ABC-7 report on broken park equipment prompts action

The city is taking action after an ABC-7 report on a playground in the Sunset Heights neighborhood that was closed due to broken equipment.

“I don’t want any more KVIA stories because then, it’s basically (on) us. We weren’t watching,” District 8 City Rep. Cortney Niland said during Tuesday’s city council meeting. “Got it? Now we’re watching.”

ABC-7 reported in January that the slides on the playground equipment at Mundy Park were barricaded, and had been that way for weeks.

Read the original story here.

Steve Lunsford, the superintendent for the city’s Parks and Recreation Department, told ABC-7, “We noticed in late fall that we had some cracks that had developed on the slides. The best thing, for safety reasons, was to block the entrance to the slides and start looking for some replacement components.”

Lunsford had told ABC-7 that the cracking isn’t unusual considering the equipment is 25 years old, but the closure is lasting longer than usual because it took time to find replacement slides.

Lunsford had hoped to have the new slides installed by early March.

In the meantime, city council has ordered a list of the playgrounds in the worst condition so they can be improved.