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Liberty Square Project update
President John's Message

At our meeting last week, I noted that where one door closes, often another opens.  We recently had to decide to forgo our Honor Air trip this year due to delays in the permitting from the National Park Service and subsequent flight schedule difficulties.  

However, another door opened.  It was with great pleasure that Jeff Leatherman, Director of Roswell Recreation, Parks, Historic and Cultural Affairs, and Councilman Will Morthland came to our meeting and announced that the City of Roswell received a $2.2 million grant from the State of Georgia for a complete rebuild of the Liberty Square Park and associated Trail System connections and extensions.  This park was previously selected by our Charity Committee and Board of Directors to be our Community Impact Project for 2022-23.  

Coupled with this announcement, the City has also received a $2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation for Trail System improvements between this park and the Big Creek Park on the east side of GA 400.  Roswell Rotary was instrumental in helping the City secure both these grants.  

For more of the story on these grants, 

In the winter of 2022 during my planning for this current Rotary year, Jeff and I met to discuss the possibility of Roswell Rotary receiving a competitive $10,000 District Grant from District 6900 which could be used to fund a Rotary volunteer built improvement to a park facility in Roswell.  We arrived at the idea of helping master plan a long term strategy for improvements to the Liberty Square Park along with a volunteer driven small project.  This undeveloped parkland is in the Liberty Square neighborhood off Warsaw Road which is within a federally identified disadvantaged section of our City, the only such designated area in Roswell.
 
When we did not receive the District Grant, our Charity Committee recommended using designated funds from the Golf and Tennis Tournaments as a Community Impact Project for this effort, allowing us to plan for more improvements to the park along with the City provided grading and landscape improvements.  As the summer progressed last year, it became apparent that the City Council was reluctant to allow this partial approach to proceed as they felt that this park deserved to be on par with other parks in the City if any improvements were made.
 
Thus, when a grant opportunity from the State was offered last fall for improvements in disadvantaged neighborhoods, the Council jumped at applying for this grant along with Roswell Rotary’s support.  Simultaneously our Club also supported the application for the USDOT grant which also was designated for disadvantaged neighborhoods.
 
In March, when State grant approval was delayed, our Board decided to release the Community Impact Funds we had set aside and distribute them to the many charities we support with our tournament proceeds.
 
Which brings us to last week’s announcement.  Roswell Rotary has committed to being part of the planning process for this park.  We foresee members helping facilitate the master planning of the park along with representatives in the neighborhood.  Ideas include playground space, picnic areas, a community garden, and service as a trailhead for the expanded trail system.  Groups such as the StarHouse Foundation, which has a large presence at Mimosa Elementary, the Fulton County Board of Education, and the Roswell Police are also interested in the outcome for this park facility.  

At this stage it will be about 6 months before the grants are processed and planning can begin.  If you would like to be part of this effort, please let me know.
 
Posted by John Carruth
June 6, 2023

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