Welcome to Monmouth Monthly a peek into the heart of the Willamette Valley. Each month we will bring you updates of the things happening in and around town brought to you by the people who helped make it happen. I am your host Sabra Jewell
All right, thank you, everybody for joining us for our inaugural Podcast. I'm excited today to welcome Mommouth Public Works Director Russ Cooper, Shannon Medel, who is the staff liaison for the skate park committee. And we also have Brice Spreadbury, who was kind of the one with the vision for the skate park. He's a local CHS graduate. And they're here today to talk about kind of the beginning of the skatepark and what we have to look forward to. So the original skate park was built around what 1995. Yeah, that's correct. And that skate park it Is it the one that we see today? Does it look exactly like that? If there have been changes since that one came to pass?
No, actually, what it started out as the dream was was for a halfpipe. And so there was a halfpipe that was constructed there, it was a wood structure and and had a steel deck on it. And then the community wanted to have something that was more of a traditional skatepark and so that's that's where what is there currently came from and over time, the halfpipe went away, it deteriorated and needed to go away. And so that's how we get to today where we're looking to construct a skate park that is now three times the size of what what is currently there and we'll you know, size to meet the needs of both communities, Monmouth and independence.
So this is definitely a shared skate park. It's called the MI town skate park. MI town being M-I.
That's right. All right. Independence. Yes.
Very cool. And so Brice, how did you get interested in this? Were you in high school at the time using this? Were you constantly at the skate park? Tell us how you got involved?
Yeah, so I was actually after I graduated, I skated for a bit, kind of like in middle school, but kind of like, just for a year or so. But once I graduated, I was I didn't have like football, basketball, you know, all those like traditional sports to kind of keep me busy. So I needed to pick up kind of like an individual, an individual, sport, and like, that's where I was like, oh, I should pick up skateboarding again. I really started skateboarding after I graduated, and I think maybe like a year after I graduated, I kind of like caught wind of someone reached out to dreamland about getting the new skate park and independence. And that was really interesting, because like, people who use the currency part kind of know, it's like, outdated and, like deteriorating, a little bit of it is wood. So we all dream about having like, a new skatepark. So when I heard that, I reached out to dreamland, and I just sent them an email saying, hey, like, I heard you guys. Like someone's kind of started the process of getting a skatepark built here, like I'm interested in, like, in like talking to someone or like how to kind of restart that process. And we ended up setting up like, a monthly meeting, with Dreamland, and in Shawn Irving from the city of independence. And like, kind of like, what that's kind of like what started the whole process. And it kind of took a while to kind of get to the spot where we were like, Okay, it's actually going to be in Monmouth this location, we also had to get another conceptual design done.
Yeah. And I think that's how it went from, or that the idea of a community or a regional skatepark came about is independence recognized as well that you know, there's a there is an existing skate park and it's in a location that is central to the users both both communities and, and so I think there was some, I'll say wisdom in in Shawn, pointing that direction to say let's let's move toward more of a community Skate Park.
Did you ever in your wildest dreams think that anybody would ever contact you back? When you reached out to dreamland? Were you were you surprised that it actually went as far as it did?
I was a little bit because, like, anyone who like, is like, into skateboarding and familiar with like, like, who builds skate parks, like, you all know, like, Dreamland and Mark Scott, who's, who's the founder and owner like, it's like the best. They're the best that's like to reach out and like to meet with them and stuff was was really, really cool. And it did surprise me but also like they're, they're local too.
Dreamland is a premier skate park design firm as well as us skate park construction company and located here in Oregon. They're over on the coast out of Lincoln city if I'm not mistaken. And they have designed and build skate parks all around the United States for sure and worldwide as well.
Right. I think they're right now building one in Israel. Yeah, that's why they're not building ours. Right. That's okay. Yeah, we're looking at the design, it looks like it's going to be worth the wait. Brice, how involved were you said you were involved in the design of this skatepark?
Yeah, actually, the community of all had an input in the design, like the first initial one we had for an independent people from Silverton, Dallas, Salem, and carveout, like, local communities came to our meeting to put their input into what they would like to see as far as features and like more street obstacles or transitions and stuff like that. All that input was, was collected by Dreamland, which helped inform how they should go about designing the skate parks of this community and surrounding communities. But I'd say like the main, the main feature that was kind of like the talking point was that that like, hollowed out by saucer type spaceship obstacle, I think that was like, a big like talking point. And like, we kind of like went over a few like, rounds of like, discussion on, on what that would look like. And also like, why we should have that in NY as a port skatepark should have like a defining feature, one of the
great parts of how this design came about was that, you know, first we had the premier, you know, Dreamland doing the design and kind of the concepts for us. But then we had the involvement of of actual skaters like Bryce and some of the other skaters that were involved in the that early work group, that that it was the skaters that were commenting on the design and not, you know, me who I don't know anything about skating. So it was it was good to have, and, and actually critical to have that component of the design review.
