By Terri Harber, Roswell Daily Record — A public meeting on Oct. 15 was held by the city of Roswell provided a forum for community members to ask questions or make comments related to Resolution 26-54, which focuses on the concept of moving some amenities out of the city’s flood zone and over to the city’s east side.
This resolution also calls for the city’s zoo to wind-down operations by June 30, 2027.
Results of a wider-ranging survey asking Roswell residents about what they consider to be important flood recovery issues were also presented at this community gathering.
Better protection from floods and severe weather is “extremely or very important” to 84.4% of the survey’s participants in response to the question, “What should matter most when rebuilding?”
Each person could fill in up to three statements that best reflect their opinion about the city government’s rebuilding projects from nine choices as well as “other.”
The statements that received at least 30% of responses were “Reduce future flood risk” with 53.2%; “Serve the most residents” receiving 44.4%; ‘Lower upkeep costs” with 34.5%; “Rebuild quickly and responsibly” garnering 33.9%; “Preserve history and identity” with 31.6%; and “Flexible spaces for existing uses” reaching 30.4%.
Choices not picked as frequently were “Support tourism and the economy” with 28.7%; “Stay within recovery funding” at 26.3%; “Make access easier” with 21.1%; and “Other” fetched 7.6%.
City government officials want to complete a drainage master plan and flood mitigation report before moving forward with flood remediation projects. These preparations are expected to take nine months to one year.
“We are dependent on them before we begin,” said City Councilor Juliana Halvorson, as she presented the survey findings. Also, she moderated the attendees who wanted to speak or ask questions from among the dozens of people who attended the meeting.
Nearly 70 people signed in at the door of the meeting room in the Roswell Public Library.
Halvorson and Councilor Cristina Arnold were involved with creating this resolution. The Adult Center would be among the amenities to bring a ”New Multi-Generational Area” to Roswell’s east side, where the city doesn’t have as many recreational services compared with other sections of Roswell, Halvorson explained.
Among the other preferences cited by those who completed the survey are providing a suitable headquarters for the Roswell Police Department and moving the adult center to the Cielo Grande Recreation Area.
Sara Hall, a former supervisor of the Roswell Adult Center, was among those who spoke during this meeting. Her thoughts about where to place the adult center echoed the survey results: At Cielo Grande, west of the recreation and aquatic center.
There, “You’ve got parking,” she said. “And a lot of handicapped parking.”
Seniors and other residents could also take more advantage of classes and other offerings with the two locations being close together by using the pool, then going to the adult center or using a trail to take a walk, for example, “with proper programming” by the staff, Hall said in a later telephone conversation.
“I want the adult center back. It’s the only center that keeps seniors happy,” said Darla Massey, who is a senior herself. “I don’t want young people in there. That won’t work.”
“You’re dragging your feet,” Massey also commented about those in charge of somehow bringing the center’s offerings back to the community.
Among city officials, staff and volunteers involved with flood recovery and at this meeting was Christopher Cortez, a former city councilor and now the chair of the Roswell Recovery Task Force.
The process toward post-flood repairs, replacement and reconstruction projects “doesn’t go fast,” he explained after Massey spoke.
The adult center, in the 800 block of North Missouri Avenue between Eight and Ninth streets and closed since the flood, “will not go back. It cannot go back. We cannot rebuild it in the floodplain,” Cortez said.
Specifically, the police headquarters ranked as the project that should receive the first available funding, with 36.4% of responses and an overall priority of 3.32 out of a possible highest score of 5.
The funding question didn’t result in one project garnering a majority of responses, but the police department achieved a wide plurality, separating it from the adult center, zoo, civic center and museum. And the other overall priority scores were the civic center, adult center, zoo and museum, with that group of scores within a much closer range, with scores from 3.32 to 2.77 out of 5.
Most of the people chose “No specific option” in the section about the zoo. Specifically, 96 didn’t show a preference. But 19 people said they would prefer the zoo “Close/relocate” and 16 said they want to see the city “Keeping/improving” it.
Among the speakers were some people who were very interested in the zoo staying open, however.
The sites are listed here in the order indicated by the city’s survey, which ended before the public gathering. This event was also a few days before the storm and flood disaster reached the two-year mark after affecting communities across Chaves County on Oct. 19-20, 2024.
The Roswell Flood Recovery Task Force met on Oct. 21, about a week after the public meeting. The task force discussion highlighted potential timelines for major projects. Completing a citywide drainage study was this group’s first topic and is a high priority.
There was interest in creating a list of flood recovery projects that wouldn’t be affected by results of the drainage study, that “will suggest mitigation that should be potentially funded through FEMA,” according to Cortez.
Halvorson, participating in the task force meeting remotely, mentioned that more flood recovery meetings with the community would be coming up and that in the future, more focus could be on a specific project during each meeting.
The narrower focus for each public meeting would allow those with keen interest in a given project to come to the particular meeting about that and have their say, she said later.
Longer timelines for such projects as the city’s museum and convention center were also talked about. The convention center is less likely to be relocated to another site because it’s considered to be less than 50% damaged—specifically at 46%, said Mac Rogers, the city’s project manager and staff liaison between the task force and city council.
The museum and adult center are considered to be more than 50% damaged. And with the museum’s historic significance as a structure, the original WPA and adobe sections might be preserved and used in some future capacity, said Cortez.
Share this story and start a conversation
