At a Thursday, Oct. 16 work session of the Guilford County Board of Commissioners, Commissioner Pat Tillman proved that he really looks through the detailed presentation materials handed to the board when staff gives the board information.  This presentation regarded the county’s new $12.3 million master plan for parks and greenways.  The commissioners haven’t adopted the plan yet – at the work session they were just being briefed on it.

“On page 15,” Tillman said to a consultant who had helped with the plan, “it says there’s a $2 million treehouse?”

The consultant said that was correct and went into an explanation of how special a treehouse it would be – really encompassing more than one would think compared to, say, a treehouse a dad might build his son in the backyard.

It wasn’t exactly clear what would be so special about this treehouse, but then Tillman had an on target and funny comment.

“You might want to reconsider the verbiage,” he said, which is a really good idea since, on the face of it, $2 million seems like a lot to pay for a treehouse at a park when taxpayers in the county are already none too happy about the way the board has been spending money in recent years.

The meeting ended soon after that, without any clear understanding of what the $2 million treehouse project included.

So, the Rhino Times reached out after the meeting to the county’s Communications Department and asked for more information about that part of the master plan, which was developed after the county collected a lot of public input through surveys and community meetings.

Guilford County Multimedia Communications & PR Manager Eddi Cabrera Blanco provided more information on the treehouse this week in an email after speaking with Guilford County Parks Director Dwight Godwin.

Blanco wrote in an email, “During the public input phase of the master planning process, residents expressed interest in creating unique, nature-based experiences within the park system. From that feedback, the concept of a ‘Tree House’ was suggested as a way to offer an interactive experience beyond a traditional playground.”

The PR manager added: “To represent the potential investment required, the plan’s consultants included a conceptual cost that reflects modern construction standards.”

Blanco pointed out that the Board of Commissioners has not yet signed off on the implementation of the master plan.

The board is likely to address the plan and the treehouse idea when it adopts a 2026-2027 fiscal budget next June.

 The email states, “The $2 million amount referenced in the Parks Master Plan for the ‘Tree House’ concept is a preliminary planning estimate, not an approved or budgeted project cost. It was included to illustrate the potential expense of developing a fully accessible, safe, and well-designed nature-based structure, should the county decide to pursue such a project in the future.”

Still, the treehouse is in the plan and there seems to be support among board members to move forward next year with the master plan or some version of it.

The Rhino Times still does not have a clear picture in its mind of what this treehouse would look like or what it would offer, but the guess is that, if it does actually cost $2 million, it will be very, very nice treehouse, and it will look nothing like the one pictured above.

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