A town square with shops around green space that may be used for weddings or other gatherings.
An agricultural area with space for a working farm exhibit.
A new museum that can greet visitors and showcase local history displays.
Green space and play space for people to come and enjoy.
Sioux Center’s Heritage Board is master planning the new space for Heritage Village in western Sioux Center, and these are a few of the highlights.
The board has been meeting with design firm Confluence since May and brought a draft of a concept to the council this week.
“We’re refining this and making it more of what we want,” said Heritage Board chairman Larry Te Grotenhuis. “We’ve been talking about incorporating this in the Sioux Center trail system, so Heritage Village becomes a destination.”
The Heritage Board has also been discussing keeping the existing play equipment and potentially moving it to the area near the water tower so families can walk around Heritage Village and have a spot for their children to play nearby where they can see them, he added.
Two existing ball diamonds at Tower Fields are set to be converted to the new Heritage Village space. The new site is 4.7 acres, almost an acre larger than the current site, and it has additional growth options, using the other two ball diamonds there, which will remain in use for now. Site and utility connection work at Tower Fields may begin as soon as late summer, and moving buildings may begin in late fall or early winter. After the move is underway, construction on Sioux Center’s new indoor turf facility will begin on the existing village site in eastern Sioux Center. Prep work has already begun at Heritage Village.
“About 7 of us over 8 different days spent 107 hours moving and getting stuff ready to go,” Te Grotenhuis said. “It’s exciting – we have already moved several loads of artifacts to storage.”
He invited all Heritage Village’s Harvest Festival, set to take place this fall at the current village site.
“I want to publicly acknowledge and commend the volunteer effort that goes into this,” Mayor David Krahling said. “Seeing it in print like that reminds me again of the commitment of a lot of different people to take care of this."
Photo: Heritage Board chairman Larry Te Grotenhuis talks through the current draft of the Heritage Village site concept at Tower Fields with the city council, noting that the concept is still fluid at this point.