Parks & Recreation August 2017

AUGUST 2017 W W W. N R PA . O R G

Enhancing Lafitte Greenway | Local Officials’ Opinions of Parks | Park Lessons

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contents august 2017 volume 52 | number 8 | www.parksandrecreation.org ksandrecreaation org

FEATURES

38 Arts Unleashed: Creating Successful, Lasting Arts Programs

48 Local Officials’ Opinions about Local Park and Recreation Services

According to Americans for the Arts, the arts can deter truancy and delinquent behavior and increase academic performance for at-risk youth. Learn how several park and rec agencies have created some highly specialized and award-winning programming, targeted at pre-teens and teens.

Together, local elected and appointed officials are the individuals most responsible for setting policy and distributing revenues to a variety of public services. But, what level of priority do these officials, specifically those in Pennsylvania, place on park and recreation investment and do they value and prioritize park and recreation services differently?

Paula Jacoby-Garrett

Austin G. Barrett, M.S., and Andrew J. Mowen, Ph.D.

44 Creating a Vibrant Public Space on the Lafitte Greenway This year’s Parks Build Community project will add several amenities to a portion of the Lafitte Greenway in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Paula Jacoby-Garrett

2017 NRPA ANNUAL CONFERENCE SECTION

52 Education Highlights Tom Crosley

54 Exhibit Hall Highlights Ted Mattingly

56 Exhibit Hall Listings 4

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contents august

departments 12 Research f Additional Park and Recreation Mapping and Data Resources 12 f Park Pulse: Making Outdoor Play a Priority for Adults 14

16 Community Center Parks and Rec and BMX Nick Adams

18 Member to Member From Steel to Green: Revitalizing Pittsburgh Through Its Park System Scott Roller

60 NRPA Update f Summer Camp on Capitol Hill: Play On to Protect Programming at Parks 60 f Congratulations to the 2017 National Award, Fellowship and Scholarship Recipients 63 f In Appreciation of David Lose 64 f Member Benefit: Five Reasons to Post Your Open Position on the NRPA Career Center 65 f Connect Hot Topics 65

columns 8 Perspectives An Amazing Year!

Stephen Eckelberry

10 Editor’s Letter Arts and Parks: A Natural Fit Gina Mullins-Cohen

22 Advocacy Career and Technical Education for Youth at Park & Rec Agencies Kate Sims

24 Law Review ADA Accessibility Rules for Alterations to Existing Facilities James C. Kozlowski, J.D., Ph.D.

30 Future Leaders Empowering Youth to Care for Local Parks and Their Neighborhoods Mark Talbert

32 Conservation Collaborating with Communities Strengthens Green Infrastructure Outcomes Lori Robertson

f The Outdoor Alliance for Kids Holds Capitol Hill Briefing 66 f Member Spotlight: Laura Bauernfeind 68 f Parks & Recreation Crossword 70 f Professional Development Calendar 71

72 Operations Artificial Intelligence: Not Your Father’s Toolbox

34 Health and Wellness Community and Home Gardening Develop Lifelong Healthy Habits Allison Colman

36 Social Equity The Empty Bowls Soup Tale Anica O’Neil and Rae Wallace

74 Products 75 Marketplace 79 Advertiser Index 80 Park Bench ‘In Tune’ with the Community Maureen Acquino

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P E R S P E C T I V E S A M E S S A G E F R O M N R PA’ S L E A D E R S

An Amazing Year!

It’s amazing how fast time flies. I’ve said it as my kids have become older, and I’m saying it as I write this, my last column as your chairman.

I’m amazed at what we have already accomplished in the first year of our very ambitious threeyear strategic plan, focused on our three Pillars — Conservation, Health and Wellness, and Social Equity. When we celebrated our 50th anniversary in Las Vegas two years ago, we had reached our goal of having more than 50,000 members. This year, we’ve already hit the 60,000 mark and are excited about the future growth of the association.

We launched a brand new website, which provides a much better user experience and is now mobile friendly, with simple navigation. We continued our popular Innovation Labs that met throughout the country, delving into topics, such as “Homelessness in Parks” and “Connecting Communities to Nature,” and are continuing to roll out new programs and forge new partnerships — Walk with a Doc and Family Fitness Day, to name a few — to help you better serve your communities.

We celebrated the third year of our Commit to Health campaign, which has been implemented by 1,250 park and recreation sites nationally and has impacted more than 228,000 youth.

No matter which side of the aisle you sit on, we all know the political climate has changed. It will be even more important in the future to let our members of Congress and the administration know the important role parks and recreation plays in the well-being of our communities and the nation as a whole. And, the Public Policy team has been leading the charge, hosting a number of events with legislators, including taking part in a recent briefing on Capitol Hill as part of OAK (Outdoors Alliance for Kids) to highlight the importance of federal funding that supports getting kids outdoors and hosting a site visit with Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue at a DC Department of Parks and Recreation facility to showcase the importance of providing programming, activities and meals during out-of-school time.

The Research team has churned out a wealth of research, from the recently released Salary and Healthy Aging surveys, to the monthly Park Pulse infographics and mapping and data resources to support, with hard numbers, the value of the work you do each and every day. And, Membership and Professional Development have also been continuing to offer tools, such as the new Leadership Certificate (https://learning.nrpa.org/products/leadership-certificate-package), to help you achieve the highest level of professional development to better serve your communities.

I look back on what we have accomplished and know that it is really only a beginning. In September at conference in New Orleans (http://www.nrpa.org/conference2017/), I will be turning the reigns over to the more than capable hands of Leon Andrews of the National League of Cities.

For those of you heading to conference this year, a wealth of knowledge and networking opportunities awaits. Thank you for the opportunity to serve this past year, and I look forward to another exciting year for NRPA! [Steve’s signature]

S T EPH EN ECK ELB ER RY Chair of the Board of Directors 8

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22377 Belmont Ridge Rd. | Ashburn, VA 20148 703.858.0784 | www.nrpa.org

NRPA’S MISSION: To advance parks, recreation and environmental conservation efforts that enhance the quality of life for all people.

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

Jack Kardys

Chair of the Board of Directors Stephen Eckelberry

Miami-Dade Parks, Recreation and Open Spaces Department Miami, Florida

Bartlett Park District Bartlett, Illinois

Michael Kelly

Chair-Elect Leon T. Andrews

Chicago Park District Chicago, Illinois

National League of Cities Washington, D.C.

Karen Bates Kress

Past Chair Susan Trautman, CPRP Great Rivers Greenway District St. Louis, Missouri

Treasurer Michael Kelly Chicago Park District Chicago, Illinois

Secretary Jack Kardys Miami-Dade Parks, Recreation and Open Spaces Department Miami, Florida

Advocate Emigrant, Montana

Herman Parker City of San Diego, California, Park and Recreation Department San Diego, California

Molly Stevens Westcave Outdoor Discovery Center Austin, Texas

Susan Trautman, CPRP The Great Rivers Greenway District Saint Louis, Missouri

William “Joe” Turner

President and CEO Barbara Tulipane, CAE

Houston Parks and Recreation Houston, Texas

National Recreation and Park Association Ashburn, Virginia

Dr. Howell Wechsler

BOARD OF DIRECTORS Jesus Aguirre

Alliance for a Healthier Generation New York, New York

LIFE TRUSTEES

Seattle Department of Parks and Recreation Seattle, Washington

Beverly D. Chrisman

Leon T. Andrews

Anne S. Close

National League of Cities Washington, D.C.

Fort Mill, South Carolina

Neelay Bhatt

New York, New York

PROS Consulting Indianapolis, Indiana

Rosemary Hall Evans

Kevin Coyle

Lexington, South Carolina

James H. Evans

Sugar Hill, New Hampshire

National Wildlife Federation Washington, D.C.

