BY JOSEPH B. NADEAU

WOONSOCKET — World War II Veterans Memorial State Park may have become an unused eyesore in the center of the city but some people apparently are not accepting that fate sitting down.

An impromptu organized corps of volunteers spent the Fourth of July weekend cleaning up the neglected closed state park and had it looking better by a big degree on Monday, according to observers.
“Oh yes, it looks a lot better,” Ernest Frappier, president of the United Veterans Council, said after several visits to the park over the weekend.
The group of volunteers began work on Saturday after Raymond Riel of North Main Street showed up at World War II with an idea that he had seen enough of the neglect there, Frappier said.
“He started working down there on Saturday and they were still working there today,” Frappier said of the city resident.
Riel and his small group of cohorts apparently inspired other people stopping in at the overgrown and trashed World War II Park to join the cleanup effort and carry it on through Sunday and Monday.
By the time the group stopped working on Monday, a pile of bagged trash had been assembled in a corner of the parking lot near Snow Street and most of the park ground’s freshly mowed and trimmed to the level typically seen there at this time of year.
The state’s move to cut World War II’s funding from its Parks and Recreation budget has left the longtime city swimming area little more than a duck pond in the center of the once awarding-winning park landscape design and no park staff working there during the day as has always been the case by July.
The park has had difficulties in opening by the end of the school year in the past but somehow lifeguards were eventually found to staff it and the park pond filled from the Harris Pond stream running through it so another summer city beach season could begin.
Last year the difficulties in getting World War II Park open were highlighted by two incidents of people attempting to swim in the park being hurt while no lifeguards were on duty.
 The park gradually became blighted with graffiti vandalism on its office building and park facilities when it closed earlier this year and the trash and overgrowth of vegetation highlighted its sudden abandonment.
 Recent talk has hinted that the park will never again open as a swimming area and in fact may be headed toward a possible private sale for housing development or even use by the city as a site for a new fire station.
 Frappier said he has heard the talk of potential condominium development at World War II or the fire station plan and doesn’t like the idea of losing the park as a city war memorial.
 The fact World War II boasts a stream running from the city’s water reservoir off Privilege street would seem an impediment to condominium development, Frappier said.
 Rather than give up all the recreational use at World War II, Frappier said the state should consider developing some sort of water park play area for local children where they could enjoy cooling sprinkler arrangements if the state did not want to staff a full swimming area as it has in the past.
  The city’s Autumnfest celebration, hosted in World War II since its inception 30 years ago, is planning to use the park as its home again this year and the work done over the weekend could help with that cause, Frappier said.
 After seeing Riel and his volunteers working at the park again on Monday, Frappier said he decided the resident should get some attention for his efforts and called the newspaper to report the good deed.
 “It looked great today, the grass was cut way down low and all the trash was picked up,” he said.
 Riel and his volunteers were able to borrow two lawn mowers from St. Charles Church to help complete the landscaping work and a city pick-up truck stopped by Monday to pick the collected bags of trash.
 “When I saw him there today, I told him ‘you guys deserve credit for doing this,” Frappier said.
 While he didn’t know what the state thought of Riel’s work, Frappier said he hopes it will help inspire an effort by local legislators and other local officials to save World War II Memorial State Park.
 The recreation area contains several monuments dedicated to city war veterans including two howitzer field pieces that the late state Sen. Alphonse Auclair, a World War II Marine Corps veteran of fighting in the Pacific, secured from the Army and had mounted near the park entrance off Snow Street.
The dedication of the howitzers drew state and city officials to the park for their unveiling and an even bigger gathering attended a tribute to city World War II veterans held in the park for the 5Oth Anniversary of D-Day.
  Frappier said he still hopes there is time to convince the state and the city that World War II Park is worth keeping as an appropriate tribute to those it honors.
He has already requested in a letter to the editor that area residents call their legislators and tell them how they feel about the park. “We will have to wait and see what happens,” Frappier said.
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