BY Emerson Drake
3/20/11
Listening to the plans for the five soccer fields (one being lighted and having artifical turf) sounded fantastic until they started talking about charging admission to the fields for both players and fans.
Then they started discussing charging for parking and of course for the consessions. There are a series of pools planned as is a MPD multi-story building featuring underground parking.
A fenced off PUBLIC PARK you ask?
For all practical purposes isn't that what happened to the McClatchey Park(except for two hours a day)?But the Mary E. Grogan Park WILL have barricades to prevent the general public from using it for free.
This is a quote from the agenda item:STRATEGIC PLAN ELEMENT:Strategic Commitment
#2 - Provide a safe and inviting community in which to live, work and visit.Strategic Commitment
#6 – Promote ModestoOf course it's for the public if you have the price of admission.It will be for
the haves, and not for the have nots. The Ridenour/Muratore led City Council (what happened to the two mayoral candidates let alone the two council candidates) now sitting making decisions for all of us?
What was also interesting was the fact during the meeting where this was discussed, the Council had their iPads and the fourteen staff members have fancy spiral bound multi-color information booklets complete with pull out color maps, however the public was given nothing.
Here's a link for all of the information that will be discussed Tuesday night at the City Council meeting.http://www.modestogov.com/sirepub/mtgviewer.aspx?meetid=334&doctype=AGENDA
