When an outside group proposed to create a plan to save the Hillsdale County Area Parks for $12,000, the Hillsdale County Parks Commission ask a favor.
Bruce Caswell, former state representative and senator, offered to assist in the parks project for no cost whatsoever after he thought the cost was high, he said.
“That was ridiculous for that amount of money, it wasn’t worth it and I would do it once I was no longer on the board of commissioners,” Caswell said.
After spending a decade in Michigan state politics, Caswell was active in local politics as a county commissioner from 2015 to 2020. When his term ended in 2020, Caswell began working on the parks recreation project.
The Hillsdale County Parks Commission tasked Caswell with creating a five-year recreational plan for Hillsdale County’s five area parks: Lewis Emery, Hemlock Beach, Bird Lake, Kathe-Cali, and the Courthouse Lawn, to eventually be submitted to the Department of Natural Resources in a grant application process.
“The State of Michigan has available every year, typically between $25 to 30 million in grants,” Caswell said, “But to apply for these grants and get them, you have to have a five-year recreational plan.”
According to Caswell, the county has not used such grants for park renovation since the late ‘90s when they constructed a community building Lewis Emery park. During this project, the county had to provide a 25% local match, but the Natural Resources Trust Fund provided roughly $175,000 for the building.
The main method of providing local input for the proposal came from an extensive survey that Caswell and the Hillsdale County IT Director, Dave Holcomb, put together.
“The survey was trying to get a handle of what people think of the parks and whether they feel they need further renovations of the parks,” Holcomb said.
While there was no target number of participants, by the time the survey closed on Feb. 19, there were a total of 194 participants. By comparison, Branch County only had approximately 200 participants several years ago when conducting their own survey for a recreation plan said Caswell.
In an article, Parks Commissioner Mike Parney claims that the recreational plan is necessary mostly to fund Lewis Emery Park and keep it open to the public.
In the absence of county funds and income from the closed community center, the park is in danger of being shut down completely.
Creating the recreational plan involved many other people besides Caswell, and he expressed his gratitude for Hillsdale County IT Director, David Holcomb; Equalization Department Staff Appraiser, Anita Myers; and Hillsdale Parks Commission Secretary, Marilyn Kilpatrick.
The ideal timeline, Caswell said, would be to gain local approval by May and then ready the proposal for the state to approve. Assuming the state approves it, then the city of Hillsdale would begin seeking grants immediately.
“These people need to be congratulated,” Caswell said. “They’ve done a really good job and spent some time putting things together, and I couldn’t have done it without them.”