By Galen Simmons, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
St. Marys council has approved a partnership between the town and the Avon Maitland District School Board’s specialist high skills major program that will see local high school students from St. Marys DCVI come up with design ideas for upgrades to Lind Park.
After the town was unsuccessful with its application last fall for up to $30,000 in FedDev Ontario funding that would have seen the park at the corner of Jones Street East and Church Street South upgraded with landscaping, picnic tables, accessible pathways, benches and signage, creating a more vibrant and active downtown environment that balances historical significance with modern community needs, town staff recently met with school board staff to discuss the potential for a partnership on this project.
“Prior to the holidays, I did get a phone call from a representative within the high skills major program at Avon Maitland District School Board who proposed the idea of doing a partnership similar to something they did in another community with a park that was geared towards public art,” said St. Marys tourism and economic development manager Kelly Deeks-Johnson. “It was something that worked really well and was a great opportunity for their students.
“So, she and I worked on what this would look like and basically, the high skills major program within the school board has various specialties – construction, manufacturing, engineering (and) they have an arts-and-culture and environmental group – and they all work on the individual specialties. The proposed idea would be that we would collectively get together staff and the school board – the high skills major staff would put together the (student) groups – and we would have a one-day session, probably at the Pyramid Recreation Centre.”
During that one-day session, the high skills major students would be grouped based on specialty and town staff would present an overview of the park-rejuvenation project including challenges, like the need to enhance accessibility at the park, opportunities and outcomes. The session would include a site visit at Lind Park and each of the student groups would be tasked with brainstorming and developing project ideas for the park. Town staff would return later in the afternoon to hear the student proposals and ask questions.
“We would take it from there as far as whether we want to pursue any of the ideas, or collectively merge any of the ideas, and put together a group to determine what a design could look like,” Deeks-Johnson said. “If there’s time, we could even enhance the partnership to have students work on things like building benches or working through some of the signage we would like to achieve with the park, those kinds of things.”
While the park-upgrade project was originally dependent on grant funding, $35,000 for the project was still included in the town’s 2025 budget. According to St. Marys director of corporate services André Morin, this partnership could not only provide an excellent opportunity for local students to engage in the community and apply their knowledge in a real-world setting, it could potentially save the town some money on consultants and design work for the park project, making it more feasible.
“I see this as extremely positive,” Coun. Jim Craigmile said. “The way I’m reading it is Phase 1 is giving them a bit of a free reign to come up with some designs and then it would come back to us. So, it could end up being multi-year because Phase 2 could be costing or construction.”
“Yes,” Deeks-Johnson responded. “It’s a small space, so there’s not much we can really do there. It’s going to be very simplified. Really, it’s adding some seeding, greenery, some low-maintenance plants, tree canopy, also some signage and we’ve talked about some introduction of some art and various interesting pieces within the park, which is something they’re very keen to explore as well. … We would give them what our objectives are and sort of what restrictions might be … and let them tell us some neat ideas. I’m excited to hear what they come up with.”
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