The County Council approved the plan, which was forged between County Executive John R. Leopold and the Crofton Regional Community Center, which gives the community group a $1 annual lease for 4 acres near the Crofton library to build a $7 million community center and a skateboard park.

The council, though, in approving the lease, has required organizers to submit estimated costs before receiving final permission for construction. The council also requires organizers to raise about $8 million – or $2.5 million in each of the next three years – and if the group fails to meet the $2.5 million goal for two consecutive years, the county may revoke the lease.

Council Chairwoman Cathy Vitale said the community center is a worthy cause, but it’s the council’s responsibility to ensure the project proceeds responsibly.

“We want them to succeed,” Vitale said.

The council’s concerns stemmed from a government report earlier this year that cited a lack of planning and a lease that could leave the county responsible for construction and operating costs.

“They don’t want us building anything, until we have sufficient funding,” said Art Huseonica, vice president of the community center’s executive committee. “It would be silly to even try to do that. We wouldn’t do that anyways. They’re very supportive and I appreciate the leadership that Cathy Vitale demonstrated. They want to ensure our success. We were very receptive to any of their suggestions because we want to be successful, too.”

Community leaders have pushed for a community center in Crofton for decades. The plan came together this past summer after Christopher Jones, a 14-year-old Crofton boy, was killed in a confrontation with other teenagers alleged to have been involved in neighborhood gangs.

A 16-year-old has been charged as an adult with manslaughter and a 14-year-old has been charged with manslaughter in connection with the attack.

Christopher’s death reinvigorated the plans for a community center for the area’s youths.

Janet Greenip, the recently retired state senator from Crofton who has long pushed for a community center, serves as chairwoman of the center’s executive committee.

The group held its first fundraiser last week – a donors’ reception at Essex Bank in Crofton. Huseonica said the event was well-attended, though he said he was not sure how much money in donations the event generated.

While Huseonica said “it’s too early to tell” whether the poor economy would hurt fundraising, he said he hoped to receive in-kind services from construction companies.

The group has a five-year timeline for a groundbreaking on the project. Huseonica said the group wants to raise at least $10 million by 2014, to “allow us to start construction and pay some operating fees.”

The group estimates that the construction will cost between $7 million and $8 million, and the center and skate park will cost about $500,000 annually to operate.

Steve Grimaud, president of the Crofton Civic Association and a member of the committee, has said he hopes some of the center’s operating costs could be funded through private donations and the rest through fees.

The Hopewell Skate Park, located next to the Community Center on City Point Road., is about 6,600 -square feet. The park has been a great success among skaters, many of whom are younger people. In fact, the park has been a victim of its own success.

That’s because the park is often packed on the weekends, the skaters say. “When we have competitions here, it gets too cramped and people even have to watch from outside the fences,” said Sam White, 14. “Sometimes there are so many skaters, that we need to wait in line until it’s our turn.”

Skateboarders make use of the Hopewell Skatepark near the community center recently.

Due to the cramped conditions, skate board supporters petitioned Hopewell City Council last month to ask for an expansion of the park. More than 50 supporters appeared before City Council to push the project and presented a petition with more than 100 signatures of skateboarders from Hopewell, Chester, Colonial Heights, Petersburg and Prince George County. “Everybody comes to the Hopewell Skate Park, because they like it,” said Montana McAllister, a 17-year-old skater from Chesterfield that presented the petition. “I’ve come here since I was 8 years old.”

Jim Gould, chairman of the newly founded Hopewell Skate Park Committee, made a strong case for the plan – and found overwhelming support from council members.

Gould said that the roughly 6,600-square-foot park would have to be expanded to 16,000 square feet to meet the skaters’ increasing needs. “To give you an idea, the adjacent tennis courts have a space of 13,500 square feet for a maximum of eight players, but we have hundreds of skaters packing the Skate Park every weekend,” Gould said.

Gould made a case that the expansion of the park is not just good for kids, but good public policy. Most skaters are in the age group between 5 and 24 years – a demographic group that makes up to 16 percent of the Tri-Cities population. “If one in four of this group skates weekly, that’s 4,190 people in need of a skate park,” Gould said.

Also, many skateboarders make the case that a park helps keep kids out of trouble. “It keeps us young people occupied,” said Hunter Case, 13. But because of the growing demand, skaters need more space. “We need more space where we can skate,” Hunter said. “If we skate on the streets, the cops always come and take our skateboards away.”

The proposal for expanding Hopewell Skate Park was met warmly by Hopewell City Council members. “I support the Skate Park expansion and I am asking the city manager to make this matter happen,” Councilor Curtis Harris said.

“We need to move forward with this,” said Councilor Christina Luman-Bailey. Council member Kenneth Emerson said that he supported the expansion plans. “My two grandsons are both skateboarders, and they come to the Hopewell Skate Park,” he said. “I think that this is a great activity for the youth.”

Gould estimates the expansion, which could use undeveloped land next to the park, would cost about $300,000 and thinks the money can come from an appropriation of city funds for local parks.

