SPENCER – The Town of Spencer is continuing its public engagement efforts around future parks and recreation projects with a community survey, open now through the end of March.

The survey is a follow up to a series of open house events held in January to collect local feedback.

The goal of the survey is to establish community priorities for the future parks and recreation facilities, programs, and services. The survey also seeks feedback on community pandemic impacts and prioritization of eligible uses of federal American Rescue Plan funds.

The survey is a component of the town’s process to update its 2014 Parks and Recreation Master Plan and apply for grant funding to help make the vision of a restored central park at Salisbury Avenue and Fifth Street a reality.

For many years of its history, Spencer had a central park filling the block of Salisbury Avenue between Fourth and Fifth streets and Yadkin Avenue.

Redeveloped into the Park Plaza shopping center in the 1960s, the town’s vision for the new town hall includes restoring park space to the area.

A donation from Fred and Alice Stanback allowed the Town to get started on planning the park addition.

The town is contracting with design firm Benesch to develop the updated Parks and Recreation master plan, design a restored central town park and apply for a Parks and Recreation Trust Fund grant.

ETC Institute, a consulting company, will administer the survey and compile the results. In the next few days, everyone in Spencer will receive a unique survey in the mail and can reply with a provided postage-paid return envelope, or respond online at spencersurvey.org.

The town asks residents to complete the survey within a week of receiving  it. All responses will be confidential. For more information, contact Special Projects Planner Joe Morris at 704-633-2231 or at jmorris@spencernc.gov.