By Barbara Taormina—For the North Star Reporter
A project long in the making will soon begin with the relocation of the gazebo at Veterans Memorial Park.
It will be rebuilt in the center of the park, a location which will better accommodate viewing for community events and activities. The move is part of the overall plan to revitalize Veterans Memorial Park.
Town Manager Michael Borg offered a brief overview of the plan at the Oct. 14 Town Council meeting.
The Veterans Memorial Park makeover began several years ago, when more and more community-wide events began going up on the calendar, and town officials recognized the need for a more functional community space.
Borg explained the rock embankment along Bank and South Washington streets will be replaced with a stone retaining wall that will provide seating for performances.
He said the plan also calls for a food truck area that will assist vendors during large events such as the farmers market and Pride Festival, and there will be improvements to pathways through the park and to landscaping.
The project, expected to cost $264,000, is being funded through the Muriel R. Jones Trust and Philip R. Jones Trust which combined, provides $292,825 for improvements to public buildings, commons and parks. The project budget has a $4,000 line item for new fir trees.
The plan originally called for a new permanent restroom that would eliminate the need for portable toilets to be brought in for events. However, Borg said the restroom carries a cost of $125,000 and will have to wait until more funding is available.
The plan, which has been in development for several years, received unanimous support from the Veterans Advisory Board during a May presentation by Assistant Town Manager Antonio Morabito.
“This started about three years ago,” Morabito told board members at the May meeting. “We started seeing an uptick in use, especially with the farmers market, Pride Festival and the block party. The first thing we noticed is we weren’t really set up for it.”
Morabito said the town began evaluating how the park could better accommodate larger crowds and more frequent events while improving accessibility and functionality.
“We asked ourselves, ‘How can we make the park work a little better for what we’re trying to do with it?’” he said.
The park redesign also calls for moving the WWI monument across the street to Barrows Memorial Park, where there are other veterans memorials for the Korean War, Vietnam War and Operation Desert Storm.
Morabito said the hope is to install a statue, “The Spirit of the American Doughboy,” a pressed copper sculpture by E. M. Viquesney to honor the veterans and casualties of World War I, to complement the existing WWI monument. The “Spirit of The American Doughboy” statue was mass-produced during the 1920s and 1930s for communities throughout the United States, although not many are still standing.
The new statue is estimated to cost around $70,000 and is not included in the budget. However, there has already been talk about fundraising.