There’s no more walking on the boardwalk at Lake Fenwick Park in Kent.
Residents are slowly starting to see crews shutting down park facilities because of city officials say is a lack of funds to do repairs or replacements.
So far, the biggest hits are at Lake Fenwick Park, 25828 Lake Fenwick Road S. The city closed the boardwalk at the park in January after shutting down a small fishing dock last year.
Park staff is expected to release a list of other potential closures at a Kent City Council Parks and Human Services Committee meeting on Thursday, April 23. Staff didn’t have a specific list yet of park facilities that might be closed.
“We’re monitoring (park features) that we are possibly looking to close/remove this year – that’s being worked on in preparation for a discussion with the Parks Committee,” said Hope Gibson, city manager for park planning and development, in an email.
The city closed the Lake Fenwick boardwalk in January that connects to the middle and south sections of the park as well as the fishing dock.
“They have both reached the end of their useful life and are no longer functional or reasonably repairable,” Gibson said about the boardwalk and dock that staff estimates would cost $960,000 to replace.
“There is no current schedule for replacing the boardwalk or the dock due to lack of capital funding,” Gibson said.
Voters in 2012 rejected a city property tax levy increase to raise about $29 million over six years, $18.3 million for parks and $10.7 million for streets. Nearly 60 percent of voters were against the levy. If voters had approved the levy, about $3 million per year would have been spent on park repairs.
Kent last year spent nearly $1.8 million to replace the synthetic turf at Wilson Playfields. The council approved spending $500,000 from the general fund, $800,000 from the real estate excise tax and the remainder from delaying other park improvement projects identified in the capital improvement fund to pay for the new turf.
Parks Director Jeff Watling said at that time that, “the deterioration of our park facilities is happening at a faster rate than our current funds can address them.” He added the city would have to close some popular park features over the next year if the facilities get to the point where they are not safe for the public to use.
In previous reports to council by city staff, other facilities that need to be replaced include the Lake Meridian Park swim and fishing dock; Kent Memorial Park bleachers, restrooms and concession stand; and Van Doren Park restroom and playground.
Meanwhile, back at Lake Fenwick Park, city staff is considering whether to bring in more carp to help eradicate an invasive plant (the Brazilian elodea) from the lake. The city stocked the lake in 2009 with carp to eat the plants, but the fish are getting older and do not eat as much, Gibson said.
Matt Knox, city environmental ecologist, who oversaw the earlier stocking, is looking into to adding more carp to the lake to get rid of the invasive plants, Gibson said.
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