Fort Mill to reopen playground, summer camp, fields, a farmers market. Here’s when.
Fort Mill will open its playgrounds, its ball fields for summer league play and for the first time in several years, a farmers market.
Fort Mill Town Council voted several times during its virtual meeting Monday night on issues related to reopening from COVID-19 coronavirus social distancing. The town closed parks in March and only reopened green area of parks for limited exercise since.
A town resident who submitted public comment ahead of the virtual meeting Monday messaged she has “five grandchildren ready to play outside” and asked that playgrounds reopen.
“If families want to take the risk to use the playground,” the resident messaged, “they should be able.”
Town council voted unanimously to reopen playgrounds on June 12.
“This would give us enough time to get our appropriate signage together,” said Brown Simpson, town parks and recreation director.
The town also would reopen restrooms at parks that have them, to allow hand washing. Temporary hand washing stations are an option at sites that don’t have restrooms.
“At Walter Elisha Park we do not have that at this time,” said Davy Broom, town manager, “so we could provide that.”
The town asks that parents have children wash hands and use hand sanitizer. They ask all participants to follow social distancing guidelines to every extent they can.
“That’s going to be difficult with children,” said Mayor Guynn Savage.
Simpson said the town will do everything it can to clean parks, but the rest is up to people who use the playgrounds.
“The biggest thing out of those guidelines is, we’re going to place...signage at all the playgrounds that says use at your own risk,” Simpson said.
Tega Cay and Clover already opened parks, while York and Rock Hill are in process, Simpson said. Councilman Jamie Shirey said reopened parks will be great for families, particularly children, couped up for months by coronavirus.
“I know it’s been trying on them with school,” he said. “I’ve got a whole neighborhood full of kids happy right now, out riding bikes.”
Councilman Chris Moody, himself a parent of young children, knows what parks mean to families.
“There’s going to be a lot of happy mothers,” he said.
Still, reopening decisions can’t be made without word from state officials who have more resources to know when its safe to play.
“Every decision we’ve made to date,” Savage said, “we’ve been in lockstep with what we’ve been asked to do.”
Another vote Monday night allows the town to hold outdoor tennis and multisport summer camps with limited capacity starting June 22. Another allows youth and adult sport practices at outdoor fields. Competitive play can begin June 22.
Simpson said he’s studied other places where fields have reopened to address issues related to summer church league softball and travel ball play in Fort Mill.
“One of the things we looked at from a safety standpoint, is keeping an area behind home plate, behind the dugout from gate to gate, that would be reserved for the players and coaches,” Simpson said.
Several organizations now use bleachers for teams to space out rather than packing players in dugouts during team at-bats. Even handshakes and high-fives have been nixed.
“That’s been the consensus of what would be the safest way to do this,” Simpson said.
Town staff will clean restrooms, and water fountains will be shut off. Players will have to bring their own drinks and sign waivers to play.
“The sooner we get those in the hands of the team, the better,” Savage said.
Town rules could change if recommendations from the state do.
“It’s not anything we’ve faced before,” Savage said. “We’re blazing a new path here.”
Farmers market
While it isn’t reopening from coronavirus, a new farmers market would bring back something the town hasn’t seen in several years. Council voted to approve a new market in the area near Veterans Park, White and Clebourne streets.
“We were hoping to be able to start it on June 20,” said Jacona Hester, town event organizer.
Broom said the idea is to start with about 10 farmers or vendors, but it could expand. Each year a handful of farmers ask about the idea of a market, he said.
“It’s something that we’ve been trying to do for a few years now,” Broom said. “We would love for this program, if approved, we’d love to see it grow.”
Hester studied how other established markets either reopened or plan to, to find the best social distancing methods. The market could, town leaders say, in a way benefit from social distancing.
“As orders are relaxed by the governor,” Broom said, “people are looking to get out of the house and do things.”
Several years back the town had a farmers market in the First Baptist Church parking lot. With town growth and community interest Broom believes Fort Mill can put a market together that is as good or better than other established ones.
“We want to draw people to the downtown area,” he said. “Again, safely, but it’s a program to highlight Fort Mill.”
This story was originally published June 9, 2020 at 8:08 AM with the headline "Fort Mill to reopen playground, summer camp, fields, a farmers market. Here’s when.."
