Name-that-park game has front-runner

And then there were two.

After a lengthy dispute between residents and county officials over what to call the 55-acre park being constructed in Estero, a pair of names emerged Monday.

Lee County commissioners boiled their choices down to Estero Community Park and Corkscrew Community Park during a management and planning meeting.

The board eventually gave the informal nod to Estero Community Park, but only after prompting from county Parks and Recreation Director John Yarbrough, who presented the board with six prospective names.

"I'm locking the doors and we're not leaving until you give me a name," Yarbrough said with a laugh.

Yarbrough was only half joking as he brought the issue before the board and discussed the logistics of the new park and what is being done to make it available to residents who live outside of Estero.

The name debate was one Yarbrough didn't expect to face when the county started building the park that is scheduled to open in August or September, he said.

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Tommy Lucas of Stephens Installers screws together roof trusses for a playground at the new public park in Estero on Monday. The park has yet to receive an official name, but Lee County commissioners gave an informal nod to Estero Community Park on Monday.

"You really can go almost nuts with trying to match a name to a facility," Yarbrough said.

The park was called Estero Community Park for several years until two months ago, when county parks and rec officials renamed it Oak Hill Community Park.

It was part of an initiative to make residents outside of Estero feel more welcome at the park, which came under fire from San Carlos Park residents for the past year.

The San Carlos Park Civic Association was among the groups that balked when it found out about plans to convert the Karl Drews Center in their community into a special needs center and move their children's afterschool programs to the new park in Estero.

The name Oak Hill Community Park did nothing to alleviate their qualms and Estero residents were also not pleased with the plan to rename the park set to become a fixture in the south Lee County community.

And then the name game began.

Suggestions on what to call the new park included Ostego Community Park and Gustave DamKohler Community Park. The Estero Chamber of Commerce offered the name "B.E.S.T. Community Park," which represents the surrounding communities of Bonita, Estero, San Carlos Park and Three Oaks.

Commissioner John Albion offered the name Corkscrew Community Park when the name came before the board Monday because the green space is between Corkscrew and Williams roads east of U.S. 41.

Commissioner Bob Janes jokingly offered the neutral title Another County Park, alluding to the controversy over the park's name.

On a 3-2 vote, the commission gave an informal nod to Estero Community Park. The decision, which is not final, bode more than well with Estero Historical Society President Mary Ann Weenan, who attended the meeting.

"We're so thrilled," she said.

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Yarbrough said the name will be on an upcoming county commission agenda for formal adoption.

"I'm OK with Estero Community Park," said Commissioner Doug St. Cerny. "That's where it is."

Plans to make San Carlos Park residents just as happy are also under way.

Yarbrough told commissioners that he would be reaching out to local nonprofit organizations to partner with the community and continue offering afterschool programs at the Karl Drews Center.

"We'd like to work with the community for the kids who can't make it to the new center, at least in the beginning," he said. "We don't want anyone to fall through the cracks."

The afterschool programs would be held in a house that sits adjacent to the Karl Drews Center, which will be used to accommodate the 400 people with special needs who are now transported from various facilities throughout south Lee.

"We see this as an ability to give them a home," Yarbrough said.