The High Ridge Civic Center has been bigger for a while.
Now, it’s time for it to be better.
In early 2019, the County Council purchased a 1.05-acre piece of property adjacent to the existing Civic Center, expanding the property to about 4 acres total.
On July 27, the Jefferson County Council voted 6-0 to approve a budget transfer of $104,840 from the Parks Department’s reserve account into its working account to begin work on improvements to the center.
Among the improvements will be updates to the multipurpose court, which will be divided in half by a fence, with one part lined for pickleball games and the other marked off for basketball and hockey, with basketball goals on each end, among other items, Parks Director Tim Pigg said.
“An asphalt surface to the court already has been completed,” Pigg said.
An old concession stand, he said, will be converted into two restrooms.
“They will be ADA (Americans With Disabilities Act) and COVID compliant,” Pigg said.
In addition, a pavilion will be built on the north side of the court, using some of the new property, Pigg said.
Concrete walkways will be poured to connect the various points near the court and leading to the Civic Center.
“That’s so people don’t need to walk in the grass,” Pigg said.
The money also will pay for grading of the new parcel.
“There’s an old foundation (of a house) and asphalt that we need to get rid of,” Pigg said.
He said once the land is cleared and graded, the department will begin seeking grants to install a playground there.
“I’d also like to see a few more pavilions around the playground, places where people can have a picnic, or enjoy a birthday party,” Pigg said.
He said County Executive Dennis Gannon suggested the scope of the work.
“He said to me, ‘Why don’t we just go ahead and get it done in one fell swoop, rather than stretching this out?’ So that’s what we did.”
Pigg said if there’s money left over after the scheduled work is complete, he would like to upgrade the lighting on the court to LEDs.
“We’ll keep the poles, but just replace the lights,” he said. “That would improve the visibility at night.”
Pigg said work could begin within a month.
“I hope to have the work, at least the court, done by mid-October,” he said.
Beck Park to get attention
In other Parks Department news, the Jefferson County Council voted 6-0 July 27 to hire VonArx Engineering of Hillsboro to design repairs to a road in Beck Park in the Jefferson County portion of Eureka.
The council also voted that night to give preliminary approval to a budget amendment that will pay for the $39,485 engineering contract. Final approval was expected on Monday, after Leader deadline.
VonArx Engineering of Hillsboro was awarded the professional services contract after it was graded the best of eight competing firms for the work.
“This is really something that has needed to be done for some time,” Pigg said.
In August 2019, he said, flooding on the Meramec River washed out part of the gravel road that runs alongside the river and the east side of the park, from Bussen Road in St. Louis County leading to homes south of the park.
“It’s a shared-use, shared-cost road,” Pigg said of South Lewis Road. There was a slide of the side of the road along the river. It took out trees and everything. The road is still there, but the hillside has degraded to the point where people are afraid to use it. No one wants that.”
VonArx will design a part of South Lewis Road to the west, away from the riverbank.
“That way, we won’t have these issues again,” Pigg said. “We need to take care of this so that people are assured they have safe access to their homes. It’s the right thing to do.”
He said the matter of how much the homeowners may be asked to contribute toward the rerouted road is a subject for another day.
“Let’s decide what’s involved here, and then, once we know how much it’s going to cost, we’ll sit down and we’ll figure out who’s going to pay how much. But we want it done right, so it won’t be another problem in the future.”
Beck Park is a 127-acre site that has been land-banked by the Parks Department for future development and is not open for public use.
Council member Tracey Perry (District 5, Festus) was absent from the July 27 meeting.