Earl T. Groves

Stephen Eckelberry

Charles E. Hartsoe, Ph.D.

Bartlett Park District Carol Stream, Illinois

Richmond, Virginia

Robert García

Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania

The City Project Los Angeles, California

Kathryn A. Porter

Richard Gulley Balboa Park Conservancy San Diego, California

Roslyn Johnson Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission Greenbelt, Maryland

Gastonia, North Carolina

Harry G. Haskell

Mendham, New Jersey

Perry J. Segura New Iberia, Louisiana

R. Dean Tice

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EDITOR’S LET TER

Arts and Parks: A Natural Fit This month, we celebrate “Arts and Parks.” What makes them a natural fit? Arts and culture reflect our natural surroundings — whether it’s Ansel Adams’s photograph, “Yosemite Falls,” or the PBS documentary, “10 Parks that Changed America” — arts give us a greater appreciation of our green spaces, as well as bring awareness to environmental causes.

In addition, arts programs can incentivize our younger community members. Our cover story, on page 38,“Arts Unleashed: Creating Successful, Lasting Arts Programs,” by Paula Jacoby-Garrett, shows how arts can help park and recreation agencies reach more at-risk youth and, hopefully, help put them on the right path to academic success. Today, there’s a plethora of arts programs available — from painting and pottery courses, to cooking and fashion design, woodworking and metal workshops, music and drama classes, and even video game and film production.

And speaking of film, for decades, Hollywood has embraced environmental themes in movies, especially in the animated genre. One such film, “The Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature,” teaches both kids and adults valuable lessons about land conservation and the power of friendship. Learn more about the movie and why its director, Cal Brunker, embraced the themes of protecting parks, as well as people of all ages, abilities and cultures, forming strong friendships through parks and recreation, on page 42.

Next, get a sneak peek at NRPA’s 2017 Parks Build Community project in, “Creating a Vibrant Public Space on the Lafitte Greenway,” on page 44. Located in New Orleans, Louisiana, Lafitte Greenway once served as a busy transportation canal, giving people easy access to local gardens and businesses. Sadly, in 2005, Hurricane Katrina destroyed the once thriving public space. But, thanks to the Parks Build Community initiative, the revitalization of Lafitte Greenway continues.

If you plan on attending the NRPA Annual Conference, please join us for the unveiling of the Lafitte Greenway, and see the completed project up close.

Do you ever wonder what local government officials really think about park and recreation services?

Austin G. Barrett, Ph.D., and Andrew J. Mowen, Ph.D., share their findings from a study they conducted in Pennsylvania in, “Local Officials’ Opinions about Local Park and Recreation Services,” on page 48.

Lastly, make sure to check out our conference preview section beginning on page 52. You’ll learn about the additional education sessions that will be presented, along with a listing of NRPA’s exhibit hall highlights. For those of you who haven’t already done so, be sure to register for conference at www.nrpa.org/conference2017/registration/.

It’s going to be a great time in the Big Easy. I hope to see you there!

GINA MULLINS-COHEN Vice President of Marketing, Communications and Publishing Editorial Director 10

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PRESIDENT AND CEO Barbara Tulipane, CAE VICE PRESIDENT OF MARKETING, COMMUNICATIONS AND PUBLISHING, AND EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Gina Mullins-Cohen gcohen@nrpa.org MANAGING EDITOR Sonia Myrick smyrick@nrpa.org ASSOCIATE EDITOR Cort Jones cjones@nrpa.org ASSISTANT EDITOR Maureen Acquino macquino@nrpa.org EDITORIAL CONTRIBUTOR Catrina Belt cbelt@nrpa.org PUBLICATION DESIGN Creative By Design www.creativebydesign.net SENIOR SALES MANAGER EASTERN REGION AND EUROPE Kip Ongstad 703.858.2174 kongstad@nrpa.org SALES MANAGER WESTERN REGION AND ASIA Michelle Dellner 949.248.1057 mdellner@nrpa.org MAGAZINE ADVISORY BOARD MEMBERS Keith Anderson Gerald Brown Ernest Burkeen Brendan Daley Anthony-Paul Diaz Ryan Eaker Robert García Kathleen Gibi Tim Herd Edward Krafcik Todd Lehman Sam Mendelsohn Maria Nardi Lisa Paradis Gil Peñalosa Dr. Kevin Riley Karla Rivera Paula Sliefert Anne-Marie Spencer Stephen Springs Randy Wiger

September 26-28, 2017 New Orleans ing Network s itie Opportun Hundreds of Education Sessions

Keynote Spea Matt Iseman, ker: of American NHost inja Warrior

The Industry’s Largest Trade Show

Register now at www.nrpa.org/Conference

Research Additional Park and Recreation Mapping and Data Resources A variety of tools to help in planning a new facility or assessing a community’s recreation needs

By Daniel Espada

B

uilding a park or facility maintenance schedule, creating a master plan and facilitating long-range planning take resources, tools and data. There are a number of resources available to the park and recreation professional when it comes to planning a new facility or assessing a community’s recreation needs. A major resource is NRPA Park Metrics, which provides detailed park and recreation agency benchmarks on staffing, budget, facilities and programming offerings based on data from more than 1,000 agencies across the United States. Whether reading the NRPA Agency Performance Review or digging deeper into the data through customized reports, Park Metrics can help your agency gain more funding support, improve operations and better serve your community.

We have recently combined other NRPA data resources with those from respected outside groups that we believe can provide your agency with valuable insights. These park and recreation-focused tools and resources are available for free or minimal cost in the Research portion of the NRPA website under Additional Mapping and Data Resources (www.nrpa.org/publications-research/additional-mapping-and-data-resources/).

NRPA Calculators NRPA, in partnership with outside researchers, developed the following three calculators that allow park and recreation professionals to place values to a number of programs and offerings.

The Park Values Calculator (https:// nrpaproragis.com/EcoBenefit.aspx) examines the environmental, economic and social areas that reflect the value of parks. With tightening budgets and growing needs for environmental actions, agencies must justify their decisions in terms of fiscal accountability.

Comprehensive research studies provide credibility to the economic value provid12

Parks & Recreation

ed by trees, water bodies and open space.

As an example, costs associated with the benefits of air quality are calculated by entering the number of trees in an area.

Using survey-derived data, the Rectangular Fields Calculator (https://nrpaproragis.com/Calculator.asp), which offers insights on the costs and benefits of rectangular fields, provides details about operating costs incurred and revenue generated by multiple sports fields, field surfaces and additional field items (e.g., irrigation, lights).

NRPA worked with Dr. Daniel Ames and his team at the Brigham Young University Department of Civil and Environ-

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mental Engineering to develop a simplified process to evaluate ecosystem services. By navigating an easy-to-use mapping interface and loading park and water body data with a few simple clicks, the Water Values Calculator (https://nrpaproragis.com/ parks/index.html) automatically calculates the acreage and subsequent monetary value of the ecosystem services provided.

You now have the ability to provide evidence of the true value of your local parks and water bodies through this streamlined process of ecosystem service valuation.

Other Data Resources Beyond NRPA Park Metrics and calculators, there are many resources available to assist your agency in operating more effectively and efficiently.

Community Commons (www.communitycommons.org/) is a hub of data, tools and stories that come together to inspire change and improve communities. As a partner with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Community Commons provides public access to thousands of data layers that support mapping and reporting capabilities that help your agency explore community health.

One of the tools within the platform is called the Community Health Needs Assessment. This reporting function lets you focus on a county of interest and examine health indicators, like levels of physical inactivity and diabetes prevalence.

