Editorial: Disc golf course didn’t fly on Garret Mountain

NorthJersey
A plan to build a disc golf course in Rifle Camp Park was met with much opposition.

The Passaic County Freeholder Board has wisely decided to abandon plans to place a disc “tournament” golf course in the middle of Rifle Camp Park, a small but cherished green space on Garret Mountain. The reversal is a clear victory for a passionate group of ordinary residents who stood together to fight this ill-formed plan from the beginning. It also is a major win for all who care about nature, open space and wildlife.

What freeholders failed to recognize for so long is that in overdeveloped North Jersey, Rifle Camp Park is an oasis — not just a bird sanctuary, which it is, but a quiet space filled with trees for all to enjoy. Why the freeholders ever thought invading this space with an 18-hole “golf course” for discs, which resemble Frisbees, was a good idea is hard to figure. In the end, though, give the freeholders credit for seeing the mistake and recognizing a miscalculation, and moving finally, to set things right.

“Your voices have been heard,” Freeholder Director Cassandra “Sandi” Lazarra told about a dozen activists who came to a meeting Tuesday night to protest the proposal again. “We will not proceed with the disc golf course at Rifle Camp Park, and we thank you for your comments.”

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If the county’s decision to pull the disc golf course at Rifle Camp Park off the table is anything, it is a testament to the power of ordinary people, a tradition in this country that dates to the founding of the republic. Importantly, it is a reminder that our government serves at the pleasure of the people, not the other way around. As Staff Writer Richard Cowen reported, the county officially pulled the plug on the proposed venue after nearly a year of growing opposition to the project.

We have always thought the disc golf plan was a silly idea, shortsighted and impulsive, and a bid, we guess, by the Freeholder Board to draw in millennials by offering them a little slice of Disneyland. Rifle Camp Park is a public park, not a theme park, and it must remain that way.

While the current Freeholder Board has shown enthusiasm for refurbishing many county parks and recreation facilities, the disc golf course plan was always a hook way off the fairway.

Rifle Camp Park, which officials have said receives little foot traffic, is nonetheless a place valued by members of the community who have for years come to appreciate its bucolic beauty and its quiet trails, where people might enjoy a nice hike unhindered by traffic, or perhaps sit and contemplate the joys that nature provides. Sadly, some initial design work for the now-scuttled disc course has left a mark on the landscape. More than 600 trees were marked with a yellow X, signaling that they would have been cut down had the disc course been built.

Credit all the members of the Save Rifle Camp Park Coalition, as well as many other activists and concerned individuals, who spoke out against this wrong-headed plan by attending freeholder meetings, writing letters to the editor, and making up yard signs of protest. This, in a nutshell, is how democracy works, and because it worked so well this time, Rifle Camp Park is preserved.