Wednesday, August 23, 2023–5:49 p.m.
-David Crowder, WRGA News-
A review committee made up of City of Rome staff is recommending that naming rights for the rebranded ECO Greenway trail system go to AdventHealth Redmond.
Rome City Manager Sammy Rich told the Rome Redevelopment Committee on Thursday that the city received two proposals – one from AdventHealth Redmond, the other from Atrium Health Floyd. The Atrium proposal was for $65,000 a year for a 10-year period, plus co-marketing and co-branding. The AdventHealth proposal was for $50,000 a year for five years but also includes in-kind enhancements to the trail system.
“The really cool thing that they came up with is the idea to do a new playground and maybe a restroom facility at the Mt. Berry trailhead behind the post office,” Rich said. “
Another amenity that AdventHealth Redmond is proposing seeks to address what is known as a ‘food desert’ in South Rome.
“If I’m looking to go get stuff in South Rome, where do I go?” Rich explained. “Where is my local shop? Where is my grocery store? A lot of people and you all have seen this, walk the Silver Creek Trail to downtown Rome and a lot of them go to Dollar General. So, one of the concepts they came up with is what I call a community garden somewhere in that area. They will partner with us to identify the space and what that would look like.”
Rich told the committee that the review group felt that with the playground and community garden, the overall investment from AdventHealth Redmond is more, even though Atrium Health Floyd is proposing more years and a higher cash amount.
“I would hope we would use the sponsorship money to build new trails,” said Rome City Commissioner Jamie Doss, who serves on the redevelopment committee.
The redevelopment committee voted to back the staff recommendation, and there are more details that need to be worked out. According to Rich, an update will go before the full Rome City Commission, although he doesn’t believe a commission vote will be necessary.
“The last time we had proposals from both local hospitals, it had to do with our employee clinic, and at the time we had several commissioners who had conflicts,” Rich said. “So, we did not ask the commission to vote on something where we were going to spend money, just knowing that we had commissioners with conflicts and weren’t sure if we would have had five votes. I’m of the impression that issue probably still exists for this, not necessarily for this committee but for the commission as a whole.”
The ECO Greenway is 16.7 miles of trail segments that run through downtown Rome connecting dining and shopping to area attractions and parks. Popular trailheads include the Rome-Floyd ECO Center/Ridgeferry Park, the Mt. Berry Trailhead, the Kingfisher Trailhead, the Town Green, and AdventHealth Stadium. The City of Rome and Floyd County have plans already underway to expand the greenway to connect to AdventHealthStadium and also add a leg to connect to Lindale.