Social Explorer (https://www.socialexplorer.com/) is designed to engage users

through dynamic maps and customizable reports. Touting more than 220 years of demographic data, 25,000 maps and hundreds of profile reports, Social Explorer empowers people to work with data by transforming it into meaningful information. Maps and tables about U.S. demography, population estimates and health data are available. The mapping system allows users to create and customize maps with a suite of tools, including side-by-side maps, satellite view and swipe maps to compare variables and geographies while providing context to your visualizations. A storyboard tool for creating sophisticated presentations is also available.

Following along with NRPA’s Social Equity Pillar, the National Equity Atlas (http://nationalequityatlas.org/) provides data on demographic change, racial inclusion and the economic benefits of equity for the 100 largest cities, 150 largest regions and all 50 states. It is a comprehensive resource for data to track, measure and make the case for inclusive growth in America’s regions, states and nationwide. The atlas contains data on demographic change, racial and economic inclusion, and the potential economic gains from racial equity.

The National Association of Counties offers the NaCo County Explorer (http://explorer.naco.org/), a visualization tool that provides key county-level information on a wide variety of topics: demographics, the economy, education, health care and public safety. The interactive mapping interface enables users to explore a variety of indicators, such as population density, median household income, and number of endangered and threatened species. County profiles are also provided to highlight data and information related to key policies and legislation.

Another resource for county-level data is the County Health Rankings and Roadmaps Program (www.countyhealthrankings.org/). A collaboration between the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute, this

program aims to measure the health of nearly all counties in the nation and to rank them within states based on a variety of national and state data sources.

Once you have explored some of the health and economic factors, the Roadmaps to Health Action Center will help you determine the next steps to take.

Recognizing that communities vary widely and efforts to improve health will also vary, the Roadmaps Action Center outlines a series of steps to find guidance and means for taking action.

A final mapping and data resource is the U.S. Health Map (www.healthdata.org/ data-visualization/us-health-map), developed by The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, an independent global health research center at the University of Washington. The interactive mapping tool lets you explore county-level health trends throughout the United States. In-

formation about life expectancy, hypertension, obesity and physical activity can be visualized quickly, providing you with the information necessary to make informed decisions. There are also infographics and county profiles that provide concise summaries of various health indicators.

From the county-level to your local neighborhood, these public resources serve as a starting point for park and recreation agencies to explore data on a variety of topics. All of these resources are openly available to help you in the quest to secure more funding support, improve operations and better serve your community. Don’t forget to check out these and many other resources on the Additional Mapping and Data Resources webpage under Publications and Research on www.nrpa.org.

Daniel Espada is NRPA’s Research Analyst (despada@nrpa.org).

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NRPA Park Pulse Each month, through a poll of Americans that is focused on park and recreation issues, NRPA Park Pulse will help to tell the park and recreation story. Questions span from the serious to the more lighthearted, and with this month’s poll, we take a closer look at the number of hours per week, on average, Americans are active outdoors.

Most Americans Dedicate Time Each Week to Outdoor Play A Park Pulse poll conducted by the National Recreation and Park Association (NRPA) asked 1,013 Americans ages 18+ how many hours per week on average, if any, they are active outdoors — including any outdoor activities they do for fun, such as walking, hiking, biking and swimming.

The typical American Adult spends

5 hours per week on outdoor play.

Baby Boomers and parents are more likely to spend more than an hour a day on average playing outdoors.

Millennials

Gen X’ers

Non-Parents

Baby Boomers

Parents

www.nrpa.org/Park-Pulse ©2017 National Recreation and Park Association The National Recreation and Park Association Survey was conducted by Wakefield Research (www.wakefieldresearch.com) among 1,013 nationally representative Americans, ages 18+, between June 5th and 12 th, 2017, using an email invitation and an online survey. Quotas have been set to ensure reliable and accurate representation of the U.S. adult population 18 and older. The margin of error for this study is +/- 3.1 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.

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Be a Park Champion!

You can advocate for parks and rec in your community by stepping up as a Park Champion! Start by signing the Park Champion pledge at www.nrpa.org/Park-Champions.

Then, use NRPA’s resources to see how you can ask your U.S. representative and U.S. senators to support federal policy that helps parks and recreation in your community.

You can get involved in two ways:

Show and Tell Show your members of Congress how important parks and recreation is to your community by inviting them to an upcoming event like a park dedication, groundbreaking or program kick-off. It’s easy to get started with the Park Champion Advocacy Toolkit, our step-by-step guide to hosting a Park Champion event. Find the Toolkit and a suite of resources at www.nrpa.org/Park-Champions

Have Your Voice Heard Send a letter to your U.S. representative and U.S. senators advocating for key park and recreation issues. NRPA makes it easy to reach out – just head to NRPA’s advocacy page at www.nrpa.org/Advocacy-Engage, type in your name and address, personalize your letter, and hit send! It only takes a few moments to make a big difference.

www.nrpa.org/Park-Champions

Community Center Parks and Rec and BMX Alternative programming for today’s youth

By Nick Adams

A

ll of us at USA BMX and throughout the BMX community were proud to see our event featured on the cover of last month’s issue of Parks & Recreation magazine. The picture was taken at the home of this year’s BMX World Championships, Novant Health Supercross BMX track, in beautiful Rock Hill, South Carolina.

This facility is sanctioned by USA BMX and managed by the Rock Hill Parks and Recreation Department, and, since its opening in August 2014, it has hosted major national and international events. In fact, in July 2017, it will host the first BMX World Championships held in the United States since 2001. The last BMX Championships

held in the United States was in Louisville, Kentucky.

Attracting a New Customer Base Since the mid-1980s, Rock Hill has been developing premier amateur sports venues to serve the needs of its community and to be used in hosting state, regional and national sports comBMX racers vie for the lead during the 2017 Carolina Nationals competition at the BMX track, managed by the Rock Hill Parks and Recreation Department in South Carolina.

Community Impact Having a BMX track in its park system sets Rock Hill apart from many of its municipal counterparts across the state and the region. The agency has seen the positive impact that the track has had on the community through rider development programs, local races, summer camps and school field trips; the facility provides another choice for families and youth to live an active lifestyle. Hosting cycling events that bring visitors from across the state, region, country and world provides an economic boost to the community through increased traffic at hotels, restaurants and other businesses that serve visitor needs. And, with the international popularity of BMX racing, Rock Hill’s hosting of recent World Cups and the upcoming World Championships, the

Photo provided by USA BMX 16

petitions that inject millions of dollars into the local economy annually. Constructing outdoor recreation facilities to include a world-class BMX Supercross track and other cycling venues was part of a larger vision set forth by Rock Hill’s mayor, city council and city management. They saw it as a way to expand the city’s already successful amateur sports tourism niche beyond traditional sports, such as soccer, softball, baseball, tennis, etc. These cycling facilities have helped attract a new customer base that wasn’t being served through traditional sports tourism venues. Now, not only is the facility serving riders from across the region, country and the world, but it’s also serving the recreational needs of the local community in a new and exciting way.

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Supporting Elements BMX tracks can be built on a space equivalent to a baseball or football field and are self-supporting once built.

Funding and land are at the top of the list for communities wanting to construct a BMX track. It also helps to have support from elected officials and city management if it’s going to be a municipally owned and operated track.

Rock Hill was fortunate to have many of these supporting elements in place as it embarked on building its facility through a public-private partnership with a land developer and funding generated through naming rights and special purpose tax fund programs. Unfortunately, not all communities will have this ideal scenario. They may need to rely on broad community support through grassroots fundraising efforts, creative land use agreements and, perhaps, private sponsorships.

While not every city or every park and recreation department will host world championships, numerous BMX tracks are operated by, or located on, park land.

Many are also managed by the recreation departments. With the addition of BMX racing to the Olympic Games in 2008

Photo provided by USA BMX

community has the opportunity to welcome and interact with folks from all over the world and to share its southern hospitality.

