CLEVELAND, Tenn. -- A North Cleveland landmark is getting a new landscaper.
The city asked Lee University if its grounds crews would take over landscaping and maintenance around the monuments on North Ocoee Street.
Ellie Phahl, the university's director of community relations, said the university began doing that Tuesday.
"As soon as the monument area is cleared out, our team will put the new landscaping in to kind of go with our campus landscaping," Phahl said.
City Parks and Recreation Director Patty Petitt said the plants there now will be transplanted to city parks.
The two monuments dominate a traffic island in the middle of North Ocoee Street at the Eighth Street NE intersection. The Jefferson Davis Chapter, United Daughters of the Confederacy, erected the monuments in 1910 "to our known and unknown Confederate dead."
"It's a gateway to downtown," City Councilman David May said.
A 2004 downtown master plan developed by MainStreet Cleveland includes the monuments as a north entry into the downtown business district.
Contact staff writer Randall Higgins at rhiggins@timesfreepress.com or 423-314-1029.
Randall Higgins covers news in Cleveland, Tenn., for the Times Free Press. He started work with the Chattanooga Times in 1977 and joined the staff of the Chattanooga Times Free Press when the Free Press and Times merged in 1999. Randall has covered Southeast Tennessee, Northwest Georgia and Alabama. He now covers Cleveland and Bradley County and the neighboring region. Randall is a Cleveland native. He has bachelor’s degree from Tennessee Technological University. His awards ...
