Grants to improve Helen Putnam Park

Nearly $30,000 raised through a matching grant program will go toward upgrades, including trails and pond access.|

Sonoma County parks officials have passed the halfway mark in a campaign to raise $50,000 in donations to match a grant from an anonymous fan of Helen Putnam Regional Park, paving the way for a variety of improvements to begin this year at the sprawling county park next to Petaluma.

The two-year matching grant to the Sonoma County Regional Parks Foundation pledged in June 2016 has the potential to generate as much as $100,000 for improvements at the park, according to the foundation’s Executive Director Melissa Kelley. Since fundraising efforts kicked off in July, $29,123 in donations have rolled in from 188 donors, along with an in-kind contribution of nearly $3,000, Kelley said.

Because the matching grant is released in $10,000 increments, parks officials now have $60,000 to put toward projects at the 200-acre park, she said. The foundation is an independent entity from the Sonoma County Regional Parks, though the two organizations work together closely, and regional parks staff have already begun to put the grant money to use, she said.

“I am just so thrilled to see this local support for this effort,” Kelley said. “The foundation can’t accomplish anything we do without the support of the community, and what this says to me is that people are really passionate about Helen Putnam Regional Park. It’s the county park that Petaluma residents are most likely to use … they really care about it and want to see it thrive and be rejuvenated.”

Planners have used grant dollars to complete assessments of the popular fishing pond and the nine trails that wind through the park, said Karen Davis-Brown, a planner with Sonoma County Regional Parks.

As early as spring, Davis-?Brown said work will began to create ADA-compliant trails to the pond, and to create three “landing areas” along the banks to provide park goers better access to the pond without risking habitat damage to surrounding areas. Two picnic tables will also be installed near the pond, and rehabilitation on the Pomo and Fillaree trials will also begin in the same time frame, she said.

Other projects on the horizon will include realigning some of the steeper trails to be more accessible, while also decommissioning “volunteer trails” created by hikers and walkers who forge their own path while making their way into the park from surrounding neighborhoods and adding interpretive signage.

The majority of the park’s remaining trails will also be revamped and additional restoration work undertaken at the pond after permits are granted, Davis-Brown said. Other projects include oak woodland habitat restoration and goat grazing for landscape management, according to the foundation’s website.

“It’s beautification, renovation and restoration,” she said.

A total price tag for the work has yet to be tallied, but a meeting will be held next month to hash out details about organizing crews and getting projects in motion, she said.

“We’ll do as much as we can with the money we have,” she said. “Quite a bit of the work will probably be done in house.”

Officials said they plan to meet the $100,000 funding goal and complete the planned work by the end of 2017.

The foundation’s fundraising benchmark comes in the wake of the narrow defeat of Measure J in November, which proposed a half-cent sales tax increase to the unincorporated county that would have raised $95 million to improve county parks over 10 years. Those funds would have been used in part at Helen Putnam Regional Park, according to expenditure plans.

Longtime Petaluma resident Stephanie McCallister, who has made two undisclosed contributions to the campaign, lauded the fundraiser as a successful effort to preserve a park at a time when securing other funding sources proves challenging.

“What led me to donate is that I honestly feel that there isn’t enough open space for people in Petaluma and what we have needs to be preserved and maintained,” she said.

While the gears are in motion for improvements funded by the challenge grant, county officials are waiting to obtain necessary regulatory approvals to add an additional 40-acre swath at an undeveloped hillside south of the traffic circle on Windsor Drive. The acreage was given to the county more than a decade ago as a condition of approval for the West Haven development, which was originally referred to as Rockridge Pointe.

The land is slated to include a parking lot and a gate that will give way to a roughly mile-long trail to the park, which will together cost between $80,000 and $100,000, Davis-Brown said. The new lot will take away pressure from a small free parking area along Oxford Court and expand options from the existing lot at Chileno Valley Road.

Sonoma County Supervisor David Rabbitt, a Petaluma resident whose district includes the area around the city, said he hopes to have regulatory issues resolved as early as spring, adding that he’s been contacted by nearby residents to prime them on the plans. He praised the foundation’s fundraising efforts and touted the planned entrance as a boon to the park.

“This will open up the north east side and make it a little easier to access for more people that live out on that side of town to meander that way into the park,” he said. “Another access point in my mind is always a good thing.”

An additional parking lot and access point are envisioned as part of a proposed Davidon Homes development at the corner of Windsor and D streets. The project is currently undergoing a new environmental impact review, according to information from the city’s planning department.

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