The parks department tries to strike the appropriate balance between offering race events at various levels (local through international) and programming (open practice, educational clinics and pump track availability) in scheduling the use of the facility. Another area where balance is important is in determining a track maintenance schedule that keeps the track in peak condition, yet keeps the facility open and available for programming and race events to meet the demand.

and a shift from traditional stick-and-ball sports, BMX has flourished. Since 2008, several facilities have been developed in conjunction with parks and recreation: Henderson, Nevada; Hesperia, Califor-

nia; Austin, Texas; Tallahassee, Florida; Yucaipa, California; Longmont, Colorado; Oldsmar, Florida; Sarasota, Florida; and plans are underway in Houston, Texas, and Knoxville, Tennessee.

There are more than 320 sanctioned BMX tracks throughout North America and a large percentage of them are part of the park and recreation system. At USA BMX, we understand the need for these facilities and the need to provide alternative programming to today’s youth. Through community outreach programs, STEM, the Partnership for a Healthier America and Olympic Day, USA BMX works daily to reach youth and promote activity.

Nick Adams is the Chief Marketing Officer for USA BMX (nick@usabmx.com).

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Member to Member From Steel to Green: Revitalizing Pittsburgh Through Its Park System The Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy shares lessons learned as it celebrates 20 years

By Scott Roller

T

he world in 1996 was markedly different than it is today, and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was no exception. “3rd Rock from the Sun” was on TV, the Spice Girls were topping the charts and solar panels were still an oddity in most of the United States. Pittsburgh was laying the groundwork for the remarkable technological and green transformation that would eventually come, and a handful of citizens concerned with the deteriorating condition of the city’s grand park system were meeting in a living room to discuss how they could help.

What followed was the birth of one of the country’s most respected parks conservancies, more than $100 million raised for major park improvement projects over the next 21 years and a vibrant park system that helped spur economic development, city pride and the designation of Pittsburgh as one the nation’s top most livable cities. This is the story of the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy, but the lessons learned since that first meeting

are ones that any size park or recreation group can use.

Meg Cheever and her friends were regular citizens who believed that a healthy, well-cared-for park system was a key to drawing and maintaining residents and essential to the future renaissance of this former industrial city. They recognized the enormous potential in Pittsburgh’s historic 2,000-plus-acre park system, while also knowing the reality of available resources.

Restoring the 70-year-old Frick Park Gatehouse was the Parks Conservancy’s first major park improvement project.

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Cheever eventually became the group’s CEO and encourages others to never underestimate the good that energized, like-minded people can accomplish.

The majestic park system, made possible by industrialists like Frick, Schenley and Mellon, was proving hard to care for as Pittsburgh — like many other cities around the country in the 1980s and ’90s — dealt with difficult financial times as steel and other traditional industries dissipated.

Early Success From its earliest days, the Parks Conservancy fostered relationships with local government through an official public-private partnership agreement with the city of Pittsburgh to ensure that relevant issues and needs were addressed. Understanding their partners’ needs and taking care to give credit and praise for their contributions proved an important part in the Parks Conservancy’s early success.

Also key was choosing highly visible projects for the first several years, which brought the organization and its work to the attention of potential funders and supporters. The high quality of those initial projects — including prominent entry features at popular regional parks — became an important selling point for fundraising efforts. “High-quality projects not only accomplish physical restoration, but also fuel community pride, encourage potential funding sources, and deter abuse and misuse,” says Susan Rademacher, the conservancy’s parks curator.

Identifying the key tenets with which

to tackle all projects makes communication of the work easier, and for Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy, those guiding lights showed respect for the environment, attention to historic design and the needs of a diverse region.

For the Parks Conservancy, this meant tackling one area of a park at a time and understanding that comprehensive improvement would be incremental.

Projects were intentionally chosen in varied locations around the city to show the group’s commitment to park equity, which helped gain geographically wide-ranging support in the process.

Also, keeping the community involved in the planning process in a genuine and meaningful way, including keeping them informed about progress and complications, has been paramount to all projects.

Multiple community planning meetings

are held for each of the conservancy’s major park improvement projects. “Having community input — and making every effort to integrate that input into the final project — is essential to long-term success,” says Heather Sage, director of community projects. “The years of community conversation that can precede the start of a project are vital to the project’s success and, ultimately, the success of the organization. The parks belong to the community, so it’s natural that their voice should be a key part of projects in their parks.” Sage cites community input for an important design feature that made its way into the recently completed Frick Environmental Center: an outdoor sandstone and grass amphitheater for use for both planned and impromptu gatherings and presentations. “Listen to those who will use your space.”

Management, Maintenance, Programming As the Parks Conservancy entered its second decade in the mid-2000s, the importance of including an endowment for maintenance in the plan for every project was clear. “Endowment is a key to longterm survival of a parks conservancy,” says Cheever. “And, having funds available to care for a project once it has been completed is vital to keeping community trust.”

Maintenance funds keep projects in top shape long after the ribbon cutting, which, in turn, creates goodwill with funders. In addition to the funding itself, the conservancy includes a season-by-season site care plan with each project, including elements like inspection dates, spring and fall trash cleanups, invasive plant sweeps, furniture inspection and repair, and culvert cleaning and clearing after significant rainfall.

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Member to Member

Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy — Lessons learned over 20 years:

1

Never underestimate the power of a few like-minded people. The Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy started with several people meeting in a living room.

2 3

Select a diverse and talented team, and promote their excellence in their fields.

Form partnerships with local government and funders, understand their needs and publicly praise them.

4

Include community input in the planning process for every project.

Communicate progress, complications and successes.

5

Incorporate a volunteer component in every project. Personal investment in parks yields long-term support.

6

Choose high-visibility projects that bring attention to your work, making fundraising easier.

7

Demand quality. Whatever is done, do well. High-quality projects accomplish physical restoration, fuel community pride, encourage potential funding sources, and deter abuse and misuse.

8 9

Build a maintenance plan and funding into each project.

Produce programming from the very beginning. Programming will educate and develop the next generation of park stewards.

10 11

Let your quest for fundraising bring focus to projects.

Keep long-term benefits of projects in mind, and communicate the financial benefits of parks and recreation.

12

Never give up. Developing parks is not for the faint of heart, but success in parks initiatives benefits the entire community for generations.

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The Parks Conservancy completed a comprehensive restoration of Mellon Square, a 1.37-acre park in the heart of Downtown Pittsburgh.

Choosing projects that have maximum impact for park users is also paramount.

The 2008 restoration of the Riverview Park Chapel Shelter included re-creation of the historic steeple and dormers, new flooring and kitchen, and landscape restoration and new garden beds. The building sits high on a mountainous park slope, and had been closed to the public and slated for demolition before the conservancy’s efforts. The major rehabilitation of the shelter had been identified by park neighbors as a much-wished-for initiative, and once completed it quickly became the city’s most requested and rented shelter.

The countless graduation parties, birthday gatherings, memorials and weddings it hosts are proof that high-quality projects that respect community input will be welcomed, used and beloved.

“Our challenge in Pittsburgh is coming up with the financial resources for all the necessary restoration projects in the parks while ensuring that resources for managing and maintaining the parks are also at a good level,” Cheevers says.

“When people donate to the Parks Conservancy, they are helping close this gap, and are investing in Pittsburgh’s future.”

Cheever is not exaggerating on this last point, either. Mellon Square, for example, a recent major conservancy project,

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holds the distinction of being the country’s first public park built on top of a parking garage. The 1950s modernist design of the downtown park is striking, but perhaps equally significant is what happened to the blocks surrounding Mellon Square once conservancy-led construction on the major reimagining of the space was underway. New economic development was spurred, with boutique hotels, the renovation and reopening of office buildings, and new residences sprouting up around its perimeter.

