favorite recreation activity in East Ridge?” Another “wall” asked people what kind of recreational activities would you like to see?
People scrawled a variety of answers: More activities in the recreation center; a skateboard park; a dog park; tennis courts; basketball courts; exercise stations along the track; playground equipment for the handicapped; a pool/splash park.
One woman, who did not want to be identified, criticized the operation of Camp Jordan. She said there was too much focus on soccer.
The woman said that average citizens are not allowed to play pickup football games or other activities on the soccer fields in Camp Jordan that are used by a soccer league that the city has an agreement with.
Parks and Recreation Director Stump Martin said that with the city recently acquiring the athletic fields at East Ridge High School there should be more “practice fields” available for people to use for unstructured activities.
Martin said that, although only a handful of residents showed up to the community involvement meeting, officials received “some quality input.” He said that these kinds of meetings reinforces what the city is trying to accomplish with its recreation programs.
“This brings us together,” Martin said.
Amanda Miller, the city’s community involvement director, said that East Ridge will host another meeting focused on recreation within the next six weeks to get additional input.
If you missed the meeting you can still give your input by taking the online survey by clicking here.
