GR may turn fmr Stocking site into park: woodtv.com

Published: Wednesday, December 08, 2010, 12:05 PM     Updated: Wednesday, December 08, 2010, 2:50 PM

GRAND RAPIDS – At first blush, the $106,000 gift from the Richard and Helen DeVos Foundation for Joe Taylor Park in the gritty North Baxter Neighborhood might seem surprising.

But the Amway Corp. co-founder's entrepreneurial roots can be traced to the corner of Baxter Street and Diamond Avenue SE, where the city is expanding the inner city park.

That is where Adrian DeVos, Richard DeVos' Dutch immigrant grandfather, opened a grocery store. Behind the storefront in a house with three rooms and a bath, Adrian DeVos raised a family of seven children.

DeVos family members occupied the house until the mid-1950s, when it became a storefront church. The building was torn down 12 years ago after it was abandoned and damaged by arsonists.

“We are thrilled that the DeVos family is making this investment in the community,” said Steve Faber, executive director of Friends of Grand Rapids Parks.

The new park is located in a neighborhood that was among the most deficient in green space areas, Faber said.

City commissioners on Tuesday approved a $500,000 contract that will transform Joe Taylor Park into a 2.2-acre recreation area. It will feature a water park, restrooms, a picnic shelter and playground equipment.

Besides the DeVos contribution, city officials said the project receive funds left over from the wall reconstruction at the Fulton Street Cemetery.

Faber said Friends of Grand Rapids Parks is now raising funds for an endowment that will provide future maintenance and improvements at the 2.2 acre park.

The DeVos connection will be noted when the new park is dedicated next year, Faber said.

Published: Monday, December 06, 2010, 4:15 PM     Updated: Monday, December 06, 2010, 4:32 PM Jim Harger | The Grand Rapids Press

GRAND RAPIDS – An old and blighted city neighborhood is about to get a shiny new park.

City commissioners were poised to approve a $500,000 construction contract Tuesday that will transform Joe Taylor Park into a 2.2-acre recreation area that will feature a water park, restrooms, a picnic shelter and playground equipment.

The project fulfills a dream for residents whose neighborhood that had the least green space in the city, said Marian Barrera-Young, a crime prevention organizer for the Baxter Neighborhood Association.

“I think overall, it's going to be good for the kids. They were playing in the streets,” Barrera-Young said. The expanded park will be surrounded by houses that face the park, creating a safe area for neighborhood children, she said.

Joe Taylor Park began humbly in 1976, when several houses were demolished and combined with vacant lots to create an open space, city Parks and Recreation Director Jay Steffen said Monday.

It was named Baxter Green until 1992, when it was renamed for Joe Taylor, a city police officer who was shot and killed in 1986 as he and fellow officers searched for a murder suspect hiding in the neighborhood.

In 2003, the park received an upgrade when Universal Forest Products Inc. and Kaboom!, a national nonprofit group, installed playground equipment.

The seeds for the latest expansion were sown in 2004, when the city purchased and demolished four blighted homes along Baxter Street SE, clearing an entire block for an underground storm water retention facility that was part of the city's sewer rebuilding project.

After it was completed this summer, the storm water project left behind a large open lot on which the current park will be expanded. The project also closed off Baxter Street, creating an L-shaped park that preserves the playground.

The new park also will feature a porous parking lot that can be used for overflow by neighboring Baxter Community Center, Steffen said. Water used by the spray park will be used to irrigate the park's plantings, he said.

“We are really looking for this to be a model of sustainable design,” Steffen said. Construction should be complete by summer, he said.

Aimed at children and families, the new park will not have the type of hard-surfaced courts and game areas that can be found several blocks away at Martin Luther King Park, said Steve Faber, executive director of Friends of Grand Rapids Parks.

Faber's group worked with neighborhood groups and churches during the design process for the new park.*

The new park is bound to give the entire North Baxter neighborhood a boost, Faber said. “We know through national studies that a well-developed park raises property values.”

Edit* Friends will also be helping fund the park thanks to a special gift from the Richard & Helen DeVos Foundation

Published: Tuesday, December 07, 2010, 4:23 PM     Updated: Tuesday, December 07, 2010, 4:23 PM Jim Harger | The Grand Rapids Press

GRAND RAPIDS – The city and state are in the process of purchasing more than one mile of riverfront railroad property that eventually will lead to a bicycle and pedestrian trail that links the downtown area and Riverside Park.

Despite 1st Ward Commissioner Walt Gutowski's doubts about spending that much for “swamp land,” the City Commission's Fiscal Committee today approved a $168,800 outlay to match more than $2 million in state and federal funds for the purchase.

“This is an opportunity of a lifetime – being able to connect the downtown to the White Pine Trail system,” argued Parks and Recreation Director Jay Steffen. “This is the missing piece of our trail system.”

The property is the final piece of a corridor that will eventually connect 245 miles of trails that include the Fred Meijer White Pine Trail State Park, the Musketawa State Trail, the Fred Meijer Berry Junction Trail, the Hart-Montague Bicycle Trail State Park and Pere Marquette State Trail.

