Greene Square Park building, a flashpoint of recent controversy over the poor and a park, slated to come down

CEDAR RAPIDS - The City Council is planning this week to vote to demolish the flood-damaged Greene Square Park building.

The building took on just a little water in the June 2008 flood, but had been slated for demolition before the flood.

The building had been the center, in fact, of one of the larger City Hall controversies of recent years.

Long abandoned by the city's parks operation, the building had been leased by the city for a nominal sum to the much-beloved Green Square Meals program, which serves a free, warm meal to the poor, Monday through Friday.

In March 2007, the council voted 5-4 to demolish the building, which was in need of repair. The meals program's promise to renovate the building wasn't enough to convince the council majority to keep the building in place.

No one, though, was in a rush to force the meals program out, and the program was still using the building when the portions of the city, including the downtown, were flooded in June 2008. The flood forced the meals program to temporary quarters until it could move to a new permanent home at 605 Second Ave. SE.

Meanwhile, the city's building in Greene Square Park has sat.

The city will receive $20,513.22 for use on another project from Federal Emergency Management Agency because the city is demolishing the park building and not reusing it, Greg Eyerly, the city's flood-recovery director, reports.

Greene Square Park is positioned to become a focal point for the downtown as it will sit between the new $45-million library and the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art.