Editor:
I have written once before and rather recently concerning this issue and feel compelled to do so again after reading in Friday’s Journal that city council continues to consider sites in the city parks for a new city hall. For the life of me, I can not understand the reasoning of council members who would prefer to take away attractive, valuable, and rare open space within the city limits while ignoring a planned unit development designed and created specifically for just this kind of office project only a quarter mile away.
Sites being considered within the city parks are in an area that is primarily residential or recreational in nature. Adding a busy city hall to this neighborhood will not only take away open space for a new building and attendant parking but also increase traffic, congestion and noise in the area and detract from our enjoyment of city park open space. Such a decision also leaves open and vacant perfectly acceptable, and even more desirable, locations specifically created for just such an office building project.
City Council members, please stop taking open space away from us. Instead, please create additional, attractive office and business space in an area created specifically for that purpose. Use that space for what it was intended, and leave the parks alone. Leave the parks for what they were intended, open space and recreation. Please, no more buildings in city parks.
I will be organizing opposition to city council’s plans for a new city hall in any of the parks. If you agree, please join me on Facebook/No More Buildings in Cortez City Parks. You can also make your wishes known here and to city council members. Remember the park belongs to us, not to city hall.
Rick Meredith
Cortez
