A standing-room-only crowd packed the Dolores Town Hall Monday night to voice concerns about the recent closure of the popular playground in Joe Rowell Park. The town board voted September 11th to close the site because of health and safety concerns. The playground was built in 2011 through a massive volunteer community effort, along with $100,000 from the Great Outdoors Colorado program. At Monday’s meeting, citizens said the board had not adequately notified the public about problems at the playground and questioned the sudden closure after it had been used for 16 years.
But Mayor Santiago Lopez held up a foot-long spear-like piece of wood that had splintered from the playground structure and asked, “What if this went up your child’s butt?” He said the treated-wood structure has numerous problems, has reached its life expectancy and needs to be repaired or replaced.
Numerous citizens spoke about the uniqueness of the playground and its importance to the town. After a lengthy discussion, the board agreed to seek an engineering assessment as quickly as possible and consider all options for restoring or replacing the play site.
Town Trustee Tracy Murphy tells KSJD, “We’ve done it before. We can do it again and we will do it again.”
