The City of Gilroy needs a radical shift in how it approaches
the installation of city parks.
Carriage Hill Park, one of several long-promised neighborhood
parks, is just one example of the preposterous amount of time it
takes to get a neighborhood park built in this city.
The City of Gilroy needs a radical shift in how it approaches the installation of city parks.
Carriage Hill Park, one of several long-promised neighborhood parks, is just one example of the preposterous amount of time it takes to get a neighborhood park built in this city.
“When we first moved here, it was supposed to be completed upon the last phase of this project, which was nine months after we moved in,” Northwest Quad resident Ralph Titus told The Dispatch.
Titus moved into his Valley Oaks Drive home when his son was 6 years old. His son is now 13.
It’s ridiculous that a family can move into a new subdivision with a young child, but have a teenager uninterested in playground equipment by the time the park construction finally begins.
It’s unconscionable that our city leaders think they can collect park fees from developers, but wait nearly a decade before delivering the park to the homeowners who paid for it.
The city’s complacency on the subject is exemplified by this comment: “Hey, these things don’t happen overnight,” City Facilities Development Manager Bill Headley told a Dispatch reporter recently, “We certainly wish they did.”
We urge Mayor Al Pinheiro and City Council members to start at the top with a 180-degree shift in attitude. Whatever it takes, the city’s policy ought to be that neighborhood parks go in at the same time the first house in the neighborhood goes up.
There’s no reason Gilroyans should wait years for their neighborhood parks to be built.
Headly was eloquent when talking about how important neighborhood parks are to residents.
“Having an environment where we get people out of their vehicles and on their feet, and kids recreating and involved in sports and using the environment in helpful ways is keeping with the city’s vision,” Headley said. “The legacy that we leave our children is as much what we do with what we have now as it is what we leave for them.”
Those words ring hollow, when the vision is delayed for a decade. Let’s focus on deeds, not words.
