You can do a quick search right now…Picklball/Florida/Lawsuits. Certainly, Citizens of Plant City want Pickleball. It is a sport that has been played in all 50 states since 1990! No, the residents surrounding this already existing park do NOT want it right across the street from their bedrooms! We have been telling the city this for months. I have spoken with countless City employees at this point and have stood up at the podium for the Commissioners meetings. It is inappropriate to put this fanatic sport within a community. Let alone be the first in the city put on a street with no sidewalk (not my department), streets not wide enough for two cars to pass (not my department), next to the main waterway of this side of the City, West Side Canal aka Mill Creek (that flooded and thankfully is in the budget to be cleaned!) A small plastic, very bouncy ball on one side and a big bouncing ball on the other side of a creek! Seriously. This is a nature park and if maintained, the Azaleas could flourish again! The sound barrier wall for the Pickle ball isn’t even in the budget.
Underutilized!! The public restrooms have been locked up for YEARS. The existing Basketball courts are maintained with a weed wacker ON the courts. They are actually a safety hazard. There are no more after school programs since the Planteen has been closed across the street. They had needed a new roof for YEARS!
One of my requests from the City Commissioners was to go visit the park. Don’t just go drive by, but actually hang out. Absolutely every person I have spoken to about this in this city knows what park I’m talking about. Not by name, not by the proximity of it being the literal Central Park of the City, but by its use. The best way I have heard it is that “it is the park that the less fortunate hang out.” Well, when anyone that is hungry can go to the Winter Visitor Building, owned by the City, and have a free meal every day, The City allows for a free shower truck to park on that same land. Although the truck can’t pull in without damaging the top of their truck, because the city hasn’t maintained the trees. At this Historic Community Center Complex, The Planteen has a full playground behind bars on that land. They also still have shuffle boards! Just the paved earth, no benches or canopy. Why not put this sports park at The Planteen complex? Because the plans for that space is in the works for an Event Center. Almost $15 million was just past for the Library Community Center. If our health was top priority, why were COVID relief funds used to build a Professional Tennis Facility? “So, that facility is for professionals, and the courts across the street from your home are for everyone else” said by a city employee!…