Tulsa County Commissioner John Smaligo is saying “not so fast” to the recently established City-County Parks Realignment Commission.
The nine-member commission announced last month by Mayor G.T. Bynum and Commissioner Ron Peters will look for park functions that could be merged. Smaligo said he gets the sense Bynum wants a city-county park system like the library or health department, a plan that’s been studied before.
"Merging the park systems as the mayor is recommending and talking about and encouraging this commission to look at has been studied, and it's been shown that actually will not help the funding," Smaligo said.
Smaligo also said he and fellow Commissioner Karen Keith were not consulted before the commission was formed. Smaligo said there isn’t enough representation for Tulsa County communities like Bixby and Broken Arrow, something he sees as problematic if a countywide tax is proposed to fund a city-county system.
"Those suburban communities are funding not only a county park system, but now they're funding a City of Tulsa park system as well as their own community park system," Smaligo said.
Peters said none of the realignment commission members has an ax to grind with the county or other cities, and the focus will be on things both the city and county struggle to provide, like swimming pools.
"All those people are pretty highly motivated to have a good park system, and I think the whole objective is to look at how we sustain the current systems into the future," Peters said.
Peters said sustainability planning will be necessary with A Gathering Place for Tulsa opening and changing demands on city and county park systems. Peters also said he’s willing to address Smaligo’s concerns about commission members.
