The Eureka Springs Parks and Recreation Commission has OK’d spending money needed to get the trail atop Lake Leatherwood Dam back open.
At its regular meeting on Tuesday, May 16, the commission voted 5-0 to spend $15,000 for “temporary” repairs that include new safety railings along the edge of the dam “This is something we can actually afford,” parks director Sam Dudley said. “We’d probably do it in-house just to get it re-opened as soon as possible.
Commissioner Mark Ingram said he’s heard a lot of people looking forward to using the area again.
“I think everybody would agree it’s a high priority item overall,” Ingram said. “… This is one of the biggest things everybody wants to be able to go down and have that opened back up and have a loop.”
Dudley said the price to make the repairs is less than he anticipated.
“It’s like $10,400 for all the fence paneling and then a couple extra thousand bucks for all the strapping we would need,” Dudley said.
The city is still researching permanent fixes for the dam.
“Everybody agrees that we should follow up on all of our options to repair the dam permanently,” Ingram said.
In other approvals, the commission approved setting a $50 daily reservation fee for the newly dedicated Sal Wilson Memorial Pavilion at Lake Leatherwood Park.
“We just feel like it would be a good thing to have it where people could reserve it,” Dudley told commissioners. “If it’s not reserved, then it’s obviously open to the public. You can hang out there, there’s no restrictions. But if you want to pay you can actually reserve it for the day.”
The only other business item approval was to OK the department selling a 2002 Dodge Ram truck, a wood-chipper, Kubota mower, Christmas decorations, two golf carts and an e-bike.
In other discussion, the commission confirmed that Dudley has the authorization to reroute an in-town trail that leads to the Crescent Hotel.
“Instead of crossing Crescent Drive and going up the old dirt road, I’m going to reroute the Harmon Loop to go through the grounds of St. Elizabeth [Catholic Church] and then up to the bell tower,” Dudley said. “That’s a much prettier way up to the front of the Crescent.”
Commissioner chair Ruth Hager liked the idea.
“It will make the trail interesting,” Hager said. “And you’ll get to see the historic things at the church.”
Dudley also explained to the commission plans to safely use certain herbicides to help control issues of an abundance of poison hemlock in certain areas of Lake Leatherwood Park and curly pond weed in the lake.
The hemlock is causing major issues, Dudley said.
“We’ve tried a few things but it’s just hard to control and kind of puts our employees at risk trying to interact with it,” he said. “I do think it’s important to notify you guys whenever we do plan to use it.”
While commissioners agreed it’s a situation where herbicides are warranted, they said it can only do so much.
“We all have to recognize that there’s no way we’re ever going to get rid of it all,” commissioner Laurie Crammond said. “All we can do is clear up the area where people are all the time and we need to accept the fact that you’re not supposed to be messing with the plants anyway.”
