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Will tree cutting resume at Lorain's Oakwood Park to make room for renovation project?

Posted at 9:50 PM, Mar 05, 2017
and last updated 2017-03-05 21:50:37-05

Oakwood Park gets its name from the hundreds of oak trees that fill the park in south Lorain.

After the city received a nine million dollar federal grant to overhaul the park, city leaders had workers start clearing trees to make room for baseball, football, soccer fields and a lot more.

But city council chose to stop the tree removal over concerns healthy trees were being cleared away along with rotted ones.

The city has already cut down 50 trees. 

The city's safety director wrote a letter to council informing them the Ohio Department of Natural Resources inspected the trees and marked 111 trees that run a high risk of falling down, or are in imminent danger of falling. 

Not everyone is convinced more than a hundred trees need to come down.

“This was not done in the way it was presented to council originally, some of these trees are very clearly healthy,” said Lorain city council member Mary Springowski.

Springowski also believes the federal grant should be spread out over all of the city's parks.

“We have a lot of parks in the city of Lorain, that need attention, not just one,” Springowski said.

The safety director has said he wants the work to continue so the federal grant isn't revoked.

Springowski says the work on Oakwood Park doesn't all need to be done at one time.

“I think this park needs to be worked on section by section, so people can still enjoy it while it's being worked on,” Springkowski said.

Lorain City Council will discuss the future of Oakwood Park during a council meeting Monday night at Lorain City Hall.