“Hope for the Future” Meeting Held at North Side Park Draws Good Crowd

A “Hope for the Future” tax and ballot initiative meeting was held Thursday (10-10) in the North Side Park Community Center. After a brief introduction a video promoting the tax proposal was shown and the crowd was urged to “Vote Yes times 3”.

Questions were answered as to the priority of projects and other topics. Assistant City Manager Daniel Shelman said there wasn’t a clear priority.   Both Parks Director Summer Chambers and Board Member Steve Montgomery addressed these concerns with all the projects grants had accomplished including swing-sets, the HUB, and others. The Streetscape project money could only be spent for the streets and if the grant comes through for the Splash Pad, as Chambers expects it will, that is the only thing that money could be spent for.

City Manager JR Wilson said the splash pad would be the first to be completed and the proposed Rec Center the last. The Splash Pad might take a month and the Rec Center would take a year.

Concern was raised about the cost of the tax with Texarkana’ sales taxes being cheaper. The response was the tax has gone down since the courthouse was completed and only 1 percent of the current taxes go to the city.  6.5 percent goes to the state and 2 percent goes to the county. If these ballot issues pass, March will be the soonest the taxes will increase. The projects would then start in the summer.

The total cost of the projects was raised with the response being $30 to $35 million. The attendees asked how long the tax would be in place and the answer was 15 to 17 years.

It was asked if local businesses would be hired with the response they would definitely be invited to bid, but the cheapest bidder in a sealed bid would be chosen.

Residents asked if food trucks would pay the tax and were told yes. The concern was voiced that residents would like to support the city but there aren’t the businesses here to support. The response was that this would draw businesses to Hope as much as some other recent improvements such as Hempstead Hall, the Pocket Park, and the HUB have.