A land swap between the City of Delta and the Delta School District that would free up land for a second turf field at Mackie Park is closer to being completed.
City council passed an application to amend the land use designation, allowing a total of about 22,000 square feet of land —roughly one half located north of Gray Elementary, the other sitting east of Hellings Elementary — to be consolidated and subdivided.
A staff report said the city would give a 21,054-sq.ft. slice of Hellings Park to the school district, while the city would receive 21,840 sq.ft of land sitting immediately north of Gray Elementary. The latter parcel would be added to a gravel field in order to make it large enough for a full-size artificial turf field.
The city will also hand over 786 sq.ft. of land sitting between the Mackie Park baseball field and Sands Secondary to the district to make up the difference in size between the two main parcels.
City manager Sean McGill said the amendments to the official community plan have to go through a second reading before moving on to public consultation, for which no date has been set yet.
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The addition of a second artificial turf field at Mackie Park is part of larger plan to upgrade, replace or build a number of sports and recreation facilities turfs in Delta, including a new track at North Delta Secondary.
The city has budgeted $5 million for the new field and building it will require “significant civil works, including drainage improvements, as well as field lighting and other user amenities consistent with the intensive, year-round use of a synthetic turf field,” according to a July 2018 report by the city’s parks, recreation and culture department.
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