Pittsburgh’s hilly terrain and three rivers make flood control especially critical, and the Parks Conservancy has included green infrastructure (GI) elements in every major park improvement project for the past 15 years. GI elements that help manage stormwater not only beautify the space, but also increase the value of the surrounding neighborhoods and keep wildlife habitat in place. Rain barrels collect water at the Schenley Park Visitor Center, the rerouting of a stream to its original path in Phipps Run helps reduce flooding of park trails and permeable asphalt that allows rainwater to soak through and into the ground are a feature of the conservancy’s McKinley Park Entrance project. The conservancy learned that the community cares about water

safety and stormwater management, and communicating the role parks and greenspaces play in easing those concerns can bring partnerships and financial support.

Also threading through Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy projects from the beginning is carefully chosen programming. “Programming, especially with an environmental or health focus, keeps the community engaged in their parks, and creates a bond,” says Camila Rivera-Tinsley, Parks Conservancy director of education. “Our all-ages programming helps create future park stewards and supporters.” The diverse slate of programming has grown to include STEM-focused summer camps, fitness classes and an extensive series of naturalist educator-led hikes, older-adult nature classes and movies in the park. “We serve a diverse community of park users,

and we put careful thought into programming accordingly,” says Rivera-Tinsley.

As Cheever prepares to pass the baton to her successor in March of 2018, she cites park equity as her wish for Pittsburgh’s green future. “I’d like to see a city where the entire system of 160 parks both large and small is beautiful, safe, healthy and clean,” Cheever says. “Our challenge is to find the resources to bring every park in every neighborhood of the city to excellent condition and the support to keep them that way. Then, we connect the parks to each other and to the riverfronts and to the neighborhoods. When we accomplish that, I think we’ll find that all Pittsburghers are happier and healthier.

We’ll have equity across our park and trail system, and our city will be a model of other cities around the country.”

In the past two decades, the Parks Con-

servancy has undeniably done much for Pittsburgh: 17 major park improvement projects, groundbreaking partnerships, and helping to transform the city into a green technology and education-focused destination. Year-round environmental education programming, a leading role in green infrastructure and dedication to park equity are the goals taking the Parks Conservancy into its third decade. Perhaps most important of all, though, are the countless happy memories of millions of park users who have grown up, played, loved and celebrated in the green spaces that are the result of the lessons learned during the group’s visionary work.

Scott Roller is the former Senior Manager, Communications and Creative for the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy.

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ADVOCACY

Career and Technical Education for Youth at Park & Rec Agencies

By Kate Sims

O

nce known as vocational education, career and technical education (CTE) is the 21st-century version of preparing our youth for today’s workforce and ensuring they have the skills necessary to become gainfully and meaningfully employed. Providers of out-of-school time (OST) programs, whether over the summer months or after school during the school year, have the opportunity to be at the forefront of this work, now perhaps more than ever.

OST programs are ideal places for CTE because they can be flexible in the type of learning environment they create for students. When provided with the space to explore interests and improve competencies, such as team work, communication and problem-solving, student employability and life skills can be vastly improved. In addition, through more hands-on activities, mentorships and internships, students in CTE programs have access to opportunities that will assist them in selecting a career path and setting goals for their future.

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Career Development Through Community Service The department of community services, Live Healthy Gwinnett in Lawrenceville, Georgia, hosts undergraduate and graduate student interns, primarily those obtaining degrees in the public health field, to develop, implement and evaluate the OST activities offered by its summer camps and contracted camps against the Healthy Eating and Physical Activity (HEPA) standards. In addition to its in-house orientation, it uses community partners to lead additional trainings for

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the interns, including the group Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta Strong4Life, which conducts a full-day training to teach the interns the importance of wellness guidelines, vending policies, healthy habits and about ongoing resources they can tap into throughout the semester.

Since 2014, Lindsey Jorstad, outreach manager for Live Healthy Gwinnett, has supervised 14 interns from eight different colleges and universities. By the end of July 2017, combined service hours for all 14 students had reached 3,700 hours.

“There is a big difference between what you are taught in a classroom and what you find through working in the field,” says Kamila Beer, a graduate of Georgia Southern University with a bachelor’s of science in public health. “Being able to actually put the knowledge I acquired in school into action allowed me to im-

prove my writing, planning and, most importantly, my public speaking skills.

Interning with Live Healthy Gwinnett has given me the upper hand for the future and prepared me to become more confident and successful.”

Building Technical Skills Through Hands-On Learning Rec2Tech Pittsburgh was launched in September 2016 to demonstrate how municipal assets can be leveraged to address the digital divide. During a one-week demonstration, Rec2Tech Pittsburgh transformed five city-owned recreation centers into technology-enhanced learning centers, where youth learned to use technology to express their creativity, solve real-world problems and build job-ready skills. Examples of activities included youth combining art and drone photography to document their community, using engineering to create a self-watering greenhouse out of upcycled materials and designing characters, building levels and making their own video game controllers.

“Rec2Tech demonstrated how we can use existing city resources to increase access to technology and provide young people with the 21st-century learning opportunities they will need to succeed in the innovation economy,” says Pittsburgh Mayor, William Peduto.

Congressional Action Around CTE and Workforce Development A series of congressional actions around CTE and workforce development in recent years has created a significant new opportunity for providers, such as local park and rec agencies, to tap into the federal funding and resources available for CTE programs nationwide.

The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), formerly known as No Child Left Behind, was signed into law by former President Obama in December 2015

and will go into effect this fall. Included in the new law is updated language that allows funding from the 21st Century Community Learning Center (21st CCLC) program to be used specifically for workforce development and CTE. (To learn more about 21st CCLC, read June’s Parks & Recreation magazine article “Federal Budget Cuts Threaten Educational Funding” (http://ow.ly/ Ow8U30dOUHh).

As part of President Trump’s “Workforce Development Week” in June 2017, an initiative to highlight job training programs and apprenticeships, the House Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development hosted a hearing titled, “Helping Americans Get Back to Work: Implementation of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA).” A portion of this hearing was dedicated to the role afterschool programs can play in preparing students for future employment.

Finally, the House Committee on Education and the Workforce introduced the Strengthening Career and Technical Education for the 21st Century Act in June 2016 and then again this past spring. The bill (now numbered H.R.2353) passed the full House and was referred to the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee for consideration in late June 2017. Specific provisions of the bill that would benefit local park and rec agencies include: • Establishment of an “Innovation Grant Program” that would reserve 25 percent of an initial $7.5 million allocation for specific programs, including partnerships with nonprofits and local municipalities.

• Allowance for community-based partners, defined as a “local public organization,” to become eligible entities to receive funding directly to support CTE programs locally.

• Prioritization of STEM (science, tech-

nology, engineering and math) learning programs for underrepresented students, especially those encouraging career pathways for non-traditional careers, such as girls in computer science or coding camps for Latino or African-American students.

• Allowance for career development activities to start as early as fifth grade (previous limit was seventh grade).

Park and rec agencies are incredibly well-positioned to offer CTE programs or incorporate CTE activities into current programming. Your agency may already be working in partnership with your local school district or higher education institutions to offer CTE, but now is the time for park and rec agencies to help lead the work in this area and bring a greater emphasis on CTE into the OST space.

We need your help to demonstrate to Congress how park and rec agencies are offering CTE activities locally and how federal funding and resources can be used to support these efforts. If your agency is currently offering a CTE program or you are interested in learning more, please contact me.

Kate Sims is NRPA’s Government Affairs Manager (ksims@nrpa.org).

Share your CTE stories, learn how federal funding affects local parks and rec, and gain critical advocacy skills at the inaugural Park Champion Advocacy Summit at the 2017 NRPA Annual Conference! This advocacy and storytelling workshop will teach you all you need to know about how to step up as a Park Champion.

