The people of Grayson were promised a community park. They were promised public basketball courts, tennis courts, and an amphitheater. Those amenities were part of the vision presented to the public, and they helped justify support for this project. Yet none of them have been built.
Instead, the Grayson Sports Park has been centered almost entirely around travel baseball and softball.
That is a serious departure from what the public was told. Local taxpayers are helping fund this project through a restaurant tax, but the broad community space they were promised has not been delivered. What was introduced as a public asset for families, events, recreation, and community use has been narrowed into something that serves a far smaller purpose.
People in this community have every right to be angry. They were sold one vision and handed another. They were asked to support a park for the whole public, and what they have gotten is a project that looks increasingly commercial, increasingly exclusive, and far less rooted in the needs of everyday people in Grayson.
That frustration only deepens when this Commission chooses to partner with an out-of-state materials company instead of prioritizing local businesses. Local people are paying for this project. Local businesses should not be an afterthought.
The public deserves an honest answer to this question. Where is the community park they were promised? Where are the courts, the fields, and the amphitheater? At what point does this Commission intend to answer for the gap between what was sold and what was actually built?
Right now, this does not look like accountable public investment. It looks like a broken promise funded by local tax dollars.
– McClain Dyer | Concerned Graysonite
