WAUPUN — Plans are being put in motion this month for the first renovations to Waupun County Park this year.
The planned renovations cover all aspects of the park, from sports equipment to camping, and will be completed throughout the next year.
Waupun County Park, often referred to as “Fond du Lac County Park” by locals, is managed by the Fond du Lac County government, and is separate from the City of Waupun.
Fond du Lac County has a total of 13 county parks located throughout the entire county. Most are located in the Fond du Lac City area, and encompass different types of parks including highway waysides, natural woods and marshland, a historic site, and recreation.
“I had requested about $2 million of ARPA money to use from the County Board to be used for county park improvements, and Waupun Park was one of the parks I was looking at,” Kaufman said.
A lot of the ideas for renovations at Waupun Park were brought up last summer when Mayor of Waupun Rohn Bishop met with County Executive Kaufman, County Supervisors Michael Beer and Jon Venhuizen, and County Parks Director Terry Dietzel met for a walkthrough.
“What I wanted to see out there was pickleball courts, which will be where the old parking lot was, and we’ll be redoing the volleyball court and adding horseshoe pits,” Kaufman said. “I’ve also been talking about setting up a stage or performance setting. More a platform kind of thing so there can be events out there.”
While the new stage won’t be like the old band dome, it will provide a new spacious venue for future events that could be used for events like the Waupun Fine Arts’ Concerts in the Park, or movie nights hosted by the County.
Other than improvements to the park itself, they were looking into adding more walkways through the woods for more nature access and he also mentioned some improvements for the campground section.
“We’re trying to clean up around there, to improve on and even expand the campground,” He said. “And the campground dump station will be moved to a location closer to the road to a separate section, to prevent a backup of traffic inside the campground itself.”
According to Kaufman, the two county parks that provide campsites are actually a net profit for the County. Waupun Park’s campground currently offers 38 sites, and Columbia Park—which is in the northeast section of the county on Lake Winnebago—offers 40.
The last project they had planned for this year was rebuilding the roads through the County Park and Maple Forest Natural Area, which are currently in poor shape.
“That’s what we had on the agenda for this year, the campsites might be more next year but those are what we are looking at,” Kaufman said.
“My goal is to enhance our County Parks because they are a fantastic asset to the county,” he said. “A lot of people enjoy being outdoors and I’d like to get people outdoors to create those events.”
Work has already begun on clearing the area for the volleyball and pickleball works, which should be complete by early June at the latest.
The County had briefly considered renaming the park to something more unique and descriptive, but they ended up keeping the name “Waupun County Park” due to a lack of submissions. The primary reason was to reduce the confusion caused by the term “Waupun County,” when Waupun is just the city.
New signs have already been ordered for all county parks in Fond du Lac County, including Waupun’s, which was set up last month. They also added a new flagpole at the west-side park entrance next to the new sign.
While only tangentially related, the City wayfinding signs that were set up last year say “Waupun County Park” when pointing towards it, but there are a few signs near the Main Street intersection with County Park Rd that read “Fond du Lac County Park,” which do not help with the confusion over the name.
