Houston officials push vote on park upgrades to July 15

Houston City Council will hold off on voting for at least one more week on funding to upgrade 25 parks in the city.

What this means

Part of the city’s Let’s Play Houston initiative, the ordinance would approve $11 million from the Parks and Recreation Dedication Fund, Consolidated Construction Fund and Contributed Capital Project Fund to improve 25 neighborhood parks.

At least two parks per district were selected for the program, with the improvements set to be completed in phases.

Council member Joaquin Martinez delayed the vote for the ordinance because Parks Director Kenneth Allen was not present for the meeting.

In similar news

Earlier in the meeting, council held a public session on the open space ordinance. The open space ordinance provides parks, recreational amenities and open space for residential areas. It typically uses fees collected from developers to dedicate and maintain the parks.

The public session was to address amendments to the ordinance. One of the changes includes making multifamily developments fee-only, instead of allowing a dedication of land or a fee-in-lieu.

The current ordinance allows developers to create park space on their property, instead of paying a fee to the city for the fund. The change is to comply with state law and is $700 per unit.

One speaker said he believes the fee should be more.

“This is part one of the changes we’re going to make to the open space ordinance,” council member Sallie Alcorn said. “The 30% move is great to be able to spread that money to parks.”

The maximum that the state will allow the fee to be increased to is $1,260, Alcorn said.

One more thing

Council is expected to vote on both ordinances later this month.