By Matt Fredmonsky
Record-Courier staff writer
The cost to design and build a whitewater park along the Cuyahoga River in downtown Kent could be reimbursed through a grant from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.
This year, the ODNR awarded $3.6 million in grants for improving public boating access facilities across the state through its Cooperative Boating Access Facility Program.
Though traditionally the grants support boat ramps, docks and even dredging bodies of water, the money can also be applied to the canoe and kayak river modifications proposed in Kent.
Julie McQuade, capital improvements administrator for the ODNR division of water craft, said there have been no whitewater projects in the state, so the grant has never had a chance to support such an endeavor.
"It's a very unique project," McQuade said. "That's why I'm interested in attending the meetings."
McQuade will be in town Tuesday to attend a 7 p.m. project meeting at Kent Fire Station No. 1. A representative from Recreation Engineering and Planning, the Colorado-based consulting firm, will meet with members of Main Street Kent and the Kent Parks and Recreation department to discuss a whitewater adaptation in Kent.
Main Street Kent and the parks department have agreed to pay $2,600 and $1,100, respectively, to the Colorado firm for the first phase of the project planning process. In August, the firm submitted its proposal, which outlines six planning phases and carries a price tag of $20,090.
The firm is the nation's leading whitewater park consulting firm and is responsible for 70 in-stream design and consulting projects. The firm helped design the Clear Creek Whitewater Park in Golden, Colo., which cost $170,000 to build and generates approximately $1.8 million in revenue annually for the town.
In Kent, initial proposals have been to create whitewater modifications along the banks of the Cuyahoga River stretching from the point near Brady's Leap south to John Brown Tannery Park. Whether those modifications are applicable to the ODNR grant will not be known until August.
Mary Gilbert, executive director of Main Street Kent, said ideally the REP study would be completed by March 2008 with the grant application then turned in by April and the results announced in August.
"We could actually break ground in 2009," Gilbert said. "Because they've never really funded anything like this before, we'll really have to convince them this fits, which I think we can."
The ODNR grant program receives approximately $7.2 million bi-annually for disbursement.