San Benito commissioners discuss Veterans Memorial Park repairs, solar lighting and stakeholder meeting

SAN BENITO COUNTY — County commissioners, parks staff and residents spent the meeting’s public-comment and project-update segments focused on Veterans Memorial Park, where recent restroom work is finished and longer-term fixes — including resurfacing, lighting and security — remain unsettled.

Mondo Medina, a resident and youth-sports organizer, opened public comments by saying, “We’re here tonight to speak about our parks and commission programming that do a veteran’s motor park,” and listed damage and maintenance concerns at the park’s fields, parking lot and restrooms. Medina and other speakers urged clearer roles among leagues, the county and volunteer groups and requested a stakeholder meeting to coordinate repairs and operations.

The parks division reported that a restroom renovation near the skate building is complete and functional. A staff presentation said the county recently budgeted about $70,000 from park impact funds for a set of near-term repairs (door replacements, drain covers, wall repairs and painting) and will put that work out to bid. Staff also described a larger phase of work for the adjacent parking lot and ball fields; staff gave a total current cost estimate for the larger project in the meeting as about $1,000,000 and said available park-impact funds were limited, leaving a shortfall to be determined.

Why this matters: Veterans Memorial Park is heavily used by youth leagues and community groups. Speakers said safety, vandalism, field surfacing, garbage and lighting problems have reduced…