And Shannon, where do you come in to all this? What what point were you involved? Are you a big skater yourself? Are your kids involved in the sport? What got you into this?
Oh, there was a need. And so I fulfilled the need just to be a staff to support the liaison between the city and the committee. And I think it's really needed in the community. So I think it's great. I hope with funding, I
was gonna say I would, I would take it from kind of participating in holding the group to get you know, the MI Town committee, you know, making sure that they were organized and moving forward, but also go into the fundraising, and helping with organizing fundraising and
because that's what I'm thinking these things can't be free or cheap. So there's money involved in this. So you, you probably were responsible for heading up a lot of what kind of fundraisers and fund development was done for this.
I tried to follow in his footsteps, they laid a lot of the groundwork early. And so as Bryce was going back to school, I think I helped facilitate that role where he had to step out a little bit so I was able to step in and, and lead that. That hand of organizing a fairly large bottle drop collection, that we raised a fairly good amount of money.
You know, how much was raised on that bottle drop fundraiser? 10,000? Great, excellent. That's a lot of cans. Yeah, that's,
that's multiple dump truck loads. Okay.
It was multiple dump trucks. Wow. brought in. So it's fun. How many volunteers
are kind of working on this, this committee, the skate park committee,
I would say, I think what like kind of made this like, so streamlined was like, I think, like, Shannon, myself, and my grandma were like, kind of like the main like, three who kind of like, kept in communication and like, meet regularly. But like, when I needed the support, I'd kind of reach out to the Facebook groups and like, kind of get get the supporters when I needed them. Because it seemed like when we would have meetings with a lot of people, we wouldn't we wouldn't get as far. So it was like, we had to set up a committee to in order to partner with both mystery markets and cities independence, but really, it was kind of just myself, my grandmother and kind of like Shannon and people from the city of mamas who are meeting regularly but there's
fluctuating as we since this process did take years to Yeah, to make it happen. And there was a lot of fluctuation in active memberships. So they'd come and go as you know, as they were available.
2017 was when the project started for the redesign and everything Is that about right?
I think that's probably about the time when Brice put that into motion. And so as we move toward a, you know, forming an actual group, the MI Town workgroup or committee Task Force is what it was called. One of the components in that was that the volunteer group, basically Brice and his, his grandma, and whoever was there had to come up with a matching component to the project to show that they had buy into it as well, that they that they really wanted to see this happen. And while the work group or the volunteer group was small, when they called on the community, that community did a wonderful job of stepping up to the plate. And when we had these canned drives, and we could fill a dump truck full of bags of cans and beyond, and we were constantly having people from the community drop off cans throughout the the entire, you know, basically two year window, it was pretty neat. So it was a small, small group organizing it, but the community really stepped up to the plate, and not only through canned donations, but also cash donations.
Curious also, was there state federal funding applied to this project as well?
Yeah, there was when we started to move forward, and that was one of the I'll just call it the, you know, as a public works director and looking to try to bring a large, costly project like this forward, when it starts as a dream and the community comes and asked for it. It was wondering, where are these funds going to come from? And so yes, there was some concerns about that. But with Brice and his team demonstrating that they were committed to it, they had already raised a good portion of that $10,000 that they had come up with kind of we did get a I'll call it a legislative appropriation from our represent local representatives, Senator Patterson, and Representative Evans used some of the COVID relief funds is what I understood the the dollars to be to help push the project over the line and they had come up with I think, was $525,000, which is pretty much the funding that we needed to secure that project, ensure that it was going to go forward.
If you're just now joining us, we are talking to Monmouth Public Works Director Russ Cooper, Shannon Medel, who is part of the staff liaison team to the skate park committee, and Brice Spreadbury, who was a CHS. Student, and local boy done good who helped create the skate park. Brice, are you going to come down for the groundbreaking when that happens in this year? Is that something that you're planning to be a part of?
Oh, for sure. Yeah, definitely.
So construction on the new skate park groundbreaking is going to be next month, have we gotten an estimate of time of how long that project is going to take to be completed.
