Future of shuttered Harborside Park in Chula Vista will be decided Tuesday – NBC 7 San Diego

For more than a year and counting, Harborside Park in Chula Vista has been fenced off and locked up. Come Tuesday, the fate of the park will be decided by city council members.

The council is considering a number of options, but two of the most popular include variations of reopening the park with safety enhancements and a dual development that would include housing and a recreation center for kids.

Renderings from the City of Chula Vista show the scope of the combined housing and recreation center options that could be built on Harborside Park.

From a 54-foot tall, 76,000 square-foot floorplate building with housing on top anda rec center on the bottom, to two separate buildings for both facilities.

“Do we need apartments here when we have apartments all the way down there? And like I said, one block over, they're building 144," said parent Cheryl Perez.

The mother of two, whose kids used to play at the park, says she could get behind a rec center with a park.

That's why she became a member of the Harborside Park Steering Committee, which is urging city leaders to re-open the park, and not to build housing.

“Kids need to run. That's how they get energy out. Play ball, run around, chase each other, play hide and go seek. You can't do that with apartments there," said Perez.

The council is scheduled to vote Tuesday on what they'd like to see done with the 5-acre park.

It's been fenced off since August of last year, after it became overrun with encampments and illegal activity.

“We need to protect the park, reopen it, because that's what the citizens of Harborside want,” said Mayor John McCann.

Mayor McCann has been pushing to re-open the park since at least May, with safety enhancements.

“Protect our families, our children, by adding lighting, putting a park ranger station there, fencing, additional fencing, and making sure that at the end of the evening that we stop homeless encampments and everybody has to get out of the park," explained Mayor McCann.

But Mayor McCann appears to be outnumbered by the council, at last count, 4 to 1.

This summer, Councilwoman Andrea Cardenas motioned to keep the park closed and try selling it to create affordable housing. One of the plans the council will consider includes building 168 housing units.

Parents like Perez are frustrated the greenspace and basketball courts have been unused for more than a year and counting and could go away with a housing development, while children on the west side of Chula Vista have limited access to parks.

“Where’s our rights to have a safe community and a safe place to go for our children to play or for adults to go or whatever to shop? " questioned Perez.

NBC 7 reached out to the council members late Monday to find out if their positions have changed. They did not respond.

If the housing plan is approved, Mayor McCann suggests reopening the park until construction starts. City leaders say it would take at least four years for that plan to come to fruition.