The Park Champion Advocacy Summit is a 3.5-hour workshop that will be held Monday, September 25, 2017, prior to the start of conference. Registration is free for conference attendees and CEUs will be offered — visit www.nrpa.org/ park-champions for more information and to register.

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ADA Accessibility Rules for Alterations to Existing Facilities

By James C. Kozlowski, J.D., Ph.D.

A

s illustrated by the case described, herein, there are two sets of rules for determining whether a public facility complies with the accessibility requirements under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Public facilities in which construction was completed prior to the effective date of the ADA (January 26, 1992) are subject to less stringent program accessibility requirements than ADA accessibility standards for new construction and alterations to existing facilities.

The ADA was signed into law on July 26, 1990. Congress intended this legislation “to provide a clear and comprehensive national mandate for the elimination of discrimination against individuals with disabilities.” 42 U.S.C. § 12101(b)(1). Title II regulates state and local governments operating public services or programs.

Under Title II of the ADA, a “qualified individual with a disability” cannot, “by reason of such disability, be excluded from participation in or be denied the benefits of the services, programs or ac-

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tivities of a public entity, or be subjected to discrimination by any such entity.”

An individual is excluded from participation in or denied the benefits of a public program if a public entity’s facilities are inaccessible to or unusable by individuals with disabilities (28 C.F.R. § 35.149). In defining accessibility, Title II’s implementing regulations distinguish between newly constructed or altered facilities, which are covered by 28 C.F.R. § 35.151, and existing facilities, which are covered by 28 C.F.R. § 35.150.

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An existing structure or facility is defined as a facility constructed prior to January 26, 1992. The ADA standards for existing facilities provide that “a public entity shall operate each service, program or activity so that the service, program or activity, when viewed in its entirety, is readily accessible and usable by individuals with disabilities” 28 C.F.R. § 35.150 (a)(1).

Title II’s emphasis on “program accessibility” rather than “facilities accessibility” for existing facilities was intended to ensure broad access to public services, while, at the same time, providing public entities with the flexibility to choose how best to make access available. The overall policy of the ADA is to require relatively few changes to existing buildings, but to impose extensive design requirements when buildings are modified or replaced.

Historic “Grape Bowl” Stadium In the case of Smith v. City of Lodi, 2016 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 75512 (E.D. Calif.

6/9/2016), the issue was whether renovations to an existing facility required the entire facility to be accessible. The city of Lodi, California, owned, operated, controlled and maintained a facility known as the Lodi Grape Bowl Stadium (Grape Bowl). The Grape Bowl is a historic building that was originally built in approximately 1940. The Grape Bowl topography is formed by two earth berms on the north and south sides of the field.

The city is a public entity within the meaning of Title II of the ADA. Beginning in approximately 2010, the city began a series of renovations that included installation of a new scoreboard and sound system, upgraded lighting, installation of synthetic turf and significant alterations to the south side of the stadium, including new ramps, seating and parking stalls.

Pedestrian entry to the Grape Bowl is from the west side of the stadium; public restrooms, a ticket window and a concession stand are provided in a common building just inside the pedestrian entrance. The city spent between $3 million and $5 million on the alterations, which, according to the city, were completed in 2013.

The Grape Bowl facility is rented out by local high schools for sporting events.

Lodi High School uses the Grape Bowl for its home football games. Fans of the home team sit on the south side of the stadium. During high school football games, the north side of the stadium is primarily used by the visiting team and its supporters.

Meaningful Seating for Disabled Visitors Plaintiff James Smith suffers from multiple disabilities, including arthritis, fibromyalgia and diabetes. He also has metal

prosthetics in his leg and requires a walker for mobility. He cannot walk long distances because of his disability, and he sometimes uses a wheelchair.

ings, the federal district court would determine whether or not the pretrial evidence was sufficient to conclusively rule in favor of either the city or Smith. If

The ADA standards for existing facilities provide that ‘a public entity shall operate each service, program or activity, so that the service, program or activity, when viewed in its entirety, is readily accessible and usable by individuals with disabilities....’

Smith had visited the Grape Bowl an estimated eight times since 2010. One specific visit to the Grape Bowl was a football game between Amos Alonzo Stagg High School and Lodi High School on or about September 20, 2013. Stagg was the visiting team, so the team and its supporters sat on the north side of the stadium. Smith, an alumnus of Stagg, claimed it was “significant and meaningful” for him “to be able to sit with his alma mater’s team.”

Smith filed a lawsuit alleging violations of Title II of the ADA. Specifically, Smith alleged he was prevented from returning to the Grape Bowl due to ADA violations associated with the north side seating, as well as parking and paths of travel on both the north and south side of the facility. In response, the city claimed that the facility was compliant with the ADA. Under the circumstances of this case, there was no dispute that Smith was an otherwise qualified individual with a disability. As a result, the issue before the federal district court was whether Smith was excluded from participation in the city’s program and whether such exclusion was due to discriminatory barriers.

Smith and the city both filed motions for summary judgment. Accordingly, at this preliminary stage of the proceed-

not, the federal district court would deny the motions for summary judgment and allow the case to proceed to trial for further proceedings to determine whether or not the city had indeed discriminated against Smith by violating the applicable ADA accessibility requirements for the Grape Bowl.

Existing Facility Accessibility Since the Grape Bowl was constructed prior to January 26, 1992, for the purposes of ADA legislation, it is deemed an existing facility 28 (C.F.R. § 35.151(a) (1)). Any subsequent alterations made to the existing facility after January 26, 1992, were required to meet the applicable ADA accessibility requirements in existence at the time of the alteration.

Alterations are defined as a “change in a building or facility that affects, or could affect, the usability of a building or facility or a portion thereof ” (ADA Standards Section 202.3).

The city had adopted a transition plan, which included plans to make the Grape Bowl compliant with the ADA. Improvements to the Grape Bowl were not made to the facility until 2010, when the city of Lodi embarked on extensive projects to make the facility ADA compliant.

Smith claimed that these improvements to portions of an existing facil-

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ity required the “entirety of the Grape Bowl” to meet or exceed the 2010 ADA accessibility guidelines (ADAAG). In failing to do so, Smith argued the city had created a “discriminatory barrier” in violation of the ADA. The federal district court rejected this argument.

While acknowledging the ADAAG “must be met by any alterations that occurred after January 26, 1992,” the court noted ADAAG requirements “do not apply to existing structures.” Further, the federal district court found Smith had not offered “any case law or statute to support the position that any alterations to an existing facility then ushers the facility as a whole” under existing 2010 ADAAG requirements (28 C.F.R. § 35.151(b)).

ily achievable” (42 U.S.C. § 12182(b)(2) (A)(iv)). Moreover, for existing facilities, the federal district court noted that “a public entity need only provide program access” when the facility “viewed in its entirety, is readily accessible to and usable by individuals with disabilities” (28 C.F.R. § 35.150(a)).

That being said, under this “lesser standard” of program accessibility for existing facilities, the court acknowledged “mere physical access is not sufficient.”

Rather, the court found “Title II requires public entities to provide “meaningful access” to their programs and services.”

Further, in providing such meaningful access, the court found the ADA would require public entities to “give priority to those methods that offer services, pro-

Alterations are defined as a ‘change in a building or facility that affects, or could affect, the usability of a building or facility or a portion thereof’ (ADA Standards Section 202.3).

On the contrary, the federal district court found “alterations commenced after the ADA’s effective date, must, to the maximum extent feasible, be made in such a manner that the altered portion of the facility is readily accessible to and usable by individuals with disabilities” (Emphasis of Court). As a result, the court found the “program accessibility” standard, not the 2010 ADAAG requirements, would apply “to those parts of the Grape Bowl that have not been altered.”