So what we understand right now is the contractor will begin to break ground in March. And then based on the contract, they will need to be done toward the end of June, couple months of construction. I think that's a realistic construction window for the skatepark.
And Bryce touched on some of the design elements talk about what this new skate park is going to look like and compare to the old one.
So this skate park is unique in that it needed to be designed so that it fit into the the allotted area that was there. And it's kind of a triangle space that's bordered on one side by a parking lot the other side by a baseball field, and then the Monmouth street to the to the south. And so it's it's kind of a, a triangle shape, but it it transitions from on on the south end is the highest elevation of it. And so as you kind of move through it from from south to north, you use you start at a higher elevation and and work your way to the what I'll call the bottom end, which is it's it's set up so that there's at least three distinct areas within the skatepark that that I think can be used different ways.
It's kind of nice, because on the outside of the skate park, there's kind of like bumps to kind of maintain your speed so people can be skating on the outside of the skate park on the rails and ledges and stuff while people are skating the inside of the skate park. There's like on the on the south end there's there's the outside area to skate, but also the inside area. And then on the north end, there's the boldest skate so so Yeah, as far as how many people can be skating it with when a skate park is set up this way. You can kind of be in your, you can have like three or four groups kind of go in at the same time and like almost doing your own thing and it's kind of nice. That way. There definitely can be like that many people are more at the skate park at one time and the main thing is like If there's like some unspoken etiquette, like I'm skatepark, like keeping an eye out like this person's going, and they might be going this way, like, I should wait and like, stuff like that. So there's like, kind of like, oh, with my turn, I'm gonna go do this type thing. So there might be like 2030 people there. But it's pretty common for maybe like four to five people need skating at one time. Because I think in skateboarding, we call it like, Oh, you're sneaking someone by like going into their line, or like, going while they're going, it's kind of like cutting in line, almost, you know, the way our skate parks set up is, there's really good visibility, like you kind of kind of like see it on the perimeter, you can see across like, whether someone's gonna go, you obviously can see who's like in the transitions and whatnot. So I think I think it's set up really, really good. And of course, Dreamland things of all these things. The perimeter is a great spot for beginners to kind of like just start learning because there's, it's flat for one. And then there's, I call them like bumps, speed bumps, kind of kind of like go over hump over like a bump, which will get you speed. And it's kind of like an obstacle that's good for learning before you get to like a transition. And even before transition like banks, which are just like straight down, they don't have any transition to them. Those are also great for learning. All along the west side, there's a brick Bank, which is which is really good for people who are wanting to kind of like drop down into, into something, but don't want to commit to dropping in on a transition. I think it's going to be really good for beginners, in that way, just to be kind of like out on the perimeter and be on your own. But also be there at the skate park. I think advanced skateboarders are drawn to either like a unique thing, or something that's just, it's nice to have read really like big rails or like big transitions. But I think advanced skater is a like something that's like, just like done right. Like the right height rail or the bowl on the north end is definitely going to be there's going to be it's going to be a feature that brings people to Monmouth and personally I state Silverton and I would drive to Eugene in the winter with dark out to go skate Eugene. And I think that is a dreamland skate park, as well.
For visual people who need to see this as it's being described. We will have a link to it on our website. It's on the City of Monmouth's website currently and we will link to it in the show notes. So everybody can take a look at the the mock up that's there right now. Because the mock up that we have right now that's that's what it's going to look like. Is that is that set in stone? Russ?
It's a pretty good concept of what there's going to be constructed. Yes.
And you did mention that there's an other parks connected to this skate park. Are they also going to be getting a facelift as well? Yeah,
so this park, it's called the Monmouth Recreation Park in the city's parks master plan shows just park having some improvements. And one of those improvements was the skate park. But yes, we are also breaking ground on a larger Park improvement that will include walking paths throughout this park, it will improve the parking lot. It's going to replace the bathroom facilities which are classic 19, late 60s bathrooms that hardly anybody would want to use. And so there's going to be a lot of improvements that go along with the skatepark and help to make this area. You know, when we talk about bringing people to the destination, these other supporting improvements are going to make it a much better place and improve the regional feature of the park.
