Better uses for $300K

Dear editor:

For over a decade, my neighbors in the Whittington Valley have partnered with city staff to obtain grants improving our parks, sidewalks and bike paths. We identified substandard buildings and if the property threatened public safety, we reluctantly advocated razing the structure. We asked city staff to add deteriorated streets to the city’s paving list — and in time those streets were resurfaced. Not surprisingly, property values in the Valley are now at an all-time high and our homes sell quickly.

Likewise, other neighborhoods, each based upon their own unique situation, are also partnering with the city to implement needed improvements with grant money.

Park Avenue residents have seen their sidewalks repaired, marked bike lanes installed and their streetscape beatified with rain gardens. A new community garden is in place and they are constructing a new community park. Consequently, once vacant commercial buildings along Park Avenue are now occupied and thriving.

The residents of the Gateway Community, again partnering with city staff, identified the need for walkable connections to businesses along Grand Avenue and obtained grants to build those sidewalks. New commercial establishments opened and older establishments saw more business. A new park has been built and soon construction of pedestrian improvements along Malvern Avenue will begin — again, paid for with grant funds.

In each instance, residents and city staff work together to implement needed improvements but must find outside funding (i.e. grants) because the city “doesn’t have the money.”

On Tuesday, the Hot Springs Board of Directors will likely approve spending nearly $300,000 to hire consultants from North Carolina to complete a Comprehensive Plan “update” for the city. After public and private meetings, the consultants will write a “planning document” that will identify needed civic investments in transportation, parks, housing, and other community needs over the next 20 to 30 years.

Might there be a better way to spend this money? Here are some alternatives:

• Pay for a splash pad in the planned David Watkins Memorial Park — rather than shifting the burden onto Park Avenue residents to find a grant to pay for it.

• Build a park at the old Summit School site on Richard Street. Director Becca Clark laments that her district has no park — this would address her concern. Moreover, the city’s agreement to use the site will expire if a park is not in place soon.

• Tackle the backlog of nearly 100 condemnable buildings throughout the city.

• $300,000 would pave over half the streets on the city’s paving list that cannot be resurfaced due to “a lack of funding.”

Ten years ago, taxpayers paid another consultant to write an update to the city’s Comprehensive Plan. That update was also intended to map out needed civic investments over a 20-30 year period. And yet well short of that period, we are asked to pay for another expensive “study” touted with great fanfare but which does not actually improve a single road, sidewalk or park in Hot Springs. But the North Carolina consultants will be $300,000 richer.

Mark A. Toth Hot Springs