The Orange City Council is considering installing a round splash pad with fountains to play in at either Navy Park or Sunset Park. The council met Tuesday morning and the park improvements were part of the agenda. Planning Director Jimmie Lewis presented two plans for putting in a splash pad plus a small skate park at one of the parks. Public Works Director Jim Wolf said the splash pad would be 43 feet in diameter. The spray fountains could be turned on and off and would not run all the time. The skate park area would be built of stainless steel and include half of a half pipe used for tricks. District 2 Councilmember Tommy Ferguson suggested that perhaps the city could leave out the skate park and have two splash pads. At-Large Councilmember Larry Spears said the council should have a public workshop so citizens can give their opinions on what to do. District 1 Councilmember Theresa Beauchamp said she liked the idea of having the improvements at Sunset Park because the park would help beautify 16th Street and show off what the city has to offer. However, At-Large Councilmember Bill Mello is concerned about a splash pad at the 16th Street park because of the possibilities of children running into traffic. The total park improvements for the splash pad and skate park will cost about $170,000 for each park. The city has $105,000 in federal community development block grant funds to spend. The rest of the money could come from remaining money in a grant money fund or from the money earned from selling a small part of Memorial Park to an Interstate 10 car dealership. The park development would be in three phases with a final cost of about $400,000.
In other business, the council approved a new property tax rate of 68.13 cents per $100 valuation. That’s a slight decrease from the current rate of 69 cents per $100. The city’s property tax rate has gone down from 74.5 cents per $100 three years ago. The main reason is because of new industrial district contracts that have the Chemical Row industrial plants paying a larger percentage for in-lieu-of-taxes contracts. The contracts mean the city negotiates to with the industries outside of the city limits, but in the city’s extraterritorial jurisdiction. The city two years ago began annexation proceedings to annex some of the plants, which then negotiated new contracts.
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