By BOB SHRALUKA
WZBD.com
A successful capital campaign and the release of ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act) funds have Decatur’s Kekionga Project now moving full steam ahead.
Community Coordinator Jamie Gephart told city council Tuesday night that $53,359 was raised by the recent two-month capital campaign.
Having collected the funds with the time period prescribed by the Indiana Housing & Community Development Authority, it is providing a $50,000 match – which Gephart said she has been told was heading the city’s way.
“Everything is coming into place,” Gephart said. “Hopefully, the dog park will be getting open this year.”
Stocking of the pond by the dog park is scheduled for October.
City Operations Manager Jeremy Gilbert was given the go-ahead by the city’s board of works and safety to accept a $98,750 quote from Custom Net Backstops Inc. to install all netting and a new backstop with netting at the dilapidated Kekionga Park ball diamond used by a men’s league and a co-ed softball league.
Custom Net put up all the netting at the REV Sports Complex.
The nets will essentially surround the field and will have a unique feature: they can be raised 10 feet in the event of flooding. That was a requirement of the Department of Natural Resource (DNR) since the area is in a flood plain.
A Custom Nets spokesman told Gilbert the work could begin yet in August. Gilbert said the work would take “basically a month.”
Bleeke Electric, which handled the non-field lighting at the REV, will light the Kekionga diamond for $56,000 and install a new electrical panel – required by Indiana & Michigan – for $7,690.
LED lights will be installed.
The board of works gave the okay to those expenses, some of which will be coming from Kekionga Project funds and some from the ARPA money.
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