Starke County Park Board to Meet with Two Firms Interested in Creating Five-Year Plan

Posted on November 16, 2016
Author Michael Gallenberger, WKVI

The Starke County Park Board plans to meet with two planning firms interested in putting together a five-year plan for the county’s park facilities. The park board has been working with the Kankakee-Iroquois Regional Planning Commission Executive Director Edwin Buswell to find potential contractors. “I think we sent it out to seven or eight agencies,” he told the park board Tuesday. “We included Purdue and Ball State and neither one of them responded.”

The two responses the county did receive came from Arion Consultants out of Warsaw and the Troyer Group of Mishawaka. Buswell said the next step is for the county to meet with the two firms, with each one getting a chance to give a presentation, followed by a question-and-answer session. Park board members plan to conduct those interviews by the end of the month.

Having a five-year plan in place would make the county eligible for grant funding from the Indiana Department of Natural Resources. But in order to qualify for next year’s grants, a draft of the plan has to be created and submitted to the DNR by January 15.

During Tuesday’s meeting, resident Kathy Lucas suggested that a link between Bass Lake and the North Judson Erie Trail be considered as the planning process moves ahead. “We have talked to some people,” she said. “We have some ideas that we’re floating. We have some potential donors who might be able to assist. But the idea is that we would either extend the trail or, in the meantime, use existing roadways to reach over to 600, which would then be a straight shot up to the lake. We had a meeting last night of the Prairie Trails Club where this was discussed, and the club is very enthusiastic.”

Lucas believes the link could help boost revenues for county park facilities by attracting new visitors to the area and bringing current trail users to Bass Lake.