ODNR NatureWorks: County, Plain City earn grants

MAC CORDELL
Press Staff Writer
Published June 11, 2003 11:47 AM CDT

The Ohio Department of Natural Resources recently announced the recipients of the 2003 NatureWorks grants and two Madison County projects were listed.

ODNR granted $20,562 to the Madison County Park District for the Prairie Path Preserve in London. The money is slated for development of a shelter, a picnic area, water fountain and bike spur and to install utilities.

The department also granted $13,860 to the village of Plain City to develop a picnic area at Pastime Park.

The NatureWorks grants are available through county governments. Amounts are based on each county's population.

"When the grants were started, each county gets a base amount, and then the rest was basically figured on a modified per capita basis," said Dameyon Shipley, grant manager for ODNR.

Plain City, which received its money from the funds available for Union County, was the only entity that applied for the money from Union County.

"It is a good project," Shipley said. "They were able to demonstrate their lack of picnic area in their questionnaire. It is not glamorous, but they needed it."

Union County has $34,997 in grant money still available. Plain City applied for $18,000.

"That's great," said Plain City Mayor Michael George. "This will be nice. As soon as you get one, you want to get another one in the works."

Shipley said money still is available.

"We have traditionally not gotten great response from year to year from Union County, so we still have some carryover," he said.

The Madison County Park Board received the full amount available for their Prairie Path Preserve project. London and Mt. Sterling also had applied for Madison County NatureWorks money.

Julia Cumming, program administrator for the Madison Soil and Water Conservation District, submitted the grant application for the park board.

"We see the shelter house as a kind of focal point," she said. "I think that portion of the rails to trails will be completed by the end of this year. I think it is nice that we got the money. This will really beautify the area back there and improve its functionality.

"I think one important benefit is that bike paths encourage healthy recreation and having this facility available to all will encourage people to be active. It will also be an educational place. I think it will also be just relaxing to people."

Cumming said she feels the local businesses also will benefit from the shelter being in London.

"There has been so much talk about how to keep the downtown alive with Wal-Mart coming," Cumming said. "I think local businesses will see increased traffic. I think people will come to the downtown to look around and maybe get something to eat. The people that will be on a bike path are not going to bike all this way to go to a Wal-Mart. They want to go to local shops."

In 1999, the park board received a grant of $33,500 to begin work on the trailhead park. Those plans initially included a shelter house, but bids for the project came back higher than expected and the shelter house was postponed.

Cumming explained that the project total is estimated at $59,411. She explained that the difference between the grant and the cost of the project will be made up by the county.

Cumming said the project will take about six months from the start of construction. She said she was unsure of when the project would begin.

Shipley said that, while there were other applicants and those applicants were first-time applicants, the scope of the work done by the park board gave the Prairie Path Preserve project priority.

"Basically, they demonstrated a need for the county and they scored more points because they cover such a large area," Shipley said of the county park board.

NatureWorks identifies projects funded by the Ohio Parks and Natural Resources Bond Issue, which was approved by Ohio voters in November, 1993.

Through this program, a total of $200 million in bonds may be issued to provide a long-term source of funds for the maintenance and improvement of Ohio's parks and natural resource facilities.

"We like to fund very basic projects, as long as they can show a need," Shipley said. "NatureWorks funds are the only state grants for park and nature development and there is only one federal fund for this, and it is funded sporadically.

"It is a niche. I think because the money is split up by county, it gives every community in the state an opportunity to receive these funds," he said.

Mac Cordell can be contacted at (740) 852-1616, 1-800-282-3838 or by e-mail at news2@madison-press.com