Parks and recreation presented a quality-of-life allocation of roughly $79,039,000 in the draft SPLOST 9 package, covering facility revitalization, transit and park-specific requests such as May Park and aquatics improvements. Staff said the original requests were larger but that many items were cut or reduced during staff review.

Commissioners probed whether reduced line items fully fund projects or would require phasing across multiple SPLOST cycles. Parks staff said items such as Jones Pool, currently closed, and other aquatics projects will likely need phased funding and that some proposed improvements cannot be fully completed with the current column of dollars.

A repeated point in the session: whether $10,000,000 proposed as seed money for a new community center in Southwest Augusta should be retained or reallocated. Commissioners and speakers from the public pressed to keep a community center on the list. Patricia Jeter, a Southwest Augusta resident, told the commission the area is the city’s fastest-growing and needs a local community center for jobs, youth programs and crime prevention; she asked the board not to remove the request.

The Riverwalk and an associated boathouse drew questions about scope and costs. Staff said a master plan is underway and that part of the $22,000,000 item covers planning and design; commissioners asked for detailed cost estimates and construction plans before funding significant construction elements of the boathouse.

Several commissioners suggested design-build contracts and feasibility studies to firm up costs before committing major construction dollars. Staff agreed to pull back historical cost analyses and to provide more detailed estimates for the boathouse and other large recreational projects.