Seccombe Lake Park was founded in 1946, named after William Carpenter Seccombe.
William Seccombe was mayor of San Bernardino from May 12th, 1941 to May 11th, 1947. During his term, William Seccombe turned Garner’s Swamp, a place he and his family duck hunted, into a city fishing spot. Previously known as Inland Lake, the parkland was taken over by the city in 1991.
In the following years, generations of politicians pledged to make Seccombe Lake into an “urban jewel”. Despite this, the lake grew a reputation of being a run-down, abandoned, wasteland filled with homeless camps.
To combat and rectify the park’s reputation, the city received funding from the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians, the American Rescue Plan Act, as well as state funding to help rebuild Seccombe Lake.
I spoke to San Bernardino City Council Member, Theodore Sanchez, to understand how the funding will be used, what changes are we expecting to see in Seccombe Lake and how will the changes be maintained in the long-term.
The first improvements made by Sanchez were back in 2021 to put up a wrought iron fence to provide security to the park, and start to overcome the park’s reputation.
Theodore Sanchez: So the Park became known as essentially an abandoned mega-sized park, near downtown San Bernardino. That no longer is the reputation of Seccombe Lake. Seccombe Lake Park is now the park that is slowly transforming from again, an abandoned park to a park that people not just around the neighborhood can enjoy, but people will drive across town to enjoy that park in an afternoon or an early morning. And that was the first hurdle we had to overcome. We were able to do that with just a little bit of cleanup thanks to our parks director and our public works director who have said this is the time to to try to take on this challenge and change the reputation of this park.
The funding used so far has gone into designing the park. These plans came from the RHA Landscape Architects-Planners. Sanchez discussed his plans and optimism for the designs presented.
Theodore Sanchez: The architects that we have contracted with are world class, and they have in collaboration with our parks department really gathered information from the community as to what the community wants to see in this park, along with local experts. And the park is is going to receive much needed, state of the art, updates. Everything from the playgrounds, to the bridges that traverse the lake to the landscape setup. It's going to be a park that looks like it belongs in the 21st century. It's not incremental, it's going to be a complete makeover, and people will be able to see it.
With the failures of past politicians to help improve and maintain Seccombe Lake, Sanchez wants to ensure that the park maintains itself and stays in good condition.
Theodore Sanchez: The way we're going to maintain it is by having the infrastructure in place, and I don't mean that at the park. But I mean that in our Public Works, and our Parks Department, and that has already happened. We have a Public Works that is more effective, better staffed, better funded than it has been in the last 20 years and the Public Works Department is charged with doing a lot of the maintenance. The Parks Department is going to be in charge of making sure that that park is utilized to its potential, which means there needs to be programming there. There needs to be programming and amenities that people can enjoy. Things that will attract people to this park. The park is only as good as the number of people it's able to bring in to enjoy the park itself. So both those departments, again, are in better shape now than they have been in the last 20 years. And those are really the two departments that are at the city level that are charged with ensuring that that investment of over $10 million bears fruit. And I have the utmost confidence that with the current leadership in both those departments, the staffing levels and the funding we've provided for those both of those departments that that park will be a park that generation after generation is going to be able to enjoy.
As for community involvement, when the park is completed, Sanchez plans to continue offering community service and job opportunities. He has led cleaning projects in the past few years to start the process of rectifying the park’s reputation. His experience taught him about how much residents genuinely care about their city.
Theodore Sanchez: There are so many people in this city, who really love the city and are jumping at every opportunity to help. The city hasn't always been the greatest at utilizing that enthusiasm from the public but we are getting better at it.
If the plans are approved by the cities’ elected officials, a construction contract could be issued at the end of the year, and work on Seccombe Lake Park would begin in January of 2024.