Pleasant Garden supports community of volunteers through upgrades to sports complex

Pleasant Garden is a town built on the principles of community service and volunteerism. The town of approximately 5,000 can be found just outside of Greensboro, and while it has a long history as a community, its official incorporation was in 1997. Since that time, Pleasant Garden has worked to build itself into a recreational destination for the Piedmont Triad area.  

The town hosts multiple youth sports leagues, including soccer, baseball, and disc golf, with over 2,000 annual participants. Many of these participants travel from surrounding areas to be a part of these programs. As the sports programs have grown, the town has recognized the need for updates at its complexes and courses, most specifically the soccer fields at the aptly named Volunteer Park.  

Soccer is Pleasant Garden’s largest sports program, so town leaders want to ensure the fields are well-maintained and safe. The fields have sustained damage from stormwater runoff and erosion, leading to steep drop-offs around the perimeter. Bobbie Hatley Culberson, Pleasant Garden’s town clerk, finance officer, and town administrator, shared that there have been concerns about people stepping off the drop-offs. The town had to purchase supplies to rope off the areas to promote safety; however, this only provides a temporary fix, and town leaders are aware of the need for a permanent solution. 

When it was announced that the town would receive approximately $1.2 million in American Rescue Plan (ARP) funds, the town council discussed the greatest needs of the town and landed on an overhaul of the fields at the soccer complex.  

“The biggest portion of our money is going to our soccer complex … roughly $1 million with the design phase,” Culberson said. “Most of our money is going to correcting that stormwater issue, because we have now gotten to erosion, and we actually have one side of the field has an advantage because it is graded the wrong way for the soccer field.” 

The plan is to grade the top of the soccer fields and reorient the direction of the fields. This requires the town to move some parts of the complex, including a walking path and playground that will be removed and reinstalled as a part of the project. The town recently moved past the design phase and hopes to have the project completed in 2025. 

Pleasant Garden has a strong volunteer base in their community, so town leaders were intentional in wanting to show the people who participate in the youth sports programs that the town cares about and will invest in the future of these programs that mean so much to the volunteers. 

“Putting the money into this project, will show [our volunteers] that we support their program,” Culberson said. “We are a big volunteer base… so having this money and being able to show the town that this is what our passion is, and this is what we care about—they see it.” 

In addition to the project at Volunteer Park, Pleasant Garden is working on plans involving their other sports complexes and making necessary updates. The town council initially invested ARP funds in a design plan for the town’s baseball complex, but after realizing the cost would exceed the funds they currently had, they decided to wait to complete this full project but have since replaced the fencing on three of the six baseball fields. The design plan can be used to apply for other grants that can help fund this project. The town has partnered with the N.C. League of Municipalities to search for other funding for the town’s projects. 

“We are working with the League to find grants for several projects that we have open and that we are not planning to use ARP funds for unless … we have an overage from the Volunteer Park project that we can use towards these recreation amenities,” Culberson said. “There are a lot of different projects that we are working on outside of ARP money.” 

Along with their own ARP funds, the town also received $5.5 million from Guilford County’s ARP allotment, plus an additional $5.5 million from the State of North Carolina. These funds are allocated for a utility extension project that would connect Pleasant Garden into Greensboro’s water and sewer system and would feed into the town’s main street. The town is currently serviced only by well and septic. Pleasant Garden is in negotiations with the city of Greensboro to determine the scope and details of this project.  

“Water and sewer is our biggest thing because right now we are well and septic. ... There is no water in town. We do have a lot of industrial sites on our main strip that could potentially benefit from water and sewer,” Culberson said. “We have an interlocal agreement that has been discussed with Greensboro as far as their water resources staff and their managers, and it has not made it to city council approval yet.” 

With its remaining ARP funds, Pleasant Garden invested in town operations. First is the creation of a new Comprehensive Land Use Plan through a partnership with Piedmont Triad Regional Council. This plan will help guide future development decisions and is expected to be completed by December 2024. Second, the town also invested in upgrading much of its hardware at town hall, including cameras and new computers. Along with these upgrades, Pleasant Garden is taking part in the League’s Municipal Accounting Services (MAS) software conversion program, which will transition the town’s finances to Black Mountain Software (BMS). As a part of the MAS program, town staff is paired with an accounting specialist who will walk them through the conversion process and provide training and resources where needed. NCLM accounting specialist Judy Gallman is working with Pleasant Garden on this transition, which should be complete by December 2024.

“Their current software was not designed for governmental use as it does not utilize fund accounting,” Gallman said. “Once converted to BMS, it will give the ability to set up Grant Project funds and Capital Project funds so as to more efficiently track revenues and expenditures for a certain project.” 

“After talking to [the League and] Black Mountain and seeing all the options that I have in that software, it will make my life so much easier, because I use a lot of Excel spreadsheets to get things done now that I will not have to do with this software,” Culberson said. 

For a town that has largely thrived due to volunteer participation, Pleasant Garden has ambitiously taken on a number of projects, both large and small, to support town programs and staff. The town hopes these investments will show its determination to invest in what is important to its residents and to upgrade infrastructure to fit the town’s needs.