Initial report: New parks building under construction in Greene County
City commissioners approved the $4.8 million building project in February. BlueScope Construction out of Kansas City, Missouri, was hired to design and engineer the structure. Brentwood Builders from Cedarville carried out the construction.
The building, located at 635 Dayton-Xenia Rd., is going to house about 32 parks and trails employees. Formerly housed in four different office locations across the county, there are now offices for maintenance staff, park naturalists and park rangers — including rooms to host animals from the nature center and a evidence holding room the park rangers.
“We started with listening well,” said Chad Coe, vice president of Development for Brentwood Construction. “The project started off over budget. They had a preliminary design from an architectural firm and the project was going to be extended beyond the date that they (parks and trails) needed to be in the building. So when we were called, we had two tasks, can we get the project under budget and can we deliver the finished product ahead of schedule.”
Coe said through a cooperative purchasing contract with BlueScope, they were able to save money and time to finish before the new year.
“We are just really excited about this,” said Jon Dobney, director of Greene County Parks and Trails. “The Greene County Board of Commissioners, we can’t thank them enough for what they did. To put that kind of confidence in us, we really appreciate it.”
Bringing an almost $5 million project to the county commissioners for approval can sometimes be a challenge, Huddleson said. The new parks and trails building, however, was quickly approved because of how important the county’s parks have become to Greene County’s economy.
“We’ve gone from just somebody coming to walk in the woods to having events and people come here just for our parks,” Huddleson said.
Several county departments that required more space will move in to the former parks and trails locations.
The building used for the parks maintenance staff on Cincinnati Avenue will be vacated to accommodate the Xenia Area FISH Food Pantry.
“Real positive ripple effect by pulling everybody together here to those in those outlined areas in these other organizations is huge for Greene County,” Huddlsen said.
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