Both Ward 4 Councilmember Janeese Lewis George and Ward 5 Councilmember Zachary Parker provided parks and recs update in their newsletters a couple of weeks ago that are of interest to the neighborhood.

From Councilmember Lewis George on planned summer repairs:

• Lamond Rec Center will have a new swing set designed and installed.
• Riggs-LaSalle will have a new shade structure designed and installed over the 2-5 playground and will have new vertical netting installed around portions of the football field. 

From Councilmember Parker on green space at southwest corner of South Dakota Avenue & Riggs Road NE:

• Park at the corner of Riggs Rd NE and South Dakota NE: DGS Hunter also confirmed that the agency is taking action on money I secured last budget season to establish a park at the intersection of Riggs Rd NE and South Dakota NE. Per the Director, DGS is in the process of leasing the land next to Food and Friends. The hope is to bid a contract by the end of FY24 (September 3[0]) and begin community engagement. Neighbors have been asking for this park for 10 years, and I’m proud to finally be able to deliver it for them sometime next year.

I listened to a recording of the budget oversight hearing for DGS, and it clarifies conflicting information we were receiving about the green space (discussion starts at roughly the 01:41 mark). The green space sits in DDOT’s portfolio. Instead of pursuing a transfer of jurisdiction to DPR, DGS Director Delano Hunter stated that they will go through DDOT’s public space permitting process to program the space. (DDOT has stated for a while that this is their preferred option). DDOT wants to keep the space in its portfolio in case of transportation needs.

Director Hunter stated that the plan is to have a designer on board before the end of this fiscal year (so before September 30, 2024) with the goal of having initial community engagement by then as well. Director Hunter stated that there is about $440,000 in the budget. We know this is not a ton of money to create an actual park, but it will be a start for some landscaping, maybe some benches, and generally making the space more useable.

Park space here is included in the neighborhood’s area development plan. A team of neighbors (myself included) has been working on getting this funded for several years now. That is the reason for all of the surveys. In my formal and informal conversations with District agencies on this, I pointed out that this space could feature any number of things, such as a neighborhood sign, neighborhood history park, an art park, native plant demonstration garden, walking path, and limited recreation (think seasonal ice/skate rink). To bolster our funding request, a team of us worked with EYA to draw up initial concept plans with the goal of providing a more concrete idea of what we have in mind for agency officials (shoutout to EYA for this).

The limited amount budgeted for this space for Fiscal Year 2024 is not going to get us anywhere close to 100% of what we want, but it is a small start. And we continue to work to identify other sources of funding for things like neighborhood history markers in the space. We also know that there is still a third phase for Art Place at Fort Totten that will eventually get started at some point (this is the space on the northwest side of South Dakota Avenue/Kennedy Street NE). If the timing were better, it would have been nice to be able to conceive of these spaces together.