The Rossmoor Community Services District this week welcomed the long-awaited completion of a shade canopy in Rossmoor Park, as the district’s General Manager and four of its five Directors gathered to dedicate the canopy and open it to the public.
It’s a bit ironic that the residential community of Rossmoor, whose own “Urban Forest” of more than 5,000 shade trees is the pride of its neighborhoods, needs a bit of shade, but the new structure will provide residents enjoying Rossmoor Park on a sunny day a place to gather in the shade.
“This canopy belongs to people of our community, and I can’t wait to see how Rossmoor enjoys it,” said Rossmoor CSD Board President Jo Shade.
“This has been long-awaited and arrived not soon enough,” said Shade during a brief ceremony at the facility this week. “It is a great addition to the park,” she said.
Already, the district has two shaded canopy areas in Rush Park, another of the district’s parks, but this is the first one in Rossmoor Park.
General Manager Sharon Landers said the district used the last of the Prop. 68 funds to complete the project, which includes a 22-foot by 32-foot concrete slab, covered with a sturdy shade mesh and fitted with metal picnic tables neatly across the underlying concrete.
Other Rossmoor Directors, including 2nd Vice President Tony DeMarco, and Directors Michael Maynard and Mary Ann Remnet, were present for the ribbon-cutting ceremony sponsored by the Rossmoor Homeowners Association.
In addition to the Directors, RHA President Art Remnet also welcomed the structure to the community park, commending Shade and the other directors for finally making it happen.
Zechariah Jauregui, a representative from State Sen. Tony Strickland’s office, brought congratulations from the Senator on the completion of the shade canopy project.
The open fields of Rossmoor Park demanded a shaded canopy, and after years of planning and funding, officials were delighted to cut the ribbon on the new facility. Landers said the project cost about $60,000 and was in the district’s capital improvement project.
Also, this past week, the Board voted unanimously to protect its parks by adopting an ordinance that will give the Special Services District and the police that protect it a bit more control over electric bikes.
The district has been working on an ordinance to protect its parks after suffering significant damage from e-bikes in various incidents over the past year.
Like other communities around the country, Rossmoor consulted with the public and with law enforcement authorities before determining that, although they had limited authority, they could at least protect the parks from additional damage.
Landers told the board that while it will take 30 days for the new ordinance to become effective, “we will use that time to create some new signage,” she said.
In addition, Landers said the staff will be working on a general enforcement plan for the parks “since there are now several issues that we have to think about.”
“We’ve started thinking about what we might want to do, and I’m going to be interested in meeting with the parks and operations committee to start talking about ideas to bring back to the board,” said Landers.
“Hopefully that will be during the budget cycle, so we have a lot of meetings that are going to be happening soon,” she said.