Death in Life

At a crucial point during the Watergate investigations, White House Special Counsel John Dean warned Richard Nixon that a cancer was spreading through the Nixon presidency. Dean’s phrase lives on in infamy because of the potency of his word choice. Cancer is the insidious, implacable death force of the 20th century. Despite its current contest with AIDS for the status of most-feared disease, cancer, the very mention of the word “cancer,” still has the power to move people in mysterious ways. For proof of that fact, witness the current struggle to establish a monument to cancer survivors in Elmington Park on West End.

The conflict has the potential to erupt into a bitter, albeit civil war. The combatants are the residents of West End neighborhoods surrounding Elmington Park. Aligned with the supporters of the Cancer Survivors Park are Nashville investment broker and cancer survivor Frank Emerson, who is spearheading the project, as well as David Kleinfelter, who represents the district in Metro Council. Their opponents include a group of neighbors, many of whom live in the Whitland Avenue area, and a number of alumni of West End High School. The grounds that surround the former West End High School (now a middle school) spill over into the Elmington Park property. Caught between the two opposing factions are Metro Parks Director Jim Fyke and the members of the Metro Parks and Recreation Board. Outside pressure is being applied by Richard A. Bloch, of H & R Block tax-return fame, and his Richard and Annette Bloch Foundation.

The Bloch Foundation has pledged $1 million for the design and construction of a Cancer Survivors Park in Nashville. A quarter of a million dollars is to be spent for sculpture, while $750,000 is designated for improvements to the site. An additional $100,000 from Bloch is to be set aside in a special Metro Parks Department account to endow the park’s maintenance.

The park proposed for Nashville is not a unique venture for Richard Bloch. In 1990, in hopes of dispelling the notion that cancer is inevitably fatal, he built his first Cancer Survivors Park in Kansas City. Bloch’s proselytizing is a highly personal crusade. In 1978 he was diagnosed with lung cancer and was informed that he had three months to live. Since the Kansas City project, the Bloch Foundation has established Cancer Survivors Parks in five other cities, and numerous others are in the works. If Nashville’s park becomes a reality, it will be the 14th of Bloch’s projects to be completed.

Richard Bloch’s generic prospectus for his parks demands a site that is visible to a large number of people, both persons who have already been diagnosed with cancer and the one-in-four people who may be affected by the disease in the future. The prospectus also requires that the park include a sculptural focal point, a computer containing the names of local five-year cancer survivors, and a “Positive Mental Attitude Walk” consisting of 14 plaques, engraved with inspirational quotations and suggestions for fighting cancer.

According to Parks Director Fyke, Emerson brought the Survivors Park proposal to him about two years ago. “I suggested Centennial Park, but that didn’t work out. I then suggested Elmington Park, which I guess makes me the villain. I thought the neighbors would welcome an added feature to the park. Shows you how much I know.”

According to Fyke, Emerson also asked about building the Suvivors Park in the Warner Parks. Fyke quickly informed him, however, that “a monument of any sort does not fit the master plan for the Warner Parks, which calls for increased naturalism.” Fyke is careful to outline the chronology of events, since, he says, “there are rumors circulating that Elmington was selected as a fallback after Warner Parks turned it down. That just isn’t true.”

Possible park sites on Blakemore and Church Street were also explored. The Blakemore location proved to be too small; the land on Church Street was too expensive to acquire and clear.

Thus, in 1995, the project returned to Elmington Park. The positives seemed high: The city already owned the land. The Bloch Foundation liked the fact that tens of thousands of cars pass by the site every day. Metro Parks liked the $750,000 that could be used for general improvements such as drainage, sidewalks, the restoration of a 1930s WPA-built stone wall near West End, and the reworking of traffic patterns through the park.

At its Sept. 5 meeting, the Metro Parks Board granted conceptual approval to a Memo of Understanding between Emerson and the city. This approval in concept was granted with the understanding that a design competition would be held to select an architect for the park, that the winning design would be approved by the Parks Board, and that, under the terms of the memo, Emerson would be able to demonstrate the support of “the area’s Council members and all affected neighborhood groups.”

It was at about that time, remembers Fyke, that “all hell broke loose.” Many area residents claimed that they had not received notification of meetings held on Aug. 29 and Sept. 2 to assess neighborhood support for the project. Council member Kleinfelter scheduled another public meeting for Sept. 16. Thirty-six persons attended, but, again, a number of area residents claimed they had not been informed of the meeting. “Kleinfelter didn’t expect opposition,” says one opponent of the project. “He presented the whole thing as a fait accompli.”