Finding the funds to build a trail that connects Canal Street Park and Riverside Park will be the next challenge, Steffen said.

The 12-acre site includes a 3-acre woods that will provide additional public access to the river and floodplain protection, Steffen said.

Gutowski questioned whether the city and state should pay millions for what he described as “swampland.”

The owners of the defunct railroad property originally wanted more than $6 million for the property before reaching a $2.2 million price with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, Steffen said. The state agency will own the property while the city will maintain and operate the trails.

“I don;t think we can pass on this, but we are talking about swamp land that is very valuable,” Gutowski said.

“I think this is an opportunity we're not going to get again,” said 2nd Ward Commissioner Ruth Kelly.

In addition to the city's $168,000, the purchase is being funded by an $850,000 grant from the state;s Natural Resources Trust Fund and $1.2 million from a federal fund through the state Department of Transportation. The North Monroe Tax Increment Finance Authority also is pitching in $31,185.

Tyler Stevenson has just been hired to the position of Forester for the City of Grand Rapids.  Mr. Stevenson comes to the City from Southern California.  Originally from the Pennsylvania area, he earned a Bachelor Degree from Virginia Tech in Forest Resource Management and a Masters Degree from Penn State in Urban Forest Management.  He has gained experience in many aspects of urban forestry, including tree inventories, arboricultural assessments, large scale management plans, bid specs, disease inspections, project management, CAD, and GPS mapping.

Please join Friends of Grand Rapids Parks in welcoming Tyler and his family to Grand Rapids. 

Congratulations to Executive Director Steve Faber, Board Member Emily Stoddard-Furrow, and City Liaison Commissioner Rosalynn Bliss for your achievements.  See all 40 recipients and read more about the Grand Rapids Business Journal's "40 under Forty".

Grand Rapids, MI (October 29, 2010)- Last May the City of Grand Rapids was presented the Siemens Sustainable Community Award for mid-size communities by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Business Civic Leadership Center (BCLC) and Siemens Corporation. The winning communities were praised for improvements to the quality of life for residents by achieving vital economic, environmental, and social goals.

It was also announced during the awards ceremony that all three winning communities would each receive a number of trees for planting throughout their community. On October 29th and 30th, volunteers will help plant 50 trees in Fuller/Hillcrest Park and at the Grand Rapids Bike Park, made possible through support from Siemens.

Grand Rapids' urban forest offers significant economic, environmental and quality of life benefits to our community. A canopy of 85,000 to 100,000 public trees beautifies our parks, streets, and neighborhoods. Trees also enhance property values, reduce storm water runoff, remove pollutants and carbon dioxide from the air, and save energy costs.

A recent sample street tree inventory conducted by the City of Grand Rapids' revealed that each $1 invested in trees returns $3.60 in annual benefit. With a present canopy cover of 34.6% (2009), Grand Rapids is well within reach of the 40% canopy target recommended by American Forests. This volunteer tree planting builds awareness about issues impacting our urban forest and moves our community toward our goal and a more sustainable city.

The trees were made possible through a grant from the Siemens Corporation to the City of Grand Rapids. The tree planting is part of National NeighborWoods Month and the organizing partnership of Alliance for Community Trees (ACT), Friends of Grand Rapids Parks (a local ACT affiliate), Global ReLeaf of Michigan (an ACT state affiliate) and the City of Grand Rapids. In addition to neighborhood volunteers, employees of Siemens, Home Depot's Team Depot of Walker and Grandville Stores, Bartlett Tree Expert Co. of Grand Rapids, Lawrence Arbor Care of Ann Arbor and BDO Seidman will help with the planting. National NeighborWoods Month is sponsored by The Home Depot Foundation.

Related Resources:

Siemens Sustainable Community Awards
Friends of Grand Rapids Parks
Global ReLeaf of Michigan