Program Accessibility As cited by the federal district court, program accessibility discrimination within the context of existing facilities would include “a failure to remove architectural barriers where such removal is read26

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grams and activities to qualified individuals with disabilities in the most integrated setting appropriate.”

As described by the federal district court, Title II’s emphasis on “program accessibility” rather than “facilities accessibility” for existing facilities was “intended to ensure broad access to public services, while, at the same time, providing public entities with the flexibility to choose how best to make access available.” Accordingly, for existing facilities, the court emphasized “[a] public entity is not required to make structural changes in existing facilities where other methods are effective in achieving compliance” (28 C.F.R. § 35.150(b)(1)).

As cited by the federal district court, the U.S. Supreme Court had charac-

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terized the ADA “program accessibility” requirement for existing facilities as follows: [T]he reasonable modification requirement can be satisfied in a number of ways.…In the case of older facilities, for which structural change is likely to be more difficult, a public entity may comply with Title II by adopting a variety of less costly measures, including relocating services to alternative, accessible sites....

Only if these measures are ineffective in achieving accessibility is the public entity required to make reasonable structural changes. And in no event is the entity required to undertake measures that would impose an undue financial or administrative burden, threaten historic preservation interests, or effect a fundamental alteration in the nature of the service §§ 35.150(a)(2), (a)(3).

Football Game Seating and Parking In his complaint, Smith had alleged that there were “no wheelchair seats available on the north side of the stadium and only 14 seats available on the south side.” According to Smith, ADA standards would require 36 wheelchair seats for an assembly area with more than 5,000 total seats, plus one additional wheelchair seat for each 200 additional seats over 5,000.

Smith had also argued the parking was deficient on the north side of the facility.

In so doing, Smith acknowledged there were “four apparently ADA-compliant parking spots servicing the south side of the Stadium,” but there were “no comparable spots servicing the north seating area.” As cited by Smith, Section 208.3.1 of the 2010 Americans with Disabilities Act Standards (ADAS) would require “parking spaces serving a particular building or facility be on the shortest accessible route to the facility entrance.”

In response, the city argued it did “not have to follow the strict technical guidelines applicable to post-1992

facilities under 28 CFR §35.151 on the north side of the Grape Bowl� because “ADA improvements have not been completed on the north side of the Grape Bowl.� Having provided “ADA accessible disabled seating at the Grape Bowl at specific locations,� the city contended “the Grape Bowl meets the program accessibility standard of an existing facility.� Specifically, the city claimed “ADA seating exists on the south side of the stadium where disabled individuals have ‘program access’ for football games in their entirety.� The federal district court agreed.

As noted by the court, “the seating and parking on the north side of the facility have not been altered and thus fall under the existing facility framework�: Although some electrical work has been updated on the north side of the building, Plaintiff has not presented this court with case law to support that this upgrade requires all of the seating and parking on the north side of the facility to be altered in order to meet the 2010 ADA building requirements. Without case law to support this leap, the Court is unwilling to interpret the myriad of statutory provisions before it to mean that updating a facility’s lighting requires the entire north side to be remodeled to current ADA standards.

According to the court, the city had provided “program access� on the south side of the stadium where disabled guests are provided with parking and seating to watch a football game in its entirety.� Moreover, in the opinion of the court, “the fact that Mr. Smith traveled to the north side of the Grape Bowl to have the experience of sitting with the visiting team did not establish an ADA violation.�

As characterized by the court, Smith’s “program access� argument would require “more than just the ability to watch the football game at the stadium, but

the ability to have access to his desired area of the stadium.� In this particular instance, the court found the seating was simply “part of the facility.� More importantly within the context of program

accessibility for an existing facility, the court found “the football game is the program offered, not the seating.�

As a result, while “sympathetic� to Smith’s circumstances, the federal dis-

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trict court rejected Smith’s broad interpretation of the applicable ADA law.

In the opinion of the court, Smith’s argument “would render the ‘program access’ standard meaningless because it would require that public entities modify existing facilities whenever the general public seating area was not accessible or ADAAG compliant.” According to the court, “the mere fact that an existing facility does not comply with the ADAAG does not render the program inaccessible.” Further, the court noted: “Assessing a program’s accessibility is a subjective evaluation that entails viewing the program in its entirety.”

gov/taman2.html#II-5.2000.

Applying this policy to the facts of this particular situation, the federal district court found “the program — the viewing of the football game — was accessible in its entirety on the south side of the Grape Bowl.” As a result, the court concluded the city’s “failure to provide wheelchair seating and parking on the north side of the stadium does not constitute an ADA violation.”

Existing Facility Altered?

Smith had also alleged that he had encountered architectural barriers in the path of travel to the north side of the fa-

As described by the federal district court, ‘required structural modifications for existing facilities is what Congress meant to avoid when it created different standards for facilities built or modified before and after the enactment of the ADA.’ Existing Facility Policy As described by the federal district court, “required structural modifications for existing facilities is what Congress meant to avoid when it created different standards for facilities built or modified before and after the enactment of the ADA.” Further, the federal district court noted this policy for existing facilities was articulated as follows in the ADA Technical Assistance Manual: Unlike private entities under Title III, public entities are not required to remove barriers from each facility, even if removal is readily achievable. A public entity must make its “programs” accessible.

Physical changes to a building are only required when there is no other feasible way to make the program accessible.

Department of Justice, Technical Assistance Manual to Title II of the ADA, (1994) § 5.2000 available at www.ada.

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cility. On this point, the federal district court found “contradicting information.”

On one hand, the city claimed no alterations had been made to “the seating, paths of travel, or parking that services the north side of the stadium.” However, the city’s parks and recreation director had stated Phase II improvements to the facility had included installation of “new steps and ramps from the field to the bleacher area, an 18-inch concrete curb, and a sidewalk path of travel along the north and south sides of the field and to the handicapped parking area.”

In light of such conflicting information, it was unclear to the court “whether this alteration was in fact made and, if so, whether it was constructed according to the applicable regulations.” As a result, the federal court denied the city’s motion for summary judgment on this particular issue. Further trial proceed-

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ings would, therefore, be necessary to determine whether the path of travel to the north side of facility had indeed been altered in this particular portion of the existing facility. If so, such alterations would have to comply with applicable ADA accessibility requirements.

Overall Programmatic Access Similarly, Smith had also claimed the south side paths of travel to the facility violated the ADA. Specifically, Smith alleged that the concrete ramp that leads from the southwest side of the stadium to the upper concourse of the south seating side required edge protection along the sides pursuant to the 2010 ADAS Section 405.9. Smith claimed this could be rectified by welding on a metal plate to the inside face of the noncompliant portions of the handrail and that the cost would range close to $50 per linear foot plus labor. Smith also claimed the asphalt ramp from the east parking lot to the upper south side concourse level had slopes that exceeded the maximum 8.33 percent as allowed by ADAS section 405.2, and lacked handrails on both sides as required by ADAS section 405.8, as well as level landings for each 30 inches of vertical rise, as required by ADAS 405.6.

In response, the city noted Smith had stated that he had not returned to the Grape Bowl because the north side was not accessible. Since Smith only wanted access to the north side of the stadium, the city claimed Smith could not show any alleged discrimination against him was “caused by any barrier on the south side of the stadium.”

While Smith conceded he was “not seeking a fix of the south side,” Smith claimed noncompliance of the south side was “relevant to overall programmatic access” to the Grape Bowl. The federal district court agreed. In the opinion of the court, it was appropriate for Smith to cite barriers to ac-

Resources cess on the south side to demonstrate the overall program in the Grape Bowl when viewed in its entirety (i.e., viewing the football game) was not readily accessible to individuals with disabilities.

