Cookeville’s Next Steps After West End Park Meeting

Cookeville city officials have neighborhood feedback on West End Park, and will begin planning and pricing the ideas.

Leisure Services Director Rick Woods said he was pleased with the input and interest he heard Tuesday night. One of the ideas multiple people expressed is rebuilding the community center. Woods said the neighborhood is not the only one to express interest in a new center.

“Habitat for Humanity has their neighborhood development there close by and they also have expressed some interest in having a community center,” Woods said. “It’s something that we will talk with them about and look at together.”

Woods said the community center burned down in the late 1980’s or early 1990’s. Woods said the costs of staffing and utilities does not rule out the possibility of a community center.

“There are issues that create an ongoing expense with an indoor facility, that doesn’t rule that out,” Woods said. “That just says that that’s something we have to plan for and keep in mind as we do that planning.”

There were other ideas Tuesday night that Woods said would not take as much extensive planning. Things like signs for curfews, water fountains and addressing some of the needs for the multipurpose field.

“Benches and seating in the multipurpose field area, those are things that we can look at,” Woods said. “Just cleaning up the property lines and those kinds of things, certainly those are things we can make happen much more quickly.”

The consensus Tuesday night was that the majority of ideas were presented with neighborhood kids in mind. Woods said the repeated feedback about things for young children will play into the city’s plan moving forward.

“Replacing the play system that is there or upgrading the play system that is there and making some modifications and some changes,” Woods said. “That would incorporate opportunities for three, four, five, six, seven year olds. That’s something that we think we can make happen more quickly than a community center.”

Woods said the plan is to meet again with the West End Park community with the revised possibilities. Woods said another key next step is locating partners on the potential community center.