Letter: Wood explains ‘no’ vote on Grafton Super Park

Last Night, the CPC voted to put forth all warrant articles and requests to Spring Town Meeting (subject to select board vote)

Among these was the previously mentioned Super Park plan.

I was the sole NO vote on putting that forward, and I seemed to be one of the few asking any tough or specific questions that did not presume this was necessary.

I wanted to expand on that NO vote here today.

First I am actually *in favor* of the Super Park, or more specifically a replacement for the type of park and benefit to the town that we lost when the old one near the high school was removed.

With the current Coronavirus pandemic and many townspeople being laid off, as well as the dire situation we find our School system in right now, to the point where we are asking our fellow citizens to shell out more money from their pockets for an override, this is not the right time to ask for a major-spend on a want, rather than a need.

This project has ballooned in scope compared to what we as a town were promised years ago, we have additionally many other parks in town which could benefit from refurbishments or improvements in accessibility, even though this plan would indeed be a great consolidation of many needs it doesn’t eliminate the fact that we have many other parks which our residents currently use (and want to use) that we could focus some efforts on improving.

I additionally have concern over the sheer cost of this project and the desire to bond it close to our limit. Business and residents throughout the state are struggling, I do not feel as confident as some that the CPC would get anything near what we got this year, from a state match. I do worry about the ability for us to do other projects where there may be a much larger need than an extra Park.

Lastly I have a concern over the idea that CPC members wanted to put this in 2 warrant articles, with the first needing a simple majority, even though that first article alone gets us, at most an unlighted path and a lawn (plus utilities connections). Where these members commented that by doing it this way it allows the town to feel like they have to vote yes on the bonding part (which requires a 2/3rds majority).

A 2.6+ Million dollar price tag to fulfill the vision is quite high, for a park whose structures are, admittedly, better than many of our current parks, but at the same time do not contain the same levels of nostalgia about what used to exist.

The potential maintenance costs were downplayed, and liability concerns were not even mentioned (zip line, dog park, etc)

I have attached my notes from the discussion as to what each individual part of the project costs, I apologize if I miswrote any part of those notes (I hoped for the meeting to be posted by now)

Justin Wood
Planning Board, representative to Community Preservation Committee