City officials put unreasonable demands on Chehaw

Imagine for a moment, being offered an exciting new job opportunity. This job entails managing a small city. The job requirements mandate this city be properly maintained and run with extreme efficiency. Operating within a budget is mandatory.

Now … imagine being told you must do all that is expected while cutting that budget $30,000 every year for the next five years, meaning your task is to replace $150,000 with new revenue streams just to break even over the next five-year period. Plus, you must allow for the increased cost of inflation. If you were interviewing for the job, I suspect you would graciously decline and walk away.

The situation just described is the relationship between the city of Albany and Chehaw Park. As a long-standing volunteer at Chehaw, I am bewildered at this logic. Without the city’s continued support, this is an unrealistic expectation for Chehaw’s current environment to improve. Personally, when visiting a new area, there are certain things that make me want to return. The area must be inviting, clean, well-maintained, and offer something new and interesting.

As a Chehaw volunteer, it is my opinion that this is the intended direction of the management of Chehaw park. If the city of Albany support continues to decline for Chehaw, so does labor and maintenance. It’s simple math, and moving in the wrong direction to draw return visitors to our area. I believe our city commissioners have good intentions. But I also believe they fail to see the end result of their decisions.

Carol Letson

Jackson