 Good afternoon to everyone. My name is Henry Simons. I'm the Assistant City Manager for Operation, of course, for the City of Columbia. Of course, we would like to welcome you and thank you for your presence on today as we celebrate the new ball field lighting amenities here at All Stars Field. Thank you, of course, to our Mayor, Steve Benjamin, our City Council members present, of course. Councilor McDowell representing this district. Councilwoman Devine, thank you so much for your presence on today. I also want, of course, to acknowledge our City Manager, Ms. Teresa Wilson in her absence for all of her continued guidance, of course, in direction on all of the parks and recreation projects. Being able to provide a place where our young children can feel safe and enjoy recreation means a lot to the City of Columbia. All Stars Field is a project that we are, of course, extremely proud of and grateful to see how nicely things have come together. This again confirms our commitment to the citizens of this community and to our great city. This portion of the project would not be possible without the partnership through the Sackalina Parks Recreation and Tourism. We were awarded a grant through their Parks and Recreation Development Fund initiative, just over $180,000. In addition, there was a 20% match provided by the City of Columbia, which brought the total for this project to close to $170,000. Our ability to add lighting provides an element of safety, visibility, and provides additional time late in the evenings to utilize the field. So we are very proud of what we have done here at All Stars Field, and we will continue to work hard to improve the quality of life for this community and across the City of Columbia. We feel very strongly that these additional amenities provide a safe environment that allows families to come together, allows them to rest, allows them to relax while their children enjoy the activities that these amenities provide. So we are very grateful to be here with you today. Now at this time we are going to ask Councilman Ed McDowell to provide some remarks. I assure you we won't be here long because it's getting hotter the longer we sit here. Let me say a word of thanks to our Mayor, to my colleague, Ms. Devine, to our President of the Book of Washington Hike Association, Ms. Regina Williams, to all of you who have gathered here. This is a delightful day in the life of our city. Six years ago a group of citizens from this area met with me on this piece of property and wanted to do more than kids running out into an open field. They said to me, we need something for our kids, for our children. At the time there were about 3,000 children in this area and in so providing activities for them, our city, our parks and recreation, they were able to secure grants. And just a word of thanks to Senator John Scott for assisting us with that grant. Of course you would look at this park today and say, well, it's all done. No, it's not all done. There are many other things that we're going to be attempting to do. We've already received a grant already to install bathrooms in this area. These lights are going to play an integral part of what takes place, of course, when it gets dark and the evening falls. This will offer activities for our children in lighted, secure and safe background. In addition to that, we've already entered into conversation about clearing off this lot, this piece of property, to the rear of me. So that when you come down less to drive, you don't have to turn into the woods and follow the yellow brick road down to the park. We are going to make it accessible because it is an old star park. Many thanks to our mayor because this is just the first rung of what we talked about almost six years ago. Starting here and moving towards West Beltline with development. So thank you for being here. Thank you for allowing us, the city of ours, these staff persons who give of their time, talent, gifts and service to make sure and ensure that we continue to grow. So keep a watch on us because we are continuing to grow. Bathrooms are next and after which the parcel of land will be cleared for immediate access off of less to drive. Thank you very much. Good afternoon everyone, or I guess it's still morning. I'm not going to talk long as Reverend McDowell mentioned, it's hot. But I did want to, as I was sitting here and speaking with Mr. Simons and the mayor and Reverend McDowell earlier, to talk about this piece of if you look to my right, your left, you see a housing complex. For far too long in this community, people have looked at Bethel Bishop Noun North Point. They looked at Colony and talked about the things that aren't always as positive. But we know this is a very strong community with a lot of strong families. But the kids need something to do. And now with this part, we'll be able to have things for the kids to do. Yesterday we had a great football game where law enforcement, excuse me, football, kickball game where law enforcement and kids were here. And we were able to have this as a place not just for activity, but a place for families and congregations. So as we talk about this all-star field, we also need to think about the anchor that this all-star field will have to this great community. And as we continue to grow and develop, as Reverend McDowell talked about, this development will allow us an opportunity to fully embrace these young people and them have productive things to do, things outside, things that are active, but things that will help them dream about being an all-star. So we thank the partnership and thank the mayor and Mr. McDowell for their leadership and making sure that we have this here in the community. But Ms. Williams, we know that this is only the first of very much more that we need to do, and we will continue to push so that these kids have more activities in their backyard. Thank you. I'm going to also be brief and then I'm going to introduce the lady of the hour, Regina Williams, my friend of 30-plus years. I couldn't be more thankful for the