But the skateboarding group knows that in times when the city can’t pay for a complete high school renovation, its plan will likely face some resistance. “I know it’s going to be difficult,” Gould said. “We realize that this will be the first step of many.”

Even Councilor Harris, who supports the project, recognizes the difficult issue over finding money in a tight city budget. “It’s really difficult these days,” Harris said. “I have to have a closer look at the budget to see what’s possible.”

Gould asked council for more meetings with his committee and the department of Parks and Recreation to further explore the project. We strongly support such meetings.

Ultimately, skateboarders believe an expansion of the park is in the best interest of Hopewell.

We agree.

If an expanded skateboard park keeps even a few teens out of trouble with the law, the expense of the expansion will be well worth it. The expansion is an investment in our youth as much as an expanded high school, and at a fraction of the cost.

[ Progress Index op ed ]

Students from Lynchburg College, Randolph College, Central Virginia Community College and Sweet Briar College teamed up with Raleigh, N.C.-based Stop Hunger Now and Lynchburg-based Sacred River Productions at a benefit event at Amazement Square’s Rotary Centennial Riverfront Skatepark.

Over a few hours out of the eight-hour event, volunteers bagged 20,000 basic meals of soy protein, dehydrated vegetables, rice and a chicken tablet, to be distributed by Stop Hunger Now.

For a $20 or $25 admission, residents could hear music from local bands and watch local skaters showcase their skills.

Lenny Craig, of Sacred River Productions, said his group was responsible for booking the music for the event.

He said he felt the musical aspect was “the most effective efficient method of marketing, especially to a younger generation.”

Craig said he felt the role he was trying to play and promote was nothing other than “to go out and be do-gooders.”

“This is the funnest thing I think I’ve ever done in Lynchburg,” he said.

Ray Buchanan, who founded Stop Hunger Now in 1998, said Saturday’s event was similar, though on a much smaller scale, to events he had organized in North Carolina.

Buchanan, who lives in Raleigh, said the group has organized all-day drives that incorporate students from Duke University, the University of North Carolina, East Carolina University, North Carolina Central University and Saint Augustine’s College, among other institutions statewide.

Those events may result in as many as 1 million meals packaged in a day, Buchanan said.

“It’s not about packaging meals,” he said, though he didn’t detract from the importance of that aspect.

“It’s about starting a movement,” he said.

For Buchanan, world hunger is a travesty along the lines of slavery in America or conditions before civil rights, both of which were accepted as normal before their respective revolutions.

“The only way we’re going to end hunger is to get everybody so outraged that there’s hunger in the world that they take action,” Buchanan said.

Carolyn Walsh, one of nearly 50 volunteers, by her estimate, from Lynchburg College, said she had helped at a similar event in Lynchburg last year.

“I think it’s a really great cause,” she said, adding, “I love how you can send (the meals) anywhere, and it can be used immediately or saved for emergencies.”

Walsh estimated that after the first round of packaging, she had helped put together about 1,500 meals.

Rosana Fernandez, a sophomore at CVCC, said she got involved through her position as the Student Government Association president.

Though she said she appreciates the emphasis on feeding children internationally, her passion lies closer to home.

“We should do something more involved within the United States because we also have a lot of poverty,” she said, emphasizing the poverty present even in Lynchburg and its surrounding counties.

“I think we’re kind of ignoring that,” she said.

Buchanan said in the four years since his group has organized events like Saturday’s, they have employed about 50,000 volunteers and packaged about 18 million meals.

“That’s a small drop in the bucket, but it shows that you can make a difference,” he said, adding, “All I want to do is change the world.”

A group of about 40 youths have formed the MSP, which stands for Marlboro Skate Park, with the help of the Marlboro Recreation Department. The young people are learning what it will take to develop and bring a skate park to the township.

Recreation specialist Liz Cellini said MSP includes young people in sixth grade through high school. The participants will be part of the planning process for the possible skate park, learning the ins and outs of what it will take to bring such a facility to Marlboro, Cellini explained.

“We want it to be their skate park,” she said.

The members of MSP may visit other skate parks to get an idea of the design layouts and elements that other skate parks offer.

The Tony Hawk Foundation Skatepark Grant awards funds ranging from $1,000 to $25,000 toward the development of a skate park, Cellini said. Marlboro officials expect to learn whether they will receive any grant funding for the project in December.

Tony Hawk is America’s best known professional skateboarder.

In addition to the possible grant from the foundation, the township may receive a matching donation from American Ramp Company (ARC), Cellini said.

ARC is looking into the possibility of designing the skate park for Marlboro and Cellini said the company is willing to match any funds that may be received from the Tony Hawk Foundation.

Members of the MSP will be making their own efforts to try and raise money for the skate park. Cellini said one possible fundraiser would have club members provide skateboard lessons to younger skaters.

MSP welcomes additional members. Any youth who wants to be a part of the effort to bring a skate park to Marlboro may contact Liz Cellini at 732-617-0100.

[ Colts Neck News Transcript ]