 All right, good morning to everyone. My name is Henry Simons. I am the Assistant City Manager of operations course for the City of Columbia, and we like to welcome you and thank you Of course for your presence Here today as we celebrate the new amenities here at Owensfield Field Park Thank you to our mayor Steve Benjamin our city council members present with us today, of course Councilman Brennan Who represents this district also Councilman Duvall? Thank you also much for your presence on today I also want to of course acknowledge our city manager Teresa Wilson for all of her continued leadership and guidance Throughout this process on all the park projects that we facilitate through parks and recreation This ribbon-cutting Today is a continuous result of The good work that's been going on for the last several months The new bicycle pump track, which of course is Directly behind me is a great addition to the Owensfield Park and Compliments the existing skate park and the other amenities within the park the pump track is a bicycle course featuring rolling hills and berms that vary in height and frequency and Design for all skill levels The track surface is asphalt and one lap on the course equals point two miles This project was made possible Through our partnership with the South Carolina Parks and Recreation and Tourism who provided a grant in the amount of 95,900 dollars excuse me through the Recreation Trails Program a Mass provided by the city of Columbia placed the total at almost $128,000 and we're certainly excited about about that the project also includes a new large seating bench water fountain Bike station trash receptacles bike racks and landscaping amenities that includes irrigation We are certainly delighted With the progress that we've made here at Owensfield Park This is certainly another amenity that our children and their families will truly enjoy So thank you all so much for your presence on today And now at this time I'm going to pass it off to Councilman will Brennan for some additional remarks councilman How about it? What a beautiful day in the Rosewood South Kilburn and at a stoke court community here in Columbia It's great to see so many active folks this morning Here to help us celebrate the official opening of the Owensfield bicycle pump track You know, I got to tell you riding bikes at Owensfield Looks a lot different from way back in the 80s when my grandpa Joe would bring me up here to ride bikes This pump track is awesome. It is awesome Now as many of you you know and remember the grand opening was delayed by just a little bit But I can confirm This wonderful outdoor city of Columbia Park amenity saw a ton of use over the last year You know during COVID Many of us were reminded of the pleasures of being outdoors and exercising and Residents from all over the Midlands came to enjoy this pump track We are very lucky to have Owensfield Park here in District 3. I Want to take a moment and I want to thank Mayor Benjamin And my city council colleagues for their support of this park from the Miracle League field to the skate park To the disc golf course To the nature trails and more our little slice of outdoor heaven here in the Rosewood communities is truly a treasure Full for all of our city residents to enjoy looking to the future I also want to thank our future mayor and my future city council colleagues Whoever they may be for their future support for seeing the master plan for our Owensfield Park continue This bicycle pump track is a great example Of how our city parks and recreation staff identified and pursued state funding to help with this project To our wonderful team at the city of Columbia Parks and Recreation Department. Thank you For thinking outside the box Thinking outside the box on how to help improve our parks And I look forward to pursuing more funding for future projects here at Owensfield Thank you and ride safe Good morning It's great to see everyone today. I'm mike ealy vice president of the rosewood community council Rosewood has been excited about this project since we first heard about it And the pump track has been a wonderful addition to the park and the neighborhood over the past year I'd like to give a special thank you to Columbia Parks and Rec We had a brainstorming meeting over at Edison court about three years ago and the idea of a pump track came up Parks and rec really ran with the idea got the grant for the funding Help design the track and the end product turned out better than any of us imagine. It's been a wonderful project Thank you so much for your hard work on this project The pump track has quickly become one of the main highlights of the park It's amazing to see all the people using the pump track young and old bikes skateboards scooters roller skates runners We had envisioned it for bikes, but if you build it they will come We've had a great use of it. The track really has been a great use of funds That's reached a wide spectrum of our community and all over the midlands We've seen people from lexington ermo late carolina come to the park just to use the pump track We hope that city of columbia can build more pump tracks to fill that demand actually around the around the city Lastly, I'd like to thank the city of columbia for working so closely with rosewood community council on this project It's been a great collaboration from beginning to end And we're looking forward to working with the city on more projects in rosewood in the future. Thank you very much Thank you so much mike for your for your comments and It is certainly a awesome amenity here at oansfield and we're just excited about the future Of expanding the master plan as as councilman Brennan has shared Let me take a moment to again acknowledge a few people of course mike who was just before you thank him for His leadership and guidance and support from a community perspective We also want to thank neil hamilton Our state state trails coordinator for the cyclone of parks of recreation and tourism We also want to thank our parks and recreation leadership team as We talked about earlier led by mr. Randy davis who's the director of parks and recreation Of course, we have todd martin who's with us today our project manager and none of these things Will be possible without their hard work and dedication To the work for the citizens of our community. So we're grateful for their support Their leadership and their passion About what we want to see in our parks throughout the city of columbia We also want to acknowledge our parks and rec foundation as well for their continued guidance And support on all of the initiatives that take place around the city We're forever grateful for everyone coming together ensuring that Our children as well as our young adults Have an opportunity to continue to play and play in a safe manner. So we're grateful So now at this time we're going to move into the extra ribbon cutting ceremony And as we as we do that, uh, we'll have an opportunity if needed to take some additional interviews After the ceremony. So thank you so much for your presence on today