Dormont Borough Council SuperCommittee Meeting - August 12, 2026

You

can call the meeting to order.

This is a super committee meeting of council for November 17th.

Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God, indivisible with liberty

and justice for

all.

Okay, we don't have any registered comments from the public.

So we're gonna move to the recreation and community affairs committee.

So don't we're first, finally first.

And I forgot to put agenda items on.

So the only agenda item we have is um

I'm

gonna hand it over and discuss the playground.

So yeah, uh Mark Ardenbach, Borough Engineer.

Um so

I

have a packet of paper in front of you guys.

Uh everyone should have that.

Uh I also send out the drop box link for the papers that are there for anyone online.

And then I think Melinda can pull up anything if there are attendees that need to see things online.

Um, but otherwise, I'll get started going through it, Melinda, if that's good.

Okay, so we'll start from the beginning.

Um we are at a a significant milestone point when it comes to getting this project going.

Um, that being um I'm here to show you where phase one currently stands in relation to where we started, uh say with the first document in here back in March in 2024.

Um, and to go over uh what's included, what we're including in phase one and what is our uh at the staff level, uh trying to project of how we want to accomplish everything that was um uh garnered in the master plan development of the entire park project right now.

So if we look at the first document you have, you have the overall site plan.

And this was this was the original concept in this very schematic phase that was presented to DCNR, um, included with a cost estimate of uh cost estimate for the grant funding that's being utilized uh for phase one.

So you can see you know, this was this was the kind of crayon level uh um the document that we're at.

Um just kind of hypothesizing how we can get funding in order to get this project off the ground and get started with replacing the castle um and moving into having a new multifunctional space that we use for the community um to replace the castle and have a playground as

well.

So

I I include this document because it's important to note, you know, we came we came from this very high-level schematic document, you know, uh in 2024.

Um if you go to the next document, then you have where we we got the new uh master plan, uh taking the input uh from the meetings that have that have happened uh with um during the development of this, uh noting that you have starting uh starting from the right of the pay plan, moving to the left.

You have the parking lot near the new bathroom, you have the new playground space working into the community green pavilion, and then going down into a walk in the park.

Uh very very four different segmented portions of this project uh that were identified as important, important parts to be constructed in different phases uh as this moves along.

Um so that we have the new master plan third document.

You can show um now we got to the point, you know, we're we're in phase one here.

Uh we're looking to meet what we identified as the goal of the ultimate build of phase one uh is to achieve a playground that is open and ready for the public July 4th.

So, in order for us and council here, you know, from the from us as engineers and from the staff level, um, we need to push forward uh with phase one in order to meet that goal and timing uh in the coming months in order to have everything uh out in the street with the contractor uh to get a contractor on board to then uh start construction and and have everything move forward that a playground will be open and ready as part of phase one.

So uh looking at this document, you can see we have phase one, phase two, uh, which is phase two is is going to include the parking lot and a stormwater install.

Uh phase three would be the community spills, the community green, uh that includes the stage and pavilion.

And phase four would be the walk in the park, which include any engagement activity um such as the sword in the stone uh that we kind of identified in the master plan process with the with the um playground committee.

Um and basically works of what's uh uphill to downhill.

Um and I and this is what we have identified right now in phase one of maximizing the use of the budget that's available through DC and our grant funding to the maximum extent that we can build based on that right now.

Phase one would achieve uh playground engagement.

So the meetings that are coming up tomorrow with letters uh to go through the the play playground input uh that'd be coming from the different commun uh different groups, focus groups that are happening, and then also the hillside.

Uh the hillside has a significant portion of uh playground equipment too that that's going to be part of uh the part of and next to what would be leathers uh main engagement piece, you know, that'll be a part of the the equipment as

well.

So

uh

this is the phasing diagram.

If there's is there any questions on what we identified

here,

um, included with your packets is also uh the cost estimates.

And I think that's a very important part to bring up with this.

So when we started where we are now with a complete master plan broken up into different phases, identify it with specific budgets, sets this project up for a multi-year phase build-out.

Um, allows the borough to strategically attack uh grants and funding opportunities that have a design plan and and a uh true engineers estimate attached with it in order to identify and and and easily go after those without having the crayon level sketch, you know, that we had previously before.

Like we are showing this is what the community wants, and this is how we can implement it.

What we need is the funding to then go along with that.