Skateboarders have been asking for one forever.

Cranberry officials have been talking about one for three years.

Now, it's looking like a sure thing: Cranberry may well have a skateboard park this summer.

Cranberry Manager Jerry Andree told township supervisors last week that a local corporate sponsor -- as yet unidentified -- has agreed to provide the bulk of the $100,000 funding for a skateboard park on township-owned property behind the Rochester Road municipal center.

"We've been wanting to do this for a long time,'' Andree said.

Supervisors gave Andree the go-ahead to work with KaBOOM!, a nonprofit group based in Washington, D.C., to assist in the funding, design and construction of the park. The group specializes in helping communities with playgrounds and skateboard facilities. The township does not pay anything to work with KaBOOM!, Andree said.

Though Andree said he can't announce the details, KaBOOM! has successfully recruited a corporate sponsor to cover about three-quarters of the costs associated with building the park, he said. The township will contribute a total of about $30,000 toward it -- about $10,000 in cash and the balance in manpower, Andree said.

One of the first steps will be to invite skateboarders to say what they'd like at the facility. Andree said the same process was used in the early 1990s, when local schoolchildren were asked to participate in public meetings on preparing for construction of the Playtime Palace equipment in the Route 19 Community Park.

Parks and Recreation Director Mike Diehl described a skateboard park as a fenced asphalt or concrete area with prefabricated ramps and "grinding" rails that skateboarders use for jumping and sliding. He said bleachers are unlikely initially, though he'd like to see them added someday.

"This is a facility that will provide a safe skateboarding area so skaters can enjoy their sport,'' Diehl said.

A skateboard center in Butler opened in April 2004. Though this region doesn't have many of them, they began being built in 1970s, when skateboarding as a sport got its start in California. Cranberry officials were approached a few years ago by a group of skateboarders asking that their needs be considered. Township officials made planning for a facility a priority in the 2004 budget.

"I've been working on this for three years,'' Diehl said.