City Commissioners approved a five-year park lease during their Jan. 20 meeting.
The lease with the Boys and Girls Club of Cascade County is for Community Hall Park at 410 16th St. S.W. for $1 annually.
The lease includes an option to review at the city’s discretion and both parties have the option to terminate with 60 days written notice.
The Boys and Girls Club will be responsible for daily maintenance during the lease term.
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The city previously leased the park to Sunburst Unlimited, a local nonprofit, for use as a garden with the items grown donated to local groups including the Boys and Girls Club, Meals on Wheels, Head Start and low to moderate income families, according to the city.
The Sunburst lease began in 2012 and in 2019, the city approved a lease with River City Harvest for the north portion of the park for additional garden development.
In 2023 and 2024, neither group was able to fulfill the terms of their leases and Boys and Girls Club assumed both leases and operational responsibility of the entire park, according to the city.
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City code requires a recommendation from the Park Advisory Board for parkland leases and the board voted during their Dec. 8 meeting to recommend approval of the lease.
Jessica Compton, interim Park and Rec director, told the park board during their Dec. 8 meeting that the Boys and Girls Club wasn’t using the area as a revenue source but for programming for kids to learn to grow food.
Park and Rec staff said this will be the first time in more than a decade that Community Hall Park wasn’t under Sunburst so there may be other community interest in leasing the park and that staff would be interested in any interest given the condition the park was in recently.
