Roseland park plan revisited

Santa Rosa is updating plans for a 20-acre park in Roseland with an eye toward developing it in phases instead of waiting until it has acquired all the property.

The city is hosting three public meetings, the first one Thursday, to get public input on plans for Roseland Creek Community Park.

“We want to bring the community back to take a look at it again and see if there’s anything we want to add to the plan,” said Adriane Mertens, marketing and outreach coordinator for the Recreation and Parks Department

The city owns three of the four parcels it needs to build the park between Burbank and McMinn avenues.

A community planning process in 2010 created a draft master plan that called for the preservation of much of the northern portion of the park with more active recreation facilities on the southern portion.

The northern parcels are largely oak woodland and grassland. Plans for that portion included a public trail, plus interpretive signs and a restored stretch of Roseland Creek.

The city is motivated to revisit the plan now because it has received a $1.4 million grant from the Sonoma County Agriculture and Open Space District, which requires construction to begin by Feb. 1, Mertens said.

But since it doesn’t yet own a 2.6-acre parcel with a home in the middle of the site, the city has decided to begin developing the northern properties now and complete work on the rest of the park later, Mertens said.

Tonight’s meeting is from 6 to 7:30 at Roseland Elementary School, 950 Sebastopol Road. Another meeting is scheduled from 10:30 a.m. to noon Saturday at the same location. The third will be June 25 from 4:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., also at the school.

You can reach Staff Writer Kevin McCallum at 521-5207 or kevin.mccallum@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @srcitybeat.