Board seeks to get skate park on improvement plan

Size, cost and location are still to be determined, but it appears a skate park will be coming to the city of Perryville soon. At least that’s the direction provided by the Perryville City Council earlier this month.
“We’ll work it into the capital improvement plan that they’ll approve sometime this fall,” Perryville city administrator Brent Buerck said.
Previously, the city had a skate area on Feltz Street, but the area had fallen into disrepair.
The location was an issue and unsavory activity was occurring, according to Buerck.
“It was a big deal when we took the old one out,” Buerck said. “Some folks felt like we dropped that on them and surprised them. Others were very happy so that cut both ways.”
“The idea now is a structure of a plan that makes it safe and sustainable for the community,” Buerck said.
Buerck noted that ultimately the preference would be to have it in a “prominent location that is easily supervised.”
“Over the course of several years, we’ve talked with the board about skate parks,” Buerck said. “There was some confusion perhaps as to what the commitment to the city was. We went, gave you guys all the minutes. Our commitment, on the table right now, is if they build it, we’ll give them a place. The board’s indicated maybe a willingness to do more than that, so we’re here for direction. We’re working on capital improvement plans now. If you want us to prioritize this, you tell us, and that’s what (Parks and Recreation Director) Jim (Cadwell) and my job will become, to figure out where to put it and plan it.”
Alderman Prince Hudson wants the city to be proactive.
“I’d like to see us get it on the plan, the sooner the better,” Hudson said. “To me, we didn’t really drop the ball as much as the folks wanted it at first. I’m still going to say that we need to follow up and go ahead and get this thing done. I liked all those comments that came in from those other cities. It just looks like a really good thing to do...the sooner the better.”

“I think that needs to be one of our projects this year for the next budget year,” alderman Curt Buerck said.
Alderman Doug Martin agreed.
“If we do something, we need to do it right,” alderman Tom Guth said.
“We will work on inserting that into the capital improvement plan, and second to that, we will start working on locations,” B. Buerck said. “We want to get it right, so we’ll schedule a public hearing and solicit some input.”
“We’ll bring back a couple recommendations for you guys to consider,” B. Buerck said.
“Is there room down there across from the Sheriff’s Office? Granted, it’s not flat,” C. Buerck said.
“That was the original suggestion we had laid out...” B. Buerck noted. “With the Sheriff’s Department now moving from that location it’s just less advantageous. We’ll look inI the area. It’ll be a prominent location that has the ability to be well supervised.”
HIGHER EDUCATION
A memorandum of understanding between the state’s Department of Higher Education and Workforce Development and the city of Perryville was adopted Aug. 3. The document lays out the details of funding granted by the Missouri General Assembly for a higher learning center.
“We’re still working with the Perryville Development Corporation to work those details out,” he said. “What this is is a line item, the $5 million is going to the Division of Work Force Development, they are passing it the city to manage. It’s a reimbursable grant. Basically, the city has to spent the money and then they get reimbursed.”
House Bill 19 provided the money. “That created funding for a technical workforce center,” Sattler said.