Likening Greenwood to a “huge, big puzzle,” Mayor Carolyn McAdams told the Greenwood Rotary Club on Monday that the city’s future is both bright and challenging.
The mayor said a lot of focus has been on cleaning and grooming the city. She likened that to building a puzzle along the bottom and the sides.
“Now, we’re beginning to put those bigger pieces of the puzzle together,” McAdams said.
The Howard Street/Johnson Street project, which started and grew under the tenures of former mayors Harry Smith and Sheriel Perkins, is now finished, McAdams said.
McAdams said she did change some specifications of the $1.7 million project, such as the installation of historical lighting and the sealing of the streets.
The mayor pointed out that the Mississippi Department of Transportation and Greenwood Utilities put up the bulk of the funds for the street renovations.
McAdams said another piece of the Greenwood puzzle will be the creation of the Linear Park, which will run along the former Columbus & Greenville Railway right of way downtown.
McAdams said after the meeting that she would like to see the park showcase the city’s heroes — both living and dead — with a Hollywood “walk of fame”-type element.
In addition, the park will provide a safer route to school for children attending Davis Elementary and Greenwood Middle schools.
Plans include police patrols using two Segway personal transports, McAdams said.
The park will also provide for a food vendor court, which will rotate on a monthly basis.
McAdams encouraged interested parties to contact her office to provide input on what should be included in the park’s final plan.
“We feel like this is going to be the icing on the cake,” she said.
McAdams said she and the City Council, which had a rocky start when she first took office, are working together. For example, when it came to renovate Main Street, a historic artery into the city, McAdams asked the council members to forgo projects in their own wards for the effort.
“They were great; they all agreed. Most of them gave up their money for their respective wards and gave it to the entire city,” she said.
McAdams said $986,000 has been earmarked for Main Street. The street renovation has been slow but is coming together, she said.
“First, I have to say it did look like a mess. But now, it is really beginning to look like a boulevard,” she said.
Work on the Greenwood puzzle will continue into the future, she said.
“This is a puzzle that’s going to be here for a lifetime, whether I’m here or whoever’s here. I hope they continue the puzzle because I believe in Greenwood,” McAdams said.
The mayor said working together is the key — “everybody seeing where we are going and everybody seeing that we’re going to get there.”
• Contact Bob Darden at 581-7239 or bdarden@gwcommonwealth.com.
