City parks department seeks community input for six-year plan
The City of Sammamish is seeking community feedback to help the city plan for investments in parks and facilities over the next six years.
Community input is a key part of city’s process for creating the next Parks, Recreation, and Open Space (PROS) plan, which will guide city spending on parks, facilities, and programs from 2024 to 2030. The PROS plan is a part of the city’s comprehensive plan that is managed by the Parks, Recreation, and Facilities Department. Washington state mandates that cities update their PROS plan every six years to qualify for state grants. The next plan will be submitted to the city council for approval by December.
“[Previous projects, such as land acquisition,] have been funded through these grants, and we use [the plan] to guide ourselves on how we develop new parks and purchase land,” said Janie Walzer, the city’s project manager for the PROS plan.
The 2024 plan will focus on improving parks, trails, and facilities based on community feedback. Specific planned improvements could include adding more pickleball courts to parks, construction of more accessible playgrounds and acquiring land to connect various trails in Sammamish. The plan could also include needed improvements to athletic facilities that were identified as priorities in the 2018 plan, but never completed.
The city’s parks department has enlisted Conservation Technix, a consultancy, as well as sub-consultants Consor Engineers and MxM Landscape Architecture, to do most of the planning work. This includes assessing the current parks system, hosting public information sessions, and helping to draft the six-year plan.
“Their role encompasses all of [the research and writing],” said Walzer. “Their specialty is that they create these documents for cities all over the Pacific Northwest.”
Staff from the parks department will have a booth at the Sammamish Farmers Market on Aug. 2, as well as a public open house on Sept. 6 at the Sammamish City Hall, to gather community feedback.
For more information on the planning process for city parks, please go here.