Park It! October, 2010 - view it in a browser

October 2010

DONATE! NeighborWoods: Nuts and Berries Bike Tour - 10/9 NeighborWoods: Garfield Tree ID Project- 10/16 Neighborwoods: Riverside Tree Tour- 10/23 NeighborWoods: Movie and Music- 10/20 NeighborWoods: Tree Planting 10/29 & 10/30 NeighborWoods: Trees, Treats & Tombstones 10/30       Be a Facebook fan   Follow us on Twitter   Watch us on Vimeo   Check us out on Flickr         ASM Gold Leaf Award Winner New City Facts 2010: Trust for Public Land Friends staff land Young NPO Professional Award nominations     word from the director   We are off the pace to create a vibrant park system in the City of Grand Rapids. Each September the Trust for Public Land's Center for City Parks Excellence releases City Facts, the nation's most complete database for park facts for the largest 85 U.S. cities.   While Grand Rapids is too small to show up on their report, we've crunched the numbers to see how Grand Rapids stacks up. There is a total estimate of 1,806 acres of “parkland” in the City of Grand Rapids' city limits: 1,209 acres of city-owned parkland, 378 acres of land owned by GRPS, and 140 acres at John Ball Park/Zoo operated by Kent County.  For this year, the annual budget for the City of Grand Rapids' Parks and Recreation operations was $6,607,332 with 23 full time equivalent staff.   In the table below we've listed the Grand Rapids' number, which city in the nation is performing the best & worst, some Midwest comparisons, and then those cities that are closest to our numbers. Grand Rapids Top Performer Low Performer Midwest Comparisons The pack we run with Acres of Parkland as Percentage of City area* (low density city) 6.2% Anchorage: 39.9% Honolulu: 1.6% Milwaukee: 9.7% Minneapolis 16.7% Indianapolis: 4.8% Tulsa: 6.3 % Fort Worth: 5.9% Louisville: 6.5% Acres of Parkland per 1,000 Residents* 9.3 acres Anchorage: 1,796.7 Honolulu: 6.9 Milwaukee: 15.8 Minneapolis: 15.3 Indianapolis: 13.9 Durham: 10.5 Birmingham: 10.5 Corpus Christi: 7.3 Total spending on parks per resident of the city (not including capital expenditures)** $34 Washington DC: $259 Detroit: $26 Milwaukee: $45 Minneapolis:$177 Indianapolis: $38 El Paso: $31 Memphis: $34 Jacksonville: $35 Regular non-seasonal employees per 10,000 people** 1.2 Seattle: 17.1 Toledo: 0.1 Milwaukee: 2.5 Minneapolis: 15.2 Indianapolis: 3.8 Mass. Dept. of Conservation & Rec. 1.2 Newark: 1.1 Fairmont Park Commission: 1.0   This quick snapshot shows that our local public funding is not keeping pace with other cities and regions. For all the indicators in the City Facts 2010 report, we hover near the bottom of the table when it comes to public investment.   Not only that, we are moving in the wrong direction (we were closer to a $37 public investment per resident in 2009). And we are ready to lose even more ground with 5 GRPS schools and land up for sale, more projected budget shortfalls at the City, and talk of even more funding cuts to parks. Please urge City leadership, and your commissioner, to reject more cuts to the Parks budget. Now is the time to rebuild our parks through public and private investment. Great parks make great neighborhoods, Steve Faber   *includes GRPS and Kent County land within city limits ** does not include GRPS and Kent County funding and any capital improvement funds mark your calendar   Featured Event:   October is NeighborWoods Month. Visit our event calendar to see all the events we are planning. We are also still looking for volunteers for October 16th's Garfield Tree ID Project and the Tree Planting at the end of October on the 29th and 30th. Please forward this newsletter to your friends to let them know about these great opportunities to learn about trees and get involved improving our tree canopy.

Help us spread the word Forward to a friend. Need to subscribe? You can sign up now. Not interested anymore? Unsubscribe instantly.

Jim Harger | The Grand Rapids Press

GRAND RAPIDS -- Thanks to a $10,000 grant, trees will be celebrated and planted next month as part of "NeighborWoods" activities hosted by the city and the Friends of Grand Rapids Parks.

The $10,000 grant from Siemens Corp. will be used to plant 50 large-scale trees in Hillcrest Park and the surrounding MidTown neighborhood, according to city Parks and Recreation Director Jay Steffen.

"These are going to make an instant impact," Steffen said of the trees, whose trunks will have diameters between 2 and 2 1/2 inches.

While they could have purchased more smaller-sized, bareroot trees, the larger "ball and burlap" trees will have a better chance of surviving, said Steve Faber, director of Friends of Grand Rapids Parks.

Faber said the Hillcrest Park area is being hit hard by the emerald ash borer, a pest that has destroyed much of the tree canopy in Southeast Michigan and is taking hold in West Michigan.

"It's running through here pretty rampantly," Faber said. "We're attempting to bring back a little bit of that tree canopy."

The grant was awarded to the city as part of its recent designation as the nation's most sustainable mid-sized city by Siemens and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Business Civic Leadership Center.

The tree plantings at Hillcrest Park will occur on Oct. 29 from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Additional tree plantings will occur at GR Bike Park and the Coit Avenue bridge over I-196 on Oct. 30.

Other NeighborWoods events next month include:

Oct. 9: Oakdale Neighbors and Art of the Table will host a "Nuts and Berries Bike Tour" of the city. The tour will begin at 3 p.m.

Oct. 16: Volunteers will conduct a tree inventory at Garfield Park at Madison Avenue and Burton Street SE. The event will be held from 9 a.m. until noon.

Oct. 23: There will be a guided tour of Riverside Park, which has more than 40 different species of trees. Tours will begin at 11 a.m. at the Lagoon Shelter near the center of the park.

Oct. 30: Oakhill Neighbors will host a two-hour "Trees, Treats and Tombstones" tour of Oakhill Cemetery, 647 Hall St. SE. The event will begin at 3 p.m.