The state Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) is backing off its plan to convert a wading pool off River Street into a spray deck, according to a state lawmaker, days after community members, calling the plan short-sighted, lit into the agency for leaving them out of the loop.

At a public meeting last week, DCR officials said the decision to remake the wading pool at Mattapan’s Ryan Playground as a spray deck had already been made, citing $600,000 in state funding that became available over the summer. Contractors had already been hired, and construction was due to start Oct. 15.

State Rep. Brandy Fluker Oakley, who criticized DCR at the public meeting, told the Reporter on Tuesday that DCR is considering a pause. There is often a feeling of things being “done to” the Mattapan community, she said, rather than “with the community. It feels like we weren’t brought along."

In a statement on Oct. 13, Rep. Fluker Oakley was more emphatic that the project would be halted and that the agency committed to a new "full community process."

“It is now official that construction will not begin on October 15th, a mere 10 days after the potential project’s first public meeting," Fluker Oakley said in the statement. "During our conversations, DCR estimated that the design process with community input, including a community advisory board, would take about one year, and that changes to the wading pool and splash pad would not begin for at least the next 18-24 months.”

DCR officials billed the plan as part of a larger statewide effort to switch old wading pools to new spray decks, since decks require less maintenance, do not require chemical treatment or a recirculation system, and are set by a timer. The agency also says it does not need to staff spray decks with lifeguards as they do the wading pools.

“In this particular case, the judgment was that we could serve far more kids, far more citizens by converting it to a spray deck versus continuing to struggle with the limitations of such a small wading pool,” said Raul Silva, a DCR engineer, during the public meeting on Oct. 5.

Overall, a spray deck would double the operating season to 18 weeks from the wading pool’s 9 weeks.

Dorchester resident Jasen Lambright, a supporter of the wading pool who attended the public meeting, said he was pleasantly surprised by the potential for a reversal. “It’s wild they didn’t discuss what it would mean for us” before they first moved ahead with the project, he said.

“For me, personally, it’s the first steps for any small kid trying to build confidence in swimming,” Lambright said. “I have three kids, all my kids have gone into the wading pool. It was the first step for me to say, ‘See, water isn’t scary.’”

Two dozen people attended last week’s virtual meeting, with many voicing opposition to the removal of the wading pool. Ruth Georges said DCR’s poor communication about the project is typical of the agency. “It has to stop,” she said. “We’re all taxpayers here.”

She noted that the presentation offered by DCR noted that community members would have an opportunity to weigh in on additional changes to Ryan Playground, such as a reconfiguration of the parking lot. That’s offensive, she said.

Ryan Playground, located at 350 River St. and steps away from the Neponset River Trail, also has a playground, restrooms and shaded benches.

Coneco Engineers & Scientists INC and Traverse Landscape Architects are the contractors hired for the project.

If DCR’s proposal stands, the Ryan wading pool would be the sixth converted by DCR into a spray deck, and the second or third in Boston, according to Silva. Cambridge, Belmont and Fall River have also seen conversions. “This is not an isolated project,” he said.

Fatima Ali-Salaam, chair of the Greater Mattapan Neighborhood Council, said if there were lines at the wading pool, that may have been due to another Mattapan pool being closed. She said the agency appears to have a “great disconnect” from the neighborhood, and its decision to remove the wading pool is an example.

“This is not a community engagement process,” she said. “It really isn’t.”

Silva said the funding becoming available over the summer accelerated the project to get it done by next summer. “We could always do better, and I guess what I’d like to say, give us the opportunity to do better in the remaining phase,” he said.

But even before the end of the virtual meeting, which lasted about 90 minutes, Silva acknowledged the opposition to the move. “I think what we’re hearing loud and clear. We’re going to take it back to our agency,” he said.

In her Oct. 13 statement, Rep Fluker Oakley said: "“I am so glad that DCR heard the community’s concerns about this project and in particular about the unacceptable way that the original process occurred. Thank you to every member of our community who used their voice to urge DCR to change this process, and I am so grateful to have worked in partnership with each resident who shared their perspective with me so that together we could persist and achieve this result.”