New board aims to guide Warner Robins recreation plan

A new volunteer board has a big task that could affect the city for many years.

The Recreation Advisory Board held its third meeting Tuesday after taking a tour of the city’s recreation facilities. The board’s job is to come up with a plan for how to use $5.4 million in special purpose sales tax dollars earmarked for recreation improvements.

The city is also looking at building a sports complex estimated to cost as much as $22 million, and that will be a part of the board’s recommendations as well.

Randy Meade, chairman of the advisory board, said he expects a plan will be ready to present to City Council within a couple of months.

“Everything’s a moving target right now,” he said. “That was the purpose of today’s tour, to get out and look around at where we can improve the parks that we have.”

The tour was mostly a rolling one, with board members riding on a bus as James Dodson, the recreation department director, explained the features of each park they visited. He also discussed many of the needs and how each park could be improved.

The only park where the group got out and had a look around was Fountain Park. It has a swimming pool, ball fields, a playground and is one end of Wellston Trail. Dodson said it’s the busiest park by far in the city.

One ambitious idea the group discussed is the possibility of adding an Olympic-size swimming pool. Dodson said that could be done as a joint project with Middle Georgia State University, the Houston County Board of Education and possibly even the Houston Medical Center.

Many of the ideas the board discussed would be less expensive, including making better use of space at some parks or adding certain features, such as a splash pad or a court for the racquet sport pickleball.

Meade said the top priority is a new recreation department headquarters. The current one, he said, is old, outgrown and houses the city’s only indoor basketball court. He hopes the city can move it to a new location to include one or more gymnasiums. That could be the sports complex or it could be somewhere else, he said.

Fred Wilson, a member of the advisory board and a member of the Houston County Board of Education, agreed that the recreation department needs a new central building.

“This was built in 1964, so it was built for the number of children and citizens at that time,” Wilson said as the group toured the current headquarters. “This is now 50-some years later, and we are still using the same facility for three times as many people.”

Other members of the advisory board are Kal Daniels, Andy Diaz, Mary Ealer, Willie Hill, Marty Hoover, Steve Miner, Kimberly Nelson, Terri Robinson and Andy Thomas. The next meeting is scheduled for 11 a.m. Tuesday in the McIntyre Room at the recreation department.

This story was originally published August 30, 2016 at 3:28 PM with the headline "New board aims to guide Warner Robins recreation plan."