By NICK BUDD
Hays Post
At Thursday’s work session, Hays city commissioners discussed adding a first responder/military memorial to Municipal Park, while also changing the name of the park itself.
According to the proposal, the memorial would consist of two aluminum plaques that would be engraved on each side, a lit American flag, a park identification plaque, and provisions to place additional flags. Plaque would be dedicated to the U.S. Armed Forces and first responders such as police, EMS and firefighters.
The Wild West Festival committee approached the city to be among the sponsors, asking for a $5,000 contribution.
The proposal said plaques would include sponsorship engravings for the city and local business sponsors. The Wild West Committee also called for the renaming to Wild West Festival Park.
Hays Mayor Kent Steward noted that during his discussions with residents, most objected to the idea of renaming the park.
“My immediate reaction to the name change was very negative and, when I presented it to a number of people, I could barely get the words out of my mouth before they objected to it,” he said. “Municipal Park is very generic and Wild West Fest Park is too generic because the park is used for a variety of other things. How about Wild West Park? It still reflects on all of you and what you do, but it’s broader than that because Wild West is Hays. That’s our heritage.”
Another topic of the discussion was the sponsorship situation. Several commissioners objected to the idea of adding sponsorship spots to a memorial.
“It is inappropriate to have a sponsorship for a memorial that is so public,” said Commissioner Henry Schwaller IV. “Coca-Cola didn’t bring us Arlington National Cemetery and Mount Hood, and we don’t have a sponsor for Mount Allen. That part of it really digs under my skin. If they want to do it out of the goodness of their hearts and not have their logo engraved, than I’m OK with that.”
Mary Karst, co-president of the Wild west Festival committee, offered an alternate solution that didn’t place them directly on the monument.
“We came up with the idea of placing a granite slab somewhere in the sidewalk,” she said. “That way, it isn’t so attached to the memorial itself as it is to the park, and it would say something along the lines of ‘park improvements made possible by the generosity of these sponsors.’ ”
The commission and the committee agreed to wait one more work session cycle to discuss to the plan for a possible decision at its March 27 meeting.