FUQUAY-VARINA, N.C. (WNCN) – Local leaders and southern Wake County residents came together in Fuquay-Varina Thursday to speak up in support of the South Wake Park Project. They want to see the former Crooked Creek Golf Course into a park.
They also stood up against a proposal Wake County Commissioners are expected to vote on at a meeting on Monday that would sell the property. Wake County Commissioner Greg Ford said the proposal would declare the property surplus, and put it up for sale right away.
“We want one park here where we can walk safely,” South Wake Park Project Leader Ron Nawojczyk said at a news conference Thursday afternoon.
Those rallying for the property Thursday included World War II Army veteran Marvin Smith, 91, who lives nearby.
“I’ve been blessed beyond measure,” Smith said. “I still try to walk 30 minutes a day, five days a week.”
Gina Gianelli said she wants to see a park someday, especially after learning her breast cancer has spread.
“All I can do is food and exercise,” Gianelli said.
Wake County spent $4 million to buy the former golf course to turn into a park.
Ford added he believes that Wake County’s newly elected Board of Commissioners should weigh in on the matter.
“The younger generation, and my great-grandkids especially, need a place they can come walk, and play, and ride a bike,” Smith said. “There just isn’t one available.”
Ford posted this statement on Facebook Thursday afternoon:
Fellow Wake County Citizens,
This afternoon, at my request, County staff approved the final documents in preparation for Monday’s Board of Commissioners meeting, at which I will make my previously-shared motion asking that our new Board corrects the former Board’s controversial single-vote majority decision to purchase a failed, private golf course in the middle of the Crooked Creek subdivision with the hopes of turning it into a future County park.
Click here for details about the language of this motion and important supporting documents.
Wake County will continue its commitment to heavily invest in our future and a great quality of life through our robust parks, open space and greenways program. We will also return to building on Wake’s solid record of preserving quality open space and advancing existing park projects with unanimous Board approval and full County staff support – a record that was tarnished by the contentious Crooked Creek purchase last year, pushed through amidst 2018’s election year politics.
In the end, Wake County voters overwhelmingly supported the Parks & Open Space Bond in 2018 – but they also removed two of four pro-Crooked Creek commissioners from office. These two outcomes are the basis of a powerful statement from Wake County citizens: While parks and open space projects are of high value to our entire community, the taxpayer bailout of a failed, private golf course in the middle of a residential neighborhood was wrong – and it needs to be corrected.
The current Board of Commissioners, now all newly elected or newly re-elected, is right to respect Wake County voters’ election results and address the questionable Crooked Creek purchase. My motion on Monday provides the Board with this opportunity to weigh in on Crooked Creek – one way or the other, before any additional time and tax dollars are spent on this controversial project. I remain confident that this Board will do the right thing this time and respect the will of the voters and the County’s well-established processes of good governance.
Meanwhile, those living in southern Wake County, like Gianelli, hope to see a park come to reality.
“We’re going to fight this, and fight this, and fight this,” Gianelli said. “By God, I hope that I can be alive more than tomorrow, next week or next year. I want to be here and celebrate the opening, and dang it, I’m going to walk it everyday.”
The County Commission is scheduled to meet and vote on the proposal on Monday at 5 p.m. at the Wake County Justice Center.
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