SHAMOKIN - A handicap-accessible community garden proposed for Claude Kehler Community Park could be completed in September, according to the city clerk.
Steve Bartos said bid specifications for the project, budgeted at $45,000, could be advertised for three weeks beginning May 22 and a contract awarded June 12. If work begins immediately, he said the garden could be completed by early- to mid-September and perhaps in time for the annual Tunnel to Towers benefit chicken barbecue and 5K being planned for Sept. 14.
The Degenstein Foundation has pledged $20,000 for the project, and the city will use $25,000 in reallocated Community Development Block Grant funds.
A handicap-accessible garden was proposed in March by members of the Self Advocates for Northumberland County. The idea is to provide a site where people with and without disabilities can interact together and produce fruits and vegetables to be shared at no cost.
An architectural drawing of the proposed garden was reviewed and discussed Wednesday by the mayor and city council members during council's monthly workshop session.
The proposed garden serves as an extension of the Kehler Park. The plans call for the garden area to be developed along Carbon Run, beginning behind the new pavilion and bathrooms at Arch and Third streets and continuing a short distance south, ending just around a bend where Mineral Street begins.
One set of raised garden beds would be installed to allow easy access for the disabled. Another set of on-grade planters is planned. They would be placed on either side of an open air pavilion planned for the garden's center. A walking path made of permeable concrete pavers is planned, as are benches and landscaping.
Bartos said Lenape Solar of Sunbury has offered to sell solar lighting equipment at cost for the garden.
The project is modeled after an existing handicap-accessible garden at Degenstein Library, 40 S. Fifth St., Sunbury. A presentation on raised garden beds is planned there for 1 p.m. Saturday, hosted by the Penn State Master Gardeners of Northumberland and Snyder Counties.
Shamokin's garden project is part of a push to reinvigorate the vitality of the Kehler Park. Its use seems on the uptick because events are planned there for the Tunnel to Towers Run along with the Jeep Jamboree registration event on June 6 and a chicken barbecue and 5K to benefit the city's 150th Anniversary Committee on June 22.
City officials are also pursuing a state grant to expand the park across Shamokin Creek, behind the site of the former Coal Hole.
A $200,000-plus upgrade on the park was completed last summer. Funded with state grand money, it brought about the new pavilion and bathrooms, lighting and sidewalks and benches, and repairs to existing park buildings and band shell. At the time of a ribbon cutting in June, state Sen. John Gordner, R-27, and state Rep. Kurt Masser, R-107, talked about the renovation as a jumping off point for further city-state collaboration on revitalization efforts at Kehler Park and beyond.