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Does Pratt gift limit park deal?

January 18, 2007 12:50 am

By EMILY BATTLE

The Fredericksburg-Stafford Park Authority last night debated how best to take care of the collection of riverside parks that started with a land gift from John Lee Pratt 44 years ago.

The Authority is an independent board that owns St. Clair Brooks Memorial Park, John Lee Pratt Memorial Park and Falmouth Waterfront Park in Stafford County, and Old Mill Park in Fredericksburg.

Fredericksburg and Stafford County leaders have proposed that their parks and recreation departments can maintain those lands more efficiently than the Authority can.

Last night, Fredericksburg City Manager Phillip Rodenberg and Stafford County Administrator Steve Crosby proposed that the localities do just that.

They would stop making their annual contribution to the Authority, and instead put that money into their own parks departments.

Fredericksburg committed $200,611 to the Park Authority this year. Stafford gave $286,588.

The idea addresses the question of whether the independent Authority is a redundant body that duplicates services taxpayers are already funding on either side of the river.

City and county residents would still be able to use all the parks under the same terms.

The Authority board agreed to work with the localities to fine-tune the details of their proposal, but board members have a lot of questions and concerns.

They'll have to work quickly to address those, because the localities will be deciding whether to give any money to the Authority as they put their budgets together for next year. That process begins in less than two months.

Rodenberg and Crosby said the Authority board would continue as a policymaking and fundraising entity, but some board members wonder what purpose it would serve if it was no longer responsible for the maintenance of the parks.

As they talked, they voiced different opinions of the terms of the Pratt family's initial land gift. Board member Eric Olsen worried that if the Park Authority ceased to exist, it might trigger a provision in the original gift that calls for the land to revert to Mary Washington Hospital.

The deed actually states that the land must be used "only for park purposes," and that it not be sold to another entity "for any other purpose."

City Attorney Kathleen Dooley told Fredericksburg council members last week that that means there's no restriction on who owns the land, it just has to be used as a public park.

Beyond the legal issues, some Authority board members are worried about losing a body they think symbolizes regional cooperation and the unique intent the Pratt family had when it gave the land on the Stafford side of the river.

Old Mill Park wasn't added until the 1970s.

"This was one of the first entities where the county and the city worked together on an issue," said board member Beverly Newlin. "That was what Mr. Pratt wanted. We cannot forget that."

Olsen worried what would happen to the Authority's employees. That's among the issues to be worked out, although city and county representatives have said they'll have to hire new staff to manage the parks.

If that's so, board member John Gray wondered why the localities don't just put more money into the Authority, to allow it to improve its maintenance capabilities.

Stafford Supervisor Pete Fields, who sits on the Authority board, said the localities have bigger organizations in place, and can do the job more cheaply.

"It's a classic case of economies of scale," he said.

City Councilman Matt Kelly, who also sits on the board, said the intent of the process is simply to help the parks better serve the public.

"There is absolutely no question that these lands will remain parks, no matter how this plays out," he said.

To reach EMILY BATTLE:540/374-5413
Email: ebattle@freelancestar.com