LAWTON — Lawton City Council members requested additional time Tuesday to review the city’s master plan for parks before finalizing it.
“We need to wait, for sure, until the redistricting is finished,” said Ward 8 Councilman Randy Warren. “My ward changes on a daily basis, it seems like, so I don’t even know what parks I’ll end up with.”
Warren was referring to the Lawton Redistricting Commission’s work on redrawing voting ward boundaries to account for population shifts. The council is currently studying four proposals for new ward maps.
Other council members said they wanted to study the plan further before moving forward.
“I’d sure like more time to look at it for my ward,” said Ward 1 Councilwoman Mary Ann Hankins.
The Texas-based engineering firm Halff Associates spent a little over a year working on the plan, which provides a framework for improving Lawton’s parks, recreation programs, trails and open space. Residents had several opportunities to comment on the plan while it was being developed.
Those comments indicated that many people aren’t familiar with the Parks and Recreation Department’s programs, said Nate Clair, director of planning and landscape architecture for Halff.
“You guys have social media, and you have a website,” he said. “But they’re not getting that communication as far as your programs and events and activities.”
Clair said the city’s top priorities should include:
• Making parks more accessible to people with disabilities.
• Developing a master plan for the proposed indoor sports complex, as well as an operating plan.
• Drawing up park maintenance standards and an operations plan.
“Your maintenance staff is stretched very thin, doing the best that they can with the resources that they have, but there’s no playbook for them,” he said. “An operation plan and a maintenance standard to tell them exactly what they need to do in each park, in order to keep a consistent level of maintenance and curb appeal for those parks, is greatly needed.”
Reactions
Some council members focused on recommendations to close some of Lawton’s 74 parks, which would make it easier for the city to maintain the remaining parks.
Councilman Sean Fortenbaugh said he had not been consulted about the plan, apart from an email that explained the rating system for determining which parks should be repurposed. He added that he and Councilman Alan Hampton – who did not attend the meeting but submitted written comments – wanted to be more involved in making those decisions.
“We know our wards, we know our parks and we know kind of what our people want,” Fortenbaugh said. “We want to make sure that they get proper representation in this.”
Councilman Jay Burk said he agreed that the city has too many parks to maintain unless officials were willing to set aside $1 million a year for upkeep.
“And I’m not sure we’re willing to do that,” he said. “I’m not sure we’re able to do that every single year, because every year won’t be a great year for us financially.”
Councilman Warren said the council needs to get serious about closing parks because the city can’t afford to maintain all of them. He added that the council should sit down and figure out how much it costs to maintain each park properly.
“We need to become adult about this and say, ‘Here’s what it’s going to cost,’” Warren said. “And if you can’t find the money to cover that acre, we need to find something to do with it, whether it’s trade it to Lawton Public Schools if it’s near an elementary or a middle school.
“There’s two or three different things we can do with those acreages, but we’ve got to be serious about it.”