Paterson’s $15M Westside Park plan hinges on this federal grant

PATERSON — City officials are moving ahead with a $15 million plan to rehabilitate long-neglected Westside Park, but they don’t have all the funding for the project yet.

Paterson is waiting to find out if it will get a $4.9 million grant from the National Park Service, a decision officials said they expect in January.

The city’s Historic Preservation Commission gave the park renovation plan preliminary approval on Monday night and the planning board signed off on the project on Wednesday.

What investments would be made?

The work would include improvements to the existing recreation facilities, including the tennis courts, baseball field and Totowa Oval complex used for football and baseball, as well as the creation of a new cricket field, officials said.

The park, which was designated a local landmark in 2017, contains a collection of historic features — monuments, a Colonial-era home, a pavilion and a boat launch — that will be restored or relocated within the park, officials said.

There also will be new pathways, including the extension of a riverwalk, and some roads inside the park will be converted to walking paths.

“It’s a great milestone for all of us,” said Gianfranco Archimede, the city’s director of historic preservation. “We need the park to be preserved and remembered for its historic character.”

Bob Guarasci, the director of the New Jersey Community Development Corporation nonprofit group, said the park is underused at present, a situation he attributed to its “deplorable conditions.” Guarasci, whose organization started some of the early planning for the park more than five years ago, said he was excited by the renovation plan.

“You can’t deny this is going to be one of the biggest park rehabilitations in city history,” Guarasci said.

Christian Callegari, Mayor Andre Sayegh’s chief of staff, said Paterson already has secured $9.7 million for the project. Callegari said the work plan would be scaled back if Paterson doesn’t get the federal funding it applied for. He said the city has not decided exactly what would be cut in that worst-case scenario.

Historic Preservation Commission members Kelly Ruffel and Kenneth Simpson said their group was concerned when the first presentation about the park project didn’t address the historic aspects of Westside. Ruffel said the historic work eventually was added to the plans approved by the commission on Monday.

“We wanted to make sure they addressed the historic elements of the park,” Simpson said.

Who else is involved?

Paterson officials are working with an organization called New City Parks on the project.

“The park is within walking distance of 60,000 residents who live in underserved communities that don’t have high-quality recreational opportunities,” said New City’s executive director, Rose Harvey. “It’s a big deal.”

The park was built in 1889 and runs along the north bank of the Passaic River in the western part of Paterson.

Now that the planning board has signed off on the project, it will still have to undergo a design review by the historic preservation commission. Officials hope to start construction next spring.

The effort to restore the park dates back to 2016, when the Community Development Corporation initiated a master plan that produced a series of recommendations and budget forecasts. That yearlong undertaking included many of the same stakeholders who are involved today.

“The mayor is prioritizing fixing all the parks throughout the city — Eastside Park is getting a makeover,” Callegari said. “Now, Westside Park, our other flagship park."

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What about the Van Houten House?

One of the most important landmarks in the park is the Dirck Van Houten House, which is listed on the National Register. The 18th-century home, considered to be Paterson’s oldest, has been battered by floods and fire. It would not be part of the restoration.

But Archimede said he hopes that the county will “take ownership of it and then preserve it so it would continue to be standing and improved from its ruinous state,” he said.

Archimede attributed the demise of the park to its precarious location along a flood plain. “The flood events contributed to the degradation of the park, not just recently but in the past as well,” Archimede said. “I don’t think one event is worse than another.”

In 2011, Hurricane Irene ravaged the Van Houten House, forcing the Old Timers Youth Baseball League, which rented the building as its headquarters, to abandon the location due to mold and damaged electrical systems. Then the city’s oldest home caught fire in 2019.

In addition to approving the site plan, the historic commission on Monday heard the findings of an archeological survey that unearthed fragments of Indigenous and Colonial artifacts, including shards of tools and pottery.

“We didn’t find any intact Native American archeology,” said James Lee, principal at Hunter Research. “We did find broken glass and pieces of a teacup here and there, but not anything that would constitute an archeological feature or an archeological site.”

The archaeological study also found traces of a second home built in 1806 that once belonged to one of Dirck Van Houten’s descendants, Abraham Van Houten. However, all that exists now is the foundation.

“When I look at Google Earth, I can see a dry patch of grass in the shape of that house,” Lee said.

Darren Tobia is a contributing writer to Paterson Press.

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Westside Park restoration in Paterson NJ hinges on federal grant