Politics & Government

Bathroom Battle: Why This One's Open When Others Are Closed

Bathrooms at neighborhood parks in Clearwater are being locked up and welded shut. Why does the one at Mandalay Park get to stay open?

Bathrooms at neighborhood parks were closed throughout the city because of cost and as part of the city’s effort to get homeless people into social services.

But even as toilet facilities were locked and in some cases welded shut, brand new bathrooms are open at a similar defined park at Clearwater Beach.

There are no bathrooms at neighborhood parks in any part of the city, leaders have continued to say since closing them June 11, 2012. 

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The city defines them: 

“These are parks that have a design that could include playgrounds, outdoor courts, picnic areas, open space and landscaping that serve a geographic area of a one mile radius.”

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The bathroom doors were locked at Woodgate Park. Welded bars were affixed across the doors at the restrooms at Crest Lake Park.

But a state-of-the-art, restroom facility was built as part of other upgrades near Mandalay Park, also considered a neighborhood park.

Why the discrepancy?

“That was because Mandalay Park supports a significant beach presence there and parking,” said Bill Horne, city manager. “So, that’s why that was there.”

The $200,000 project replaced the old wooden, open-air, six pack of bathrooms with the modern facility. Crews also built a two-and-a-half-foot tall, skateboard resistant sandwall, a seven-foot-wide sidewalk and put in new landscaping around April 2011.

For months residents and neighbors rallied to reopen the bathrooms at Crest Lake Park. Petitions were signed. Resolutions were read. Options to monitor and partly use the bathrooms were also offered in an effort to defer some of the city's $35,000 cleaning costs.

In the end, city leaders decided to destroy the seven open-air restrooms at a cost of about $9,000 as part of an effort to redevelop the public space as a signature city park.

Plans to redesign Crest Lake Park are expected to come before the council Aug. 6. City leaders recently discussed a survey to send out to residents and stakeholder groups to find out what they want at parks, and some of that information could be what is seen in the new park, which leaders would like to see reopened in time for the city’s centennial in 2015.

“We really did not get into the bathrooms discussions but I think that is one of the things that will become part of the survey,” Horne said. “I think that is one of the questions we can ask, ‘What is the community preference for bathrooms in parks’.”


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