OP-ED: Yes, Let’s Keep Asking What The Northport Community Center Debate Is Really About

*The following is an opinion editorial written and submitted to Tuscaloosa Patch for publication by Sandra Barnidge*

When the swings went missing, we had a feeling something might be wrong.

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It was March and the weather was finally pleasant enough for my family to resume our seasonal habit of walking to the Northport Park with our young daughters. My older was ready to try the “big girl” swings, but when we arrived, we were surprised to find only an empty blue metal frame. “That’s odd,” my husband and I said to each other, hoping eventually the swings would reappear.

Instead, two months later, we heard from a neighbor that the city was putting the whole park up for sale, and it was destined to become a parking lot and short-lease condo building with an adjacent drive-through of some kind. I immediately pulled out my daughter’s markers and a sheet of bright pink paper, and together she and I made a Save Our Park sign. We held it up during the city council meeting on June 5, when the council voted unanimously to enter into a due diligence period with Beeker Property Group, which would end in the destruction of the park.

The vote lit a fuse in me. In 2023, what kind of city seriously entertains the prospect of paving over its oldest public park? What kind of city forces its police officers to silence those trying to speak out against such a backwards plan? What kind of city, exactly, had I chosen to be my daughters’ home?

I’m a Midwestern transplant to the Deep South and I’ve only lived in Northport for two years, so the last month has been a crash course in local politics, history, characters, and complexities. There’s a lot I don’t yet know about this place, obviously, but there is one thing I most definitely do: the people here care about Northport. They are open-eyed about the challenges of balancing development with preservation. They love big trucks and fast roads, sure, but they also appreciate the value of a good green space where they can gather and let their kids roam free.

Shortly after the council meeting, fellow downtown resident Amy LeePard launched a petition to save the park, and I started collecting signatures alongside her, my neighbor Paige Spencer, Spencer’s nine-year-old daughter Kathryn Evans, and several other volunteers. We went to the Northport Farmers Market, and I was floored by how many people approached our table, already well informed about the proposed sale and eager to defend the park from Beeker’s bulldozers. I listened to dozens of stories about the park’s heyday, when teenagers danced in the community center and kids played baseball at the long-gone diamond. I heard, too, about the park’s segregated origins, and how Black residents in town fought for equal access to the park and community center the council is now threatening to take away.

Most people agree that, overall, the park has seen better days in terms of maintenance, but no one likes the idea of destroying it wholesale.

Through the petition work, I met other vocal park supporters, including a small group who began talking about what the park could become if we manage to save it. There’s no shortage of possibilities: an upgraded, accessible playground; a facelift for the community center; more shade trees and native plants; a sculpture garden; a space for food trucks—we have several pages of handwritten ideas, and we haven’t even asked the broader community to share theirs, too.

In his latest column for Patch, Ryan Phillips visited the Northport Park and reflected that, “[I] couldn’t help but think if the tall grass and noticeable litter were an honest reflection of a park that those in the community actually want to save.”

The answer is no, of course not. As someone who has personally cleaned up litter at the park so my daughters wouldn’t get ahold of empty cans and used napkins, I can say without hesitation that the status quo of the park is not what my kids — or any of the kids from diverse backgrounds who play there regularly — deserve. I want the park to be better. So, too, do many of my neighbors. To that end, we’ve filed for nonprofit status to launch a new Northport Community Foundation, and we already have $30,000 in pledges from local nonprofits and individuals to revitalize the park. All that, and we don’t even have a website yet for me to conveniently plug here.

We could easily transform the Northport Park into an attractive, iconic entrance to the city. Considering its physical proximity to the Hugh R. Thomas Bridge into Tuscaloosa, the park is the perfect space to serve as a symbolic bridge between Northport’s past and future—and between the two halves of downtown that are too-often separated by Lurleen Wallace Boulevard in all the worst ways. My council district representative, Christy Bobo, previously told Patch the city has long been on the hunt for ways to “beautify and open up gateway areas to Northport.” I suspect most Northport residents would probably agree with me that a spruced-up art park could be a much prettier gateway than another asphalt parking lot.

In short, letting Beeker pave over the park now takes away what we currently have, along with the potential of what the community could build in the future, together.

My neighbors and I were planning to announce the launch of the new foundation later this summer, with a fuller plan (and pictures!) to engage the community and the council. But Patch’s photographs of park litter this week have prompted us to spill the beans a little ahead of schedule. We’ll tell you more when we’re ready, I promise. We’ll get a website.

At the June 19 city council meeting, I appeared before the council and asked them to transform the public outrage at Beeker’s offer into positive energy to revitalize the park. The council appeared to be actively listening to my remarks, as well as listening to Spencer’s comments on behalf of the park. But at the end of the meeting, the council surprised the crowd by announcing that instead of backing off the sale, they were going to press on, and, worse, they would now consider repealing a long-standing resolution that makes it (rightfully) difficult to sell not only the Northport Park, but also Kentuck Park, Civitan Park, and the Robert Hasson Community Center. In short, all four of Northport’s downtown parks could soon be at risk of sale to developers.

I was — and still am — upset and confused by the council’s escalation of this controversy, both during council meetings and in spats with park supporters on social media. As a newcomer to Northport, I find myself asking one question over and over: Why is this happening?

For answers, I started by asking other park supporters, including LeePard, who was one of the strongest advocates for the Northport Park in 2015, when the city council first introduced the idea of selling it to become a Krispy Kreme. For eighteen months, LeePard, along with Jody Jobson, Spencer, and many other Northport residents, gathered signatures on a petition, hosted events, and held the council accountable to every procedural rule in the book to stave off the sale. Eventually, the council tabled the idea and seemed to move on.

Yet the first generation of park defenders noticed the council was oddly cool about passing a resolution to dedicate the Northport Park as a park in perpetuity, which would have prevented the exact crisis we’re now facing with a new council and a different developer.

Why?

At this point, the question is not whether the community wants to sell the Northport Park. We don’t. The question is not whether we are truly invested in revitalizing and maintaining the park for the long haul. We are. And the question is not whether we want a Starbucks or a Krispy Kreme at that particular location. We want neither, not there, not in exchange for the park.

We’ve all read Council President Jeff Hogg’s leaked email from last year about how developers matter more than constituents during elections, and Patch has previously reported on some of the connections between city council members and local real-estate developers. Yet it’s hard to follow money we can’t see, either on or off city books. The community simply can’t answer the why question on our own.

And so, to repeat Patch’s recent column headline, what is the Northport Community Center debate really about?

The people who know the answer will be sitting in city hall, in front of the community, on Monday, July 10, at 5:30.

Maybe one of them can also tell us what happened to the swings.

Sandra Barnidge is a writer based in Northport, Alabama. She is a founding member of the Northport Community Foundation, which will support local greenspace initiatives. The opinions expressed in this editorial are those solely of the author and in no way reflective of the views held by Tuscaloosa Patch or our parent company. To submit op-eds for future publication, email them to ryan.phillips@patch.com for consideration.