Lincoln Skatepark submits formal design proposal to County Commission

Plans to bring a skatepark to Lincoln are gaining momentum as Lewis and Clark County officials’ enthusiasm for the project grows.

Community Coordinator Karyn Good, who agreed to help the Lincoln Skatepark Committee with organization and outreach, as well as funds sourcing for the project, presented a proposal prepared by Evergreen Skate Parks to County Commissioners and other officials at Lincoln’s Government Day Meeting, Feb. 4.

“We reached out to (Pearl Jam drummer Jeff Ament) and he put us in contact with Evergreen Skateparks, and they would be our project managers. They would be paid through Jeff’s foundation with the money that he’s willing to give us for the skateboard park,” she told county officials, including Lewis & Clark County Commissioners Susan Good-Geise and Andy Hunthausen, County Chief Administrative Officer Roger Baltz, and Director of Public Works Eric Griffin.

The Lincoln Skatepark Committee formed last spring after Lincoln Schools English teacher Philip Reed contacted Ament on behalf of students who wanted a safe place to skateboard. A native of Big Sandy, Mont., Ament has partnered with Pearl Jam’s Vitalogy Foundation, Evergreen Skateparks and local organizations, parks departments and municipalities to bring world-class skateparks to small communities across Montana.

Ament committed to $100,000 in funding for the project and visited Lincoln last fall, meeting Reed and the students who make up the committee. Not long thereafter, the student-driven committee presented their proposal to the Community Council and Lincoln Parks Board, meeting with approval.

Good, who said the cost of the park will depend largely on how much money Lincoln is able to raise, told the BVD that the students are currently working to raise $25,000.

“We’re looking at a $20,000 grant from the Tony Hawk Foundation - they just want us to come up with some sort of (matching funds)…to show that there is some sort of community interest and people are willing to put their money where their mouth is. We could, depending on how much money we raise, put in a $200,000 skate park,” she said.

Good and Reed came to Government Day armed with a glossy 30-page proposal drafted by Evergreen Skateparks, which operates out of Portland. The packet included photos of parks built by Evergreen Skateparks, design and construction specifics, information on navigating liability issues and letters of reference from other small communities that have benefited from parks built by Evergreen. Reed said the park design outlined in the proposal would likely cost somewhere in the $150,000 range.

“These folks are also very interested and willing to come to Lincoln and meet with the community or meet with the County Parks Board,” said Good. “They are super excited about this project and very anxious to get started.”

“This is exactly what we were looking for, this is very helpful,” Geise said of the proposal.

Hunthausen, who sits on the County Parks Board, said enthusiasm for the project is mounting.

“I think you have a lot of good support in terms of wanting to see your project happen, and we’ll try to help as best we can,” he said. “Having Public Works involved and having our county engineer involved is going to be good…getting together with them is going to be important in understanding some of the things you might not be thinking about yet, in terms of this construction. We’ve had problems before, even in this park, where we didn’t do a very good job of contracting with someone and we got burned…that was on us. We learned that lesson and we’re not going to do that again, so we will help you not have to learn that lesson.”

“In my opinion this is really the right way to go about a project,” said Baltz. “The county, all of the time, deals with risk assessment and risk analysis…the Commissioners deal with it all of the time in their decision making process….We’ve talked to our insurance company about this project and the liability concerns would not be a reason to not do this project.”