Midvale woman seeks to create nature park

Published by admin on Wed, 07/10/2024 - 7:00pm

Elsa Freeman stands at the edge of a seven-acre parcel of land adjacent to the Weiser River in Midvale. She wants to create a nature park, fulfilling her late husband’s wishes. She envisions a fishing pond, streams to keep it circulating, bridges over the streams, a walking path that connects to the Weiser River trail and more. A meeting was held July 8 to gauge the publics interest. Photo by Philip A. Janquart.
By: 
Philip A. Janquart
MIDVALE – If her plans come to fruition, Midvale will be home to a seven-acre nature park that abuts the Weiser River. 
 Since her husband’s passing over two years ago, Elsa Freeman, who is a former owner of the Midvale Market, has spent time trying to decide how to get her project off the ground, but is now moving forward.
 “My late husband, Lane (Williams), owned MTE (Midvale Telephone Exchange); He and I set up a 501c3 nonprofit called Midvale Market Place, Inc. to benefit the community,” she explained. 
 “Lane was all about giving back to the community. We donated money to either grants or loans to people who wanted to start a small business or students that had projects.”
 Elsa is the director of the nonprofit, which currently has a bank balance of about $85,000, the bulk of which was invested by Elsa and Lane.
 Lane spent many years as an educator, including eight years working with migrant workers, before taking over MTE for his parents in 1977.
 In 2008, he created an ESOP (employee stock ownership plan) and sold the company to his employees to help ensure their continued employment and security in retirement.
 Elsa and Lane bought the seven-acre riverfront property in 2016 with the vision of turning it into a nature park for the community to enjoy but, sadly, Lane passed away before the project materialized.
 “At the time, we owned the store and the building, and he was getting up in years and having some health problems, so we really didn’t get anything done with that. Before he passed, though, he said, ‘I want you to make sure you do something with this for the community. I said, ‘Ok, I will do that.’ – Be careful what you promise, hahaha.”
 Aside from a small boat launch on the east side, there is no real public access in Midvale to the Weiser River.
 Lane, Elsa said, envisioned a place where families could picnic, fish, play in the water, and enjoy the beauty of the river in a peaceful setting.
 “It is my goal to make his vision a reality,” she wrote in a letter of explanation.
 Though Elsa once taught small business startup and previously owned a hotel in Gooding and a bed and breakfast in Nampa, she wasn’t sure how to trigger movement on the park, which was recently cleared of brush and weeds.
 After over two years, she resolved to quit stalling.
 “I finally decided I needed to take some action; let’s do something, let people know about it, then go from there,” she said.
 To that end, Elsa scheduled a meeting for Monday, July 8 at Midvale City Hall, enlisting the help of Lane’s stepson, John Stuart, who recently retired as MTE’s CEO and from the Weiser Fire District where he served as assistant chief for many years.
 The meeting was held too late to make this week’s publication, but a follow-up story is planned for a future issue of the Signal American.
 “He’s much more organized and has done a lot of meetings,” Elsa said of Stuart. “I asked if he would be on our board of directors and now he is a board member.”
 Her vision for the park includes a fishing pond that would make use of part of the property that floods every spring, complete with stream beds to keep the water circulating.
 “You could do a fishing pond and a little bridge over the streams,” she said, adding that her vision also involves a walking path that would hook up with the adjacent Weiser River Trail.
 “It’s going to take vision besides mine, and effort and some people willing to put some work in, maybe loan some equipment,” she said. “It is really going to take the community to decide what they want, how much effort, time commitment they want to put into it. I’m almost 80-years-old; I need to pass this on to whoever is going to make this happen. 
 “I’ll get it started, but I’m not the one who is going to make it happen and carry it into the future.”
 Elsa, on the advice of her attorney, has since donated the land to her nonprofit to make it easier to obtain grants. 
 She said that Monday’s meeting was, in part, to gauge the community’s interest to see if there is a way forward.
 “This would kind of be Lane’s legacy,” Elsa said. “This is what he wanted, so we’ll see what kind of interest there is.” 
 Elsa will be visiting with Mike Thomas, who was instrumental in developing the Weiser Community Pond, for advice.
 
 

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