Palm Springs reopens Downtown Park splash pad after years-long contractor dispute

Palm Springs officially reopened the Downtown Park splash pad on Tuesday at Downtown Park, 230 Museum Drive, bringing back a water feature that had been inoperable for years following a contractor dispute that left the project unfinished.

City Manager Scott Stiles opened the ceremony, saying the splash pad represents the kind of public investment that unites communities.

“This is exactly the kind of place that brings the community together — families, kids, neighbors, and visitors all enjoying a safe and vibrant public space right here in the heart of downtown,” Stiles said.

The splash pad is part of Downtown Park, which the city built for approximately $7.6 million. The park opened in October 2021, but less than a month later the water feature stopped working. The city had hired Fast-Track Construction Corporation in 2019 to build the park, with a completion deadline that was extended multiple times due to COVID-19 and other issues.

A June 2022 city council staff report documented that Fast-Track Construction had failed to properly manage the project, repeatedly missed deadlines, left major work unfinished, and effectively abandoned the job. By May 2022, the city had assessed liquidated damages totaling more than $2.35 million, and numerous unpaid subcontractors had filed stop-payment notices against the project.

The city council formally declared Fast-Track Construction in default and terminated the company’s contract, triggering a performance bond held by Great American Insurance Group. The bonding company ultimately paid for the completion of the work needed to restore the water feature.

During her remarks Tuesday afternoon, Mayor Naomi Soto said she had been advocating for the splash pad’s repair even before the issue came before the council. She called the reopening a personal milestone as well as a civic one.

“I came here when my daughter was just teeny tiny, and then I had a little boy and it wasn’t working,” she said. “And now it’s working for the first time and he’s four and getting to experience it as well.”

Soto said the reopening reflects a broader commitment by the city to maintain and improve its public spaces.

“We fix things that are broken in our city,” Soto said. “If something is wrong, if something is broken, if something needs modernizing, we’re going to make sure to fix it, because when we take care of the things that we have, we appreciate them, we love them.”

Soto also described the splash pad as serving multiple generations at once, noting she had recently observed children playing in the water while parents and grandparents listened to music at a nearby concert in the park.

“It’s this multi-generational effect that is really incredible, and so this really reflects our commitment as a city to say we value this,” she said.

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