Aquatics-center plans shrink
Some like design, others say too many features lost
GREENWOOD — A proposed aquatics center for Ben Geren Regional Park has shrunk in size from initial proposals and some area residents are expressing their disappointment, although others liked the plans.
Michele Walker, a ninthgrade English teacher at Ramsey Junior High School, said her students believe the proposed center is “too juvenile.”
Sebastian County Justice of the Peace Danny Aldridge said the diving area in the original plan is now gone and the double-loop, 770-foot “lazy river” feature is now down to one loop and is only 440 feet long. The inner-tube slide that empties into the lazy river also has been removed from the design, Walker said.
“This is going to be good,” Otis Edwards of Greenwood said after looking over the pictures of plans and drawings on easels that lined the room at the Greenwood courthouse.
“It’s been needed for years, ever since they closed the pool” at Ben Geren, he said.
Two public-input meetings on the project were held this week — Monday in Fort Smith and Tuesday in Greenwood — where residents got to see the latest proposals for the aquatics center.
Sebastian County and Fort Smith are equal partners in the $8 million project. The city and county also will share the cost of operating the center, estimated to be about $110,000 the first two years, according to information provided by county officials.
Fort Smith voters approved reallocation of a 1 percent sales tax last March. Revenue from 0.75 percent of the tax will be used to pay off bonds issued to pay for several projects, among them the aquatics center.
Sebastian County’s share is coming from a capital fund that has built up over the years with part of its share of a 1 percent countywide sales tax.
Quorum Court members voted 7-6 on Jan. 15 to appropriate money from the fund to the project. Because the vote did not receive a two-thirds majority, it must be read and voted on twice more.
The second vote will be at the Feb. 19 meeting.
Walker said when she discussed the aquatics center with her students, they said they felt cheated. She included their remarks in a letter she said she was delivering to each Quorum Court member.
Aldridge, who attended both public-input meetings, mentioned the smaller lazy river feature, the lack of landscaping around it and the reduction of the 7-acre campus to 4.5 acres.
He also said he’d like to see the proposed party room for children put back in the plans. The room was replaced with offices for the Ben Geren Park staff, he said.
Aldridge said Wednesday that his constituents deserve the most features for the money and, if they’re not going to get them, the project may not be worth doing. He wouldn’t say Wednesday whether he would change his vote on the project. He voted in favor of the appropriation Jan. 15.
“It will be a great addition to the region, but I’d like to see it tweaked,” Aldridge told Andrew Smith, the representative of center designer Larkin Aquatics of Kansas City, Mo., who attended Tuesday’s meeting in Greenwood.
Fort Smith City Administrator Ray Gosack said Wednesday that Fort Smith voters approved the construction of an aquatics center last March, but not each feature in it. Choices on which features to put in and take out had to be made to keep the project within the budget, he said.
Gosack said he was confident the county and city could build an aquatics center residents of all ages could enjoy, but the features are limited to the money available.
Sebastian County Judge David Hudson said he would consider the feedback and bring up the suggestions for the center at a joint Sebastian County/Fort Smith meeting scheduled for Tuesday at Ben Geren Park. Hudson said he was confident the Quorum Court would continue to vote for the appropriation, supporting the commitment the county made with the city to fund the aquatics center.
Hudson said if the Quorum Court votes down the appropriation ordinance, the city and county may have to enter into mediation to resolve the issue.
Ben Geren Park is not in the Fort Smith city limits, although city directors annexed the land for the aquatics center last year so city money could be spent on the project.
The proposed aquatics center will have a children’s pool, one for families with depths ranging from 3 to 5 feet, the lazy river feature that will propel floaters around a loop on a current created by intermittently placed water jets and a pool that will be the splashdown point for four water slides.
The water slides will start atop a tower about 30 feet tall.
The center also will have grassy areas, shaded areas, areas for sunning, a concession area and a bathhouse.
The project is scheduled to be put up for bid this spring with construction beginning this summer. The plan is for the center to be ready to open on Memorial Day weekend 2014, according to information released by the city and the county.