By Zach Friend, County Supervisor 2nd District
Over the last few years our office has been working on securing the financing needed to meet the long-promised permanent restrooms at the Polo Grounds Park. The restrooms were part of the original master plan for the park from a few decades ago. Working in partnership with the Cabrillo Host Lions and County Parks we began working on a funding process that would include County funds as well as privately raised funds to build the restrooms. Additionally, after discussions with some of the sports leagues and community members that use the park, we heard that a concession stand would also be a helpful addition.
On April 27, we will break ground to make both a reality.
The 62-acre Polo Grounds Park often hosts hundreds of kids and parents over any given weekend playing on the baseball and soccer fields. Until this point, the only restroom options were portable restrooms that left much to be desired. I’ve heard from many parents that use the Polo Grounds that they knew the exact distance to local businesses in Aptos with restrooms — anything to avoid having their kids use the portables.
Last year, the Cabrillo Host Lions joined our office and County Parks to kick off a fundraising campaign to construct the restrooms and concession stand. In this year’s budget, we were able to identify funding through state reimbursement funds, capital improvement funds and park funds to put together the majority of the amount needed. Once the funding was complete, the Parks Department worked to find a company to handle the installation. In February, the Board of Supervisors approved the contract with the Public Restroom Company for the installation of a public restroom and concession building and separate storage building (for Parks Department equipment) at the Polo Grounds.
At a recent Board meeting, the Board approved a solicitation of bids to also replace the deteriorated electrical service currently at that section of the park with a new service. This will provide an upgraded power source into the restrooms and concession stand and that overall section of the park.
All of this work on the new permanent restrooms and concession stand are expected to be completed this summer – ready for the sports leagues and some of the busiest usage of the park. While the details of the new concession stand are still being finalized, the goal will be to allow for a fundraising opportunity for some of the leagues and others that use the park.
In the past year the Santa Cruz County Parks Department has done a number of upgrades to parks throughout the County including the opening of the Seacliff Village Park. In this coming year’s budget I’ve been working with Parks staff and the community on prioritizing upgrades at other parks in the district.
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As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts on parks issues or other district issues. Please feel free to call me at 454-2200.