WHATELY — As soon as funding is secured, the town will be ready to begin work on the upgrades planned for the Veterans’ Memorial Park adjacent to Town Hall.
Town Administrator Brian Domina said the town is hoping to cover the project with a combination of Community Preservation Act funds to be voted on at annual Town Meeting and a Veteran’s Heritage Grant, the application for which was submitted last week.
For the last few years, a four-member ad hoc committee of veterans has worked to redesign the memorial park on Chestnut Plain Road, which was last worked on in 1975, according to committee member Jim Ross.
After interviewing three landscape designers, the group contracted with the Conway School of Landscape Design in Northampton to design the space, Ross said.
“Conway gave us the idea of not just an open space, but to define the monument with some sort of a backdrop,” Ross said at a recent information session on the project. “We settled on a Goshen stone wall.”
He said the vision of the design school is to open up the area and remove the shrubs, many of which are invasive, and to turn the monument 180 degrees so it faces east.
“They wanted to maximize the view, so people coming in can enjoy the view to the east, and also they can turn to the west and observe the monument and any other celebrations that might be going on around that monument,” he said.
The memorial will be moved about 12 feet from its current location, and on either side of it will be two areas to display additional monuments, recognizing veterans who served before World War I and after Vietnam.
Ross added that the Whately Historical Society has been helpful in supplying names from the French and Indian War, and up to World War I.
“I think they’re still researching those to make sure there’s no duplicates and to give us a final template, probably in the summer,” Ross noted. “This is a nice addition to our monument.”
Veterans from after the Vietnam War will be more difficult to identify, he noted, as they’re covered under privacy laws. People will have to come forward to provide permission for the town to include their names.
“We’re also looking to add any corrections,” he said. “I’ve already received a couple from World War I and World War II and Vietnam. They will be corrected.”
The plans also include a new flagpole and a proposed sidewalk going through the park, replacing the current one that extends from the front of Town Hall.
“It was our desire to keep the maple tree from being impacted,” noted Highway and Building Superintendent Keith Bardwell. “To move that sidewalk any more east would then be detrimental to that maple tree.”
The town has contracted with Snow & Sons Landscaping in Greenfield to complete the landscaping work, as well as Sonam’s Stonewalls and Art in South Deerfield for the stone wall going behind the monument.
“As soon as the funds are available,” Ross said, “we’re prepared to start.”