MetroParks officials take trolley tour of Mill Creek Park

YOUNGSTOWN — Tempers that were on display in a tense email exchange between Mill Creek MetroParks officials late last week seemed to have cooled today, when park board and staff members took a trolley tour of park properties and facilities together.

During the two-hour session, planned some time ago to give board members a better overview of the park system, MetroParks officials shared laughs, traded polite comments and quizzed park staff members on various park features included in the tour.

Starting at Ford Nature Center, the tour looped around all three park lakes and made stops at project sites, Fellows Riverside Gardens, the Lily Pond, golf course, Wick Recreation Area, and other prominent park holdings.

“The objective was to share with them a firsthand experience of the assets of Mill Creek Park, talk a little bit about its age, and what its age and success have meant to us as management,” said MetroParks Executive Director Aaron Young.

A theme that came up again and again during the tour, which was led by MetroParks Planning Manager Justin Rogers, was the park’s past success in acquiring third-party dollars to fund capital improvements. Rogers noted, for example, that a recent rehabilitation of the Lily Pond’s parking lot was 100 percent funded by a grant.

For the complete story, read Tuesday's Vindicator and Vindy.com