By Nick Diamantides
Staff Writer
Scherer Park is one of Long Beach’s oldest parks. City officials, prompted by its deteriorating condition, are mulling major renovations at the 36-acre park, including demolishing the existing community center and building a new, larger facility. Last Thursday, about 55 residents met with city officials and architects at the Fairfield YMCA in North Long Beach to discuss various options for improving the park.
“We are here to talk about building a new community center,” said 8th District City Councilwoman Rae Gabelich. “” We don’t have a center anywhere in the 8th District for community meetings and events for families, youth and seniors.”
Several months ago, the city hired Lynn Capouya, Inc., a Costa Mesa-based architectural firm, to come up with preliminary concepts of the community center and park improvements.
Gerry Ohta, the company’s senior landscape architect, told the audience that one option was to build a one-story community center, which would take 8,200 square feet of ground space. Another option was to build a two-story center, which would take 5,100 square-feet of ground space–roughly the same footprint as the existing community center.
He added that a possible plan for the renovated park could include a dog park with two sections, one for large dogs and one for small dogs.
The park could also include two new play areas, one for children up to four years old and one for children ages five and up. An outdoor sports court able to accommodate several different games could also be part of the improved park, according to Ohta.
Leslie Gentile, an architect with Long Beach-based Fernald Design Group (also under contract with the city), elaborated on Ohta’s descriptions. She explained that one concept calls for the community center to have a game room, two social halls, a fitness room, a teaching kitchen, a senior citizens room and an outdoor deck.
The configuration of the rooms and the parking lot would vary, depending on whether the facility had one or two stories. She noted that the size of the parking lot had not yet been determined.
Gentile added that everything in the building would be in compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act and the equipment in the playgrounds would also be accessible to children with disabilities.
According to Lynn Capouya, president of the company with the same name, every effort would be made to preserve as many existing trees in the park as possible, and any trees that had to be removed would be replaced by newly planted trees.
After the brief presentation, audience members had an opportunity to ask questions and make comments. Several residents expressed concern over parking and increased traffic problems that could result from more people coming to the park because of the new amenities. Others talked about drainage problems in the location of the proposed dog park.
One woman asked if improved lighting was being considered. “Scherer Park always seems very, very dark to me,” she said. “It needs more lighting for security reasons.”
Capouya replied that parking, drainage and lighting would all be improved in any city-approved plan for renovating the park. She stressed that that all concerns expressed at the meeting were being recorded and would be taken under consideration when a park master plan was being developed.
“We don’t really know what we are doing yet,” she said. “We’re trying to figure that out, and the purpose of this meeting is to find out what the residents would like to see at Scherer Park.”
She noted that the new community center could range anywhere from 6,000 to 10,000 square feet depending on the wishes of the community.
One man noted that property crimes were on the rise south of the park and he felt that city money would be better spent on beefing up the police department.
“It’s about balance,” Gabelich responded. “We have to give opportunities for our kids to recreate.” She noted that youth engaged in wholesome recreational activities are less likely to commit crimes.
“Seniors have recreational needs too,” she said, adding that money that is set aside for parks cannot be transferred into police department budgets.
Phil Hester, director of the city’s department of parks, recreation and marine elaborated. He explained that money to acquire, improve and maintain city parks comes from federal and state grants and park impact fees charged to developers. By law, those funds can only be spent for parks.
Hester added that Scherer Park was one of the city’s oldest parks and was in need of an upgrade, but the city had no intentions of making changes opposed by the community.
“We’re not interested in creating more problems,” he said. “We want to mitigate the issues you brought up.” He stressed that the meeting was one of the first steps being taken by the city to develop a plan for the park. “Don’t think that this is the plan,” he said. “We’re just starting the process and coming up with ideas, and we need your comments.”
Anna Mendiola, park development officer, said all the residents’ questions and comments would be considered as the architects worked on a conceptual plan for the park and community center. That plan, she noted, would be brought back to the residents at another public meeting some time in the next several months.
