Three years ago, Sault Ste. Marie councillors agreed to upgrade three city parks a year with new equipment and features.
By the end of the 2023 construction season, the following parks were to be revitalized: Anna Marinelli, Rosedale, Parkland, Downey, Wilcox, Westwood, Manitou, David Kyle, Mike Zuke and Ruth Street.
Have they done all that?
Not even close.
Only Anna Marinelli and Rosedale are complete and they should be making preparations to start work next year on Esposito, Laurentian and Sutton parks.
Every year, the city's public works staff ask for money for new equipment, accessible features and installation expenses to keep up with council's multi-year parks revitalization.
And every year, they get turned down.
"This request has been submitted in 2021, 2022 and 2023 and has not been approved," said Brent Lamming, the city's director of community services, and Susan Hamilton Beach, director of public works, in a report prepared for this week's city council meeting
It's so bad that welders on the city payroll are forced to MacGyver fixes for playground replacement parts that are no longer available.
The following are excerpts from the Beach-Lamming report:
Staff would like to make council aware that some amenities will need to be removed from existing parks that do not meet required safety standards should the parks funding request not be supported for 2024.
Playground equipment in certain parks has exceeded its useful life and needs to be replaced. In addition, accessibility features will be taken into consideration when selecting new components for the parks.
Playground equipment is required to be inspected on a monthly basis by a Registered Playground Practitioner. Currently, public works parks division has four staff members with this certification.
The inspection process is becoming increasingly difficult as safety and repair items must be documented, work orders entered and remedies sought for the numerous issues.
There are blocks of similarly aged playground arrangements and apparatus. In general, these packages are estimated to have a service life of 20 years.
In most cases, the original manufacturing company of the playground pieces exist, however, replacement pieces are not available due to age and/or the improved styles of apparatus throughout the years.
To solve some issues (i.e. aged platforms) public works welders are designing our own replacement pieces, however, this takes additional time and effort away from other priority projects.
Each playground location may have several of each of the above components. Public works has included a $50,000 repair parts allowance in the 2024 budget deliberations to address those deficiencies and concerns realized during inspections.
Should replacement or repair not be feasible (or for the length of time of delivery, etc.) the broken apparatus will be required to be closed off for public use. This has occurred a number of times throughout recent years (i.e., Boston Park slide, Munroe, Greenfield, Centennial).
Age alone, however, is not the determining factor for replacement or critical wear. The generation of equipment manufactured in 2000-2005 is built with a plastic coating over metal frame components (i.e., stairs, etc.). Inspections have determined that many of the coated components have a rotten metal core and are thus a higher priority for replacement.
Increasing amounts of time and money are being utilized to keep the playgrounds in compliance with CSA requirements and/or capital upgrades can be considered.
New playgrounds mitigate the need for repairs (new playgrounds require minimal to no repairs for the first 10 years) and will also address accessibility requirements and allow for the installation of other critical components such as those for sensory sensitive (autistic) children.
To date park revitalization has occurred at a slower rate. Anna Marinelli Park and Rosedale Park have been revitalized in partnership with community partners stepping forward with significant contributions. Staff will continue to work with community partners but require funding to address items in the 78 parks that are maintained on an annual basis.
Park revitalization was approved as a priority and staff are recommending the revitalization of Parkland Park and Downy Park in 2024.
A request of $300,000 is recommended by staff and has been submitted as part of the 2024 budget process. This amount will allow staff to address safety concerns, items beyond useful life as well as revitalize park space.
City staff have reset expectations on park revitalization, setting their sights on "one or more" parks per year instead of the three parks agreed on by city council three years ago.
Their funding request will be referred to city council's 2024 budget deliberations.