Organizers of a pollinator park planned for the east side of Columbus, where flooding destroyed 48 homes a decade ago, will ramp up fundraising efforts early next year.
Plans for the 2.49-acre park in the Pleasant Grove area, near the Cummins Technical Center between McKinley Avenue and Fifth Street, were approved by the city in September. However, state and federal agencies must also approve the pollinator park plan before work can begin.
Plans for the park call for development of a walking path and providing native plants to attract birds, bees and butterflies, in addition to a memorial marking the 2008 Columbus flood. The city purchased the flood-damaged homes — where the city’s worst damage occurred — through a federally funded buyout program to clear the site for parkland.
“We want this to be the premier park for the east side of Columbus,” said Eric Riddle, a project champion and author of “Watershed: Service in the Wake of Disaster,” which focused on the local flood.
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Fundraising efforts will build on $16,000 that has already come in from individuals and businesses, he said.
Funding will be pursued through a Creating Places grant provided by the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority, which would provide up to a $50,000 match in donations. A separate grant from the Indiana Department of Natural Resources will also be pursued, Riddle said.
A fund for the proposed pollinator park has been established locally by the Columbus Park Foundation, Riddle said. Officials will also work to raise awareness through public events, he said.
Approvals needed
The next step in moving the project forward will be submitting plans to the Indiana Department of Homeland Security, said Jeff Bergman, city-county planning director.
The planning department will make that initial submission when Columbus Parks and Recreation Department volunteers working on the project indicate it is ready, Bergman said. The group continues to refine and add detail to the plans, he said.
Once the plan clears Homeland Security, it will be submitted to the Federal Emergency Management Agency for review — which could take about six months, Bergman said.
“We have to have FEMA approval before we can put a shovel in the ground,” said Riddle, who added that the project’s estimated cost has not yet been set since materials that will be selected also require approval from the federal agency, he said.
Since the federal agency supported plans to plant 10 Serviceberry trees on the site during a 10-year flood anniversary event in June, Riddle said he is confident that the pollinator park will also be approved, perhaps in the spring.
That’s when fundraising efforts will ramp up, Riddle said.
Landscape architect Rachel Kavathe, who created the pollinator park design, said work will continue on details such as what type of plant species will be included.
A design presented to the Columbus Plan Commission in September has been modified to include parallel parking for the pollinator park, she said.
Long-range plan
The proposed site is part of a long-range plan by the city’s parks and recreation department that could involve a connection to the People Trail system to reach Foundation for Youth, parks director Mark Jones said.
A pollinator park fits in with the city’s plans to add nature-based programming, Jones said.
The parks and recreation department would oversee maintenance of the proposed pollinator park in conjunction with other city departments and volunteers, Jones said. A shelter and green space at the site would also present some educational opportunities as well, he said.
“We’re hoping that will be a destination for field trips,” Jones said.
He’s not the only one who thinks that.
“People are going to be surprised at how many people will make that a destination,” said Andy Ertel, who helped develop 800 pollinator parks over the past four years in nearby Jennings County.
Leading the way
Ertel, who is executive director of the Jennings County Soil and Water Conservation District, said his agency received reports from the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 2014 with concerns about declining pollinators such as the European and American honeybees. That resulted in formation of a committee that included four biologists, he said.
“Locally, we didn’t see as many butterflies and we started talking about what could be done,” Ertel said. “It seemed like a pretty simple solution.”
About 7,000 plants were sold to residents over a three-year period, while an additional 1,000 pollinator seeds were given out for people to plant, Ertel said.
“The community very successfully responded,” Ertel said.
Every public elementary school in Jennings County now has pollinator monarch weigh stations, allowing students to see caterpillars and other wildlife during the year, Ertel said. Eight different locations on area industrial sites also have pollinator parks, he said.
All park properties with green space were developed with native plantings, giving local families more chances to see butterflies, bumblebees and other wildlife, Ertel said.
The county soil and water conservation district has won national, state and regional awards and recognition for its efforts to preserve pollinating insect habitats in the area.
As in Jennings County, the initial pollinator park in Columbus could be a launching point for more of them in the future, Jones said.
“The idea is to look at the entire community and the entire parks system to see where a pollinator park would be a good fit,” Jones said. “This will be the main project and really get things rolling.”
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Work on a proposed pollinator park in the Pleasant Grove area of Columbus can begin after the city submits plans and receives approval from the Indiana Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
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Donations to the city’s pollinator park project can be made to the Columbus Park Foundation by visiting columbusparkfoundation.org. Contributions can be made with recipients asked to specify that their donations are intended for the pollinator park.
Information: 812-376-2680.
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