March 27, 2017
City’s Parks Master Plan draft seeking public input
Public meeting set for April 10 in Community Room
MURPHY (March 27, 2017) Murphy residents are invited to share their ideas, suggestions and thoughts on how the City should move forward as it relates to parks, trails, preserves and open spaces, as the Parks Department hosts an open forum on a reworking of the Parks Master Plan.
Set for Monday, April 10 in the Community Room, on the south end of City Hall, the discussion begins at 6:30 p.m. and will offer an opportunity for residents to speak directly to City staff, members of the Parks Board, as well as to the contracting architects who have an intimate familiarity with Murphy facilities.
“In addition to the City Parks Department personnel and members of the Parks Board, Dennis Sims, of Dunkin, Sims and Stoffels will be at the meeting to facilitate the conversation,” says Parks Superintendent Matt Foster. “The firm has worked with us, hand in glove, for several years on our parks, trails and open spaces. We feel very comfortable that they know our parks and recreational facilities very well, and we’re confident that they can help guide the discussion in such a way that will result in a workable plan.”
The discussion at the April 10 meeting will center on the revised Parks Master Plan, a draft of which is currently under development. The new plan will essentially be an updated redefinition of the current plan, which has become dated and virtually obsolete.
“We’re developing a new version of the Parks, Recreation and Open Space Master Plan that, once approved, will cover the City for the next ten years,” said Foster. “It will then be updated every five years, at a minimum. The existing Master Plan, dating from 2008, needs to be redone because most the items in that document have been completed with funding from the 2010 bond package.”
The April 10 forum has been scheduled to gather public input, an important aspect of the new plan as it will be in place for the next decade. Comments from the public will be taken at the meeting in both oral and written form and subsequently reviewed and analyzed for possible inclusion in the plan draft.
The contracting architects will then work with staff in developing a final draft that will be further discussed and amended. When completed, it will provide guidance in park and open space development into the future.
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