After some initial confusion, the Hamilton County Commission agreed they were poised to accept the bid of Baseline Sports Construction LLC for the Enterprise South Nature Park project, which would cost $849,280. This project would create a cycling trail. Commissioner Tim Boyd was hesitant at first, wondering where $820,000 of that was going to come from.
Mayor Jim Coppinger said the overwhelming portion of the total cost would be paid for by an anonymous donor.
He said this is not the first time this donor has helped finance large outdoor projects.
“This a great example of the philanthropic community we’re blessed to live in,” Mayor Coppinger said. “These people helped us build the Riverwalk, the riverfront, and they’ve purchased equipment. But they’ve wanted to remain anonymous in the 10 years I’ve been the mayor.”
Park and Recreation director Tom Lamb pointed out that the donation was approved and accepted almost two and a half years ago, and the county is just now ready to start construction.
“It is coming from the donated funds that were given to us and accepted in June 2019,” Mr. Lamb said. “They authorized the acceptance of the donation, and went back in August of 2019 and authorized $28,000 for the survey. Now we’ve done the survey and the layout is finished, and we’ve got final plans and inspections going out to bid. We’re ready to move on to construction.”
And so the county commissioners needed to approve around $28,000 to cover what the original donation would not. Commissioner Boyd had much less of an issue approving that.
“What you’re asking us to do is to approve $27,530,” Commissioner Boyd said. “That’s a lot less shock value to this commissioner. As long as it’s not coming from the general funds or reserve funds, I’m good with it.”
“This is something that has been before the commission and we voted on this unanimously,” Commissioner Greg Martin said, before thanking the anonymous donor. “This is something that will benefit everyone around the county. Thank you again, whoever this is.”
Other commissioners also publicly thanked the anonymous donor. Commissioner Boyd suggested adding references to resolutions in the future to avoid confusion.
“The synopsis I get late that I depend on, if we could include some kind of reference in the synopsis instead of digging through a couple hundred pages of resolutions of backup documents, it would be very helpful,” Commissioner Boyd said.
The Commission will vote on this resolution next week.