Hart County Sets Rules, Fees for Long Point Park
Photo courtesy: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
Hart County has set some of the fees for the use of Long Point Park, which will be officially turned over to the county by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on Thursday.
The County recently took over the maintenance and operation of Long Point and Milltown Parks from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. However, Milltown will remain closed for the time being.
The County has turned over the running of the parks to the Hart County Recreation Department, but not much will change.
“We won’t be reinventing the wheel,” Hart County administrator Jon Caime told the board. “Most of the operations of the park will stay the same as when the Corps operated it.”
At their regular meeting last week, the board heard from Recreation Director James Owens who said one thing that will remain the same is the offering of season passes.
“It will be one of our options for a season pass,” said Owens. “I was contacted by Ken Bedenbaugh with the Corps and asked about whether we would honor the Corps season passes that people had already bought and I feel like we should.”
County administrator Jon Caime noted honoring the Corps season passes would just be for the remainder of this calendar year. The board then voted to honor those fees.
Other rules include parking fees and reservations of pavillions. For example, fees to rent the pavillions will be $4 dollars per day for the small shelter and $30 per day for the larger shelter. Reservations would be made through the Rec Department.
Owens said additionally, the parking fee would remain the same.
“Just as you had with the other Corps properties, there is a fee per car and that is $4 just as it is with the other Corps properties,” Owens said. “There is a box with envelopes there at the entrance to the park and it is an honor system.”
However a question came up about how safe the money would be in the drop box with no one there to supervise the collection. Some commissioners believe unless the park has someone there while the park is open, the drop box could be broken into. However, no decision on how to handle the parking fees was made.
Another question was raised about whether to keep the gates to the park open 24×7, but again, no decision was made by the board. The county continues to work on a plan for handling the park’s parking fees and the hours of operation.
“We’re new at this and in uncharted waters,” noted County Commission chair Joey Dorsey.