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SARAH CAVACINI/Palatka Daily News – The Jerry Bedenbaugh Community Park playground is undergoing renovation, but officials hope it will reopen by Christmas.
After two years of work, Putnam County leaders hope a revamped East Palatka park will open before Christmas.
Renovations have been progressing at Jerry Bedenbaugh Community Park, 125 W. McCormick Road, with Parks and Recreation Department employees installing playground equipment and putting together picnic tables.
“Hopefully, it’ll be a nice family park,” Board of County Commissioners Chairman Terry Turner said Tuesday.
Kevin Stevens, the senior division manager of the Parks and Recreation Department, said the playground mulch still needs to be put in the enclosed area. The playground includes four slides, a bongo for children to make music, places for them to climb and a ramp accessible to people with disabilities.
“We’re hoping it’ll be an early Christmas present,” Stevens said.
The park cost $50,000 to complete, he said, and the 1.83-acre property is valued at $29,700. A community club member sold the property to the county for $10 through a quitclaim deed, according to Putnam County Property Appraiser Office records.
Bedenbaugh Community Park’s history goes back at least 50 years, Stevens and Turner acknowledged.
The county has been working on the park since November 2021 when the land was donated to the county by the East Palatka Community Club after former Florida Highway Patrol Sgt. Jerry Bedenbaugh’s death. A longtime businessman, Bedenbaugh had been the club’s president and worked for FHP for more than 20 years.
He died from brain cancer in May 2020 at 86, the Daily News reported.
“He was a longtime leader in our community,” Turner said. “He was a fine man. He sure was.”
Bedenbaugh also owned and operated Brunner Building Supply in East Palatka from 1983 to 2011. He was involved in numerous community organizations, including the Palatka Horseman Club, and was a big supporter of Rodeheaver Boys Ranch and Scouts, according to Bedenbaugh’s obituary.
The East Palatka Community Center used to sit on the property, Turner said, but he remembers playing baseball with his San Mateo Little League team at the park. That was about 55 years ago, he said Tuesday.
Stevens said part of the park still has some of the old baseball fencing.
The park sits near the Palatka-to-St. Augustine State Trail trailhead, allowing not only East Palatka families ample opportunities to use the park, but also out-of-town people who are biking or jogging on the trail.
“I think it’ll be used quite a bit by families and by people using the bike trail,” Turner said.