leadership. Henry, Randy, Carrie, your entire team at Parks & Rec, not just because of the physical vision we see here, but the constant relationship building that is invested into the men and women who work every single day to make this community special for our children. As Ms. Devine mentioned, just to our right, we see an amazing opportunity, some beautiful young bright minds. You nurture them with love. You give them everything they need that children deserve, and they will yield the fruit that we know indeed that they can be. A great city is a collection of great neighborhoods. Great neighborhoods are a collection of great people and great leaders. And just as I thank our internal staff, Mr. McDowell, for his leadership here in District 2, and he referenced, of course, Senator Scott and his amazing leadership in helping us secure resources as well. My greatest thanks goes to Regina and all the men and women over here who toil in the vineyards every single day to make sure that these kids have the opportunity to do the great things that we know God has in store for them. They are amazingly gifted. They need the opportunity, the luxury of being children right now. And this is what All-Star feels all about, giving kids the same opportunities that we had to come out and do amazing things. So it's my pleasure, again, on behalf of the city, on behalf of our city manager, I know it would be here, Teresa Wilson, if she could. My greatest thanks to Tyler at the Union Avenue, our parks and rec staff. We have a team here that does it and does it well. My colleagues here on council, a great thank you. But my greatest thank you to the men and women who make this community great. And I want to yield to my friend, Regina Williams, who does it every single day. As Mayor Benjamin said, he's known me and he's had to pull my cocktail or shirt tail since we were at USC together. And I appreciate our relationship. I'm Regina E. Williams, president of Book of Washington Heights neighborhood organization. I want to thank Randy Davis and Ms. Pearl Osborn at Parks and Rec for helping me to navigate paperwork to have events to come through Parks and Rec. As mentioned yesterday, we had a phenomenal program down here where it was joy over nonsense. We had over 100 children, black, white, all races, families, people came in from Winsborough around here. The city of Columbia's recruits, it was phenomenal. And people were just saying how wonderful the children are. And that is what our goal is. Our goal is to shine the light on the positive aspects of our community. I want to also thank Mr. Davis, Parks and Rec, and everybody who was responsible for getting grants to install equipment needed to make this a fully operational park. I'd like to thank Councilman Ed McDowell along with Councilwoman Tamika Isaac Devine and Councilman Howard DeVall for always being in touch with the needs of this community. I'd like to thank the city of Columbia Police Department. They are phenomenal. I can't say why I'm so appreciative of them today, but if you see what they do and what they did yesterday, you would understand. I can't talk about it, but I do appreciate Chief Holbrook, Deputy Chief Melron Kelly, and Captain White who led the efforts yesterday. We even had the ice cream truck here. These lights are symbolic. I want you to look at these lights. These lights are symbolic that we will continue to shine light on the crime that is prevalent here in our neighborhood. I cannot look at this beautiful field and think that everything looks like this. We have a lot of crime here. Prayerfully we will be meeting with the owners of these apartment complexes for them to help the City of Columbia Police Department with the crime. These are private owned. The City of Columbia is so busy protecting everywhere. We have to have the owners to take responsibility. And that is what we are praying is going to happen really, really soon. Also we are praying that these lights shine light on the aesthetics of our community. The bushes, the trees as Councilman McDowell has mentioned, we're already in talk to cut these trees down to make it safe. To clean up the area to make it look pretty like some other areas in the City of Columbia. We're looking forward to that happening. And we're looking forward to the Bellfield Center to become a hub for the City. Even possibly putting a gymnasium there. Using parks and recreation to possibly shuttle children and families across Beltline. To make that a hub. I went to that school when it was serenance. And I know what it was then. And I know what it can be. I thank everybody. I thank you for this opportunity. And we are so blessed and so fortunate and we stick with you. Book of Washington Heights stands on the positive side of change. My Vice President is here. If he would stand. I'm so thankful. Book of Washington Heights stands on the positive side of change. And we're looking for nothing but positivity. Have a great day. Thank you again to everybody. And if you need me, I am retired. I am right here for you. Just really quickly, thank you Ms. Regina for your comments. I want to quickly acknowledge again some of our parks and recreation staff members who are present with us today. Of course the Mayor has already recognized our Randy Davis, our Director. But I also want to recognize Ms. Hattie Bean there. Our Deputy Director is with us. Stephanie Belvin, Ebony Kelly, Todd Martin, Ray Williams, Fred Kitt. Thank you all so much. I just want to really thank, I'm sorry, I see Carrie back there. He was acknowledged earlier. But I also want to thank our Public Relations Department. You know, they have been awesome. We've done a number of ribbon cuttings and dedications and under the leadership of Director Alicia Utsi. Just some amazing work. And thank you so much. Our Parks and Recreation Public Relations Manager Kevin Crawford is with us today. Just a phenomenal team. So I just want to acknowledge them as well. And now we're going to transition into the ribbon cutting at this time. So thank you all so much for being here. God bless you.