Excellent. And Bryce touched on this about the impact that it's going to have on the Monmouth independence community talked about building some tourism around it. What do we think for the locals? What do we think the impact of this is going to be for our local community? Ross, you want to talk about that? The
The main thing is that it provides a regional sized skate park that that when I when I look at our park system on myths park system and ask the question, what what facilities are being used the most year round? The skatepark ranks right up there with one of the most used facilities in our park system. And so this is going to give a new, you know, a new feel to it a larger field, it'll be able to accommodate more users. And so I think it's just a great improvement not only for our kids, I mean, I see plenty of young adults I don't see many people my age out there skating but certainly is going to provide more opportunity.
I want to add to that a little bit. I think for the what's missing for mom with independence is a skate park, I think is such a huge component in community recreation because a skate park is it hosts a number of like community like recreational activities like skateboarding, biking, rollerblading, scootering, as in the age range and all those As activities, there's not really a limit there. So it serves a huge, huge demographic as far as that goes. And I think like with me getting into skateboarding that was, okay, like I was really into football and all the team sports, which is great, up until you graduate as in, then what do you do? You know, it's like, if kids can kind of find something at a young age, that they're able to sustain far past when they graduate, and good for them. In many ways. It's I think it's huge.
Is there in this may be too early to say, Shannon and Russ. If the public wants to get involved now or when this skate park is opened? Is there going to be a way is it going to be classed as Is there a way for the public to give money and funding as is the part of the funding done what's going to be needed in the future?
You know, we're still accepting donations for this while the while the skate park itself is fully funded the construction of the skate park, there's amenities like benches, or bike racks, or drinking fountains that are going to support this facility. And so we're still accepting donations. And that's where those funds would go to. If people are wanting to donate, as we look at how will this skatepark provide opportunity, the city park and rec department offers each year a what we call mini grants. And so Bryce was a recipient of one of those and put on a, I think what we'll call a skating clinic, it was actually even bigger than that. I could see moving forward that there will be individuals in the community who may want to put on some sort of a skating rodeo or come on out. This is how we learn to skate or use these particular features. And through that park and rec funding grant, I could see that being a way for that to occur. And I suppose the sky is open for opportunity
to tell us more about how to donate Shannon,
on the city of Monmouth website, there is a link will lead you to where you can donate money directly for the website,
Brice. I feel like the one thing that we haven't really talked about is your grandmother, she keeps coming up in conversation. Tell me more about your grandmother and how she's involved. Yeah,
so my grandma, she's huge. She was a huge part of, of this project and kind of keeping it going. The reason why she got kind of stoked on this was she was watching an OPB bid on skateboarding. And there was snow all over the ground. And they were kind of showing the the soccer facilities, all these fields that weren't being used. But they panned over to the skate park and it was just full of kids participating in free recreation. And I think that's what she's big on. Like, like, kids need something to do. And not everyone does football, or whatever. So, yeah, she was she's a big advocate for that. And she's the one who kind of kept me in line as like, oh, like, how's the paper doing? Or, Oh, we what's next? or whatnot, you know, and she was always a part of the meetings and yeah,
yeah, I think Barbara had a great sense of that, that dreams don't just happen overnight, and that there is a there is a certain amount of time and persistence. And you know, she did she came to these meetings, and then routinely she would stop by the office and she'd bring in a bag of cans and, and it was always funny because they were 40 ounce, you know, beer cans, bottles that she you know, she admittedly was embarrassed that she was bringing them in but they had come from the local park down where she's at and you know, so it was just it was her persistence and and she understood that these projects take time to develop and come to fruition and so I agreed I think she she helped even you know myself in in making sure that we just keep keep it moving forward. It's a slow process, it rolls forward. And so yes, definitely a big player in in making this thing reality.
We are looking forward to the groundbreaking and Brice we can't wait to welcome you back. You live in Portland right now. Right? Yeah,
but I'm, I'm coming to Monmouth all the time. So
and even more after we get this thing open. So thank you for being a part of this community and creating this incredible skate park for everybody to use now into the future. All right, I want to say a special thank you to our guests today Shannon Medel and Russ Cooper and Brice Spreadbury for coming on to the inaugural Monmouth monthly podcast to talk about the upcoming skate park. We look forward to welcoming the community to that groundbreaking stay tuned to the city website and your newsletter for more information about what that event is going to look like. And also stay tuned next month we're going to have guests on to talk about the new Trolley that is going in between mommoth and independence to take it to the river to the university. Thank you for joining us on Monmouth monthly and we will talk to you again next month
Thank you for joining us for Monmouth Monthly My name is Sabra Jewell. Our music is catching up by chill steady and we record it in the comments which is co working community in independence Oregon. Please find us wherever you find podcasts rate review, tell the friend and we will see you next month.