Conclusion Based on this pretrial evidence, the federal district court found neither the city nor Smith had conclusively proven their case under the ADA. The federal district court, therefore, denied the city’s as well as Smith’s motion for summary judgment. As a result, this case would proceed to trial for further proceedings to more fully consider whether the north side of the Grape Bowl had complied with ADA compliance as an existing facility and whether alterations to the south side of the facility in 2010 complied with the ADA requirements for

alterations and new construction in an existing facility.

NOTE: On October 14, 2015, the Lodi News-Sentinel reported that the city had decided to “close the whole north side of the stadium to spectators” as a result of Smith’s ADA lawsuit. Use of the Grape Bowl by the Lodi Unified School District was subject to a joint use agreement between the school district and the city through the Lodi Parks, Recreation and Cultural Services Department (www. lodinews.com/news/article_48fcd4e2-7 308-11e5-8d2b-b3903a910cb1.html).

James C. Kozlowski, J.D., Ph.D., is an Attorney and Associate Professor in the School of Recreation, Health and Tourism at George Mason University in Manassas, Virginia (jkozlows@gmu. edu). Webpage with link to law review articles archive (1982 to present): http://mason.gmu. edu/~jkozlows.

Links to YouTube videos with views of the “Grape Bowl” in Lodi, California: • https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=VGv2mq0iejE • https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=Gp5QtL4rYms • https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=aL3seJfSNWg SEE ALSO: • State Fair Fails ADA Accessibility Test for Existing Facilities James C. Kozlowski. Parks & Recreation. Sept. 2004. Vol. 39, Iss. 9 http://cehdclass.gmu.edu/jkozlows/ lawarts/09SEP04.pdf • ADA Requires Wheelchair Areas to Be Integrated into General Seating James C. Kozlowski. Parks & Recreation. Jan. 2005. Vol. 40, Iss. 1 http://cehdclass.gmu.edu/jkozlows/ lawarts/01JAN05.pdf

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Branches interns examine macroinvertebrates in Baltimore, Maryland’s Gwynns Falls prior to releasing the trout they raised during the school year.

Photo by Parks & People Foundation

FUTURE LEADERS

Empowering Youth to Care for Local Parks and Their Neighborhoods

By Mark Talbert

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magine Baltimore City public high school students gathered behind row homes on an overcast, humid summer day. They are in one of the most urbanized parts of the city — Sandtown-Winchester — where incomes are among the city’s lowest and a sea of concrete and black rooftops make the summer temperature soar from heat island effect. A few kids sit on stoops beside an abandoned, decaying home. Everyone is sweating.

But, behind the row homes, the lots are alive with Black Eyed Susans, budding chamomile and ripe tomatoes. Chesapeake grasses line a rain garden and mulched paths weave between shrubs.

There, in a huge garden that cannot be seen from the main road, a student, with her school’s green uniform tie still around her neck, lifts her spade to dig a hole to plant flowers. Beside her, another student tears open a bag of mulch and spreads it evenly over the pathways.

Instead of the decay and abandonment that dominate the environment in some

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of Baltimore’s inner city neighborhoods, they are surrounded by people working on the plot, tending the plants and building community.

The location is Small Street Garden, an urban green space in Baltimore that began by one woman who wanted to turn abandoned garages and an illegal dumping site into a productive community use. The high schoolers who are working in the garden, and who work in other similar gardens and parks throughout Baltimore, are taking action to improve Baltimore and, in so doing, improve their own lives.

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The students participate in Branches, a summer and afterschool internship program of the Parks & People Foundation, which employs youth to tend to Baltimore’s green spaces and learn about opportunities available to them after high school.

Improving Public Spaces and Lives Blake Wrigley, a Parks & People Foundation employee and team leader for the Branches interns, explains the program: “The basic framework is that it’s an internship. It’s not just an afterschool program. The interns are paid to come here. The two main goals are exposing the interns to environmental education — we do that through hands-on community greening projects, so they are actually out improving Baltimore’s green spaces, mixed in with some environ-

Breaking the Mold Branches is not a typical work-skills job program. The youth who intern with Branches obtain work experience that is catered to the unique needs of a high school student. When they aren’t maintaining parks or green spaces, they spend time learning about college degrees, job training programs and the basics of personal finance. They are exposed to environmental science — phenology, ecology, hydrology — and learn how the green spaces they are maintaining benefit the city and the people who live around them.

Photo by Parks & People Foundation

mental science — and job skills training and life skills training. What does it mean to be a professional employee?

For some of the interns, this is their first job experience.”

Everyone needs a first job or internship with early work experiences shaping viewpoints on employment and responsibility. Khyja McCray, a 2016–2017 graduate of Branches and rising freshman at Hood College, says that she is one of the few among her peers to have a job. She is not alone in that fact.

The Rockefeller Foundation reports that “the unemployment rate for younger workers remains more than double the national average.” Yet research consistently shows that young people who work in high school are more likely to be stable in careers and earn more as they age. This fact is incredibly important for young people in Baltimore, a city where the median family income is less than half that of the state.

There is a saying that a person cannot be what they cannot see. And, when youth in Baltimore see decayed schools, peers involved with crime and a lack of investment in their communities, youth reflect that environment and have a harder time overcoming barriers than their socioeconomically advantaged peers.

Branches interns and team leaders (2016-2017 school year) gather at the Parks & People Foundation’s headquarters in Druid Hill Park in Baltimore, Maryland.

“Branches was impactful because it opened up my mind between the relationship with our environment and health. Branches has allowed me to take the initiative and start that change to make a better environment for Baltimore City,” says Zion Smith, a high school sophomore and returning intern for the 2017–2018 program.

“At first, I wasn’t a fan of getting muddy,” says McCray, “but when we were planting seedlings and flowers, I began to enjoy getting my hands dirty.

The feeling of being outside is serene.

It’s just beautiful.”

These testimonies speak to exactly the impact the program aims to achieve: providing high school students with opportunities to break out of the norm, and showing youth that they are an active part of the community and their local parks, and, that through their actions, they can help neighbors like the caretakers of Small Street Garden.

Caring for Baltimore This summer, when Branches goes back to Small Street Garden, more interns will lift shovels and plant vegetables for the community. It is hot work and most high school students would shy away

from anything laborious, but in part because of Branches’ help, that space will be maintained and remain as an asset for a community. If not for Branches, interns would be spending their evenings at a routine job or watching TV at home, rather than learning how to break out of the cycle of poverty. Instead, they are experiencing the chance to progress productively and seamlessly from high school to the next opportunity.

“We are nurturing the next generation of homegrown urban gardeners and passionate stewards of beautiful and splendid city parks,” says Sam Little, environmental education manager and supervisor of all Branches staff. “Our team members are roses growing up in a concrete place with a lot of negativity, but here, they are investing in themselves and the places they inhabit on a daily basis, making both the better as a result. They chose not to let the bad and sad overwhelm them. Instead, they are earning a paycheck, gaining valuable life skills and learning the importance of being civically engaged Baltimoreans.”

Mark Talbert is the Grant Manager and Writer for the Parks & People Foundation (mark.talbert@ parksandpeople.org).

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Photo courtesy of Jeremy Marshall

Rainwater cascades through Rain Ravine, a channeled water art installation feature by environmental artist Stacy Levy at the Frick Environmental Center by the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy in Pittsburgh, Pennysylvania.

Collaborating with Communities Strengthens Green Infrastructure Outcomes

By Lori Robertson

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s traditional gray stormwater management infrastructure continues to age, it often fails to adequately mitigate effects from increasingly frequent extreme weather events, as well as everyday rain events. Severe flooding and degraded water quality from combined sewer overflows ensue, and can lead to poor environmental and community health, negatively impacting the quality of life for surrounding residents. Not surprisingly, such circumstances disproportionately affect the most vulnerable communities, including low income and communities of color.

These realities helped to shape the creation of NRPA’s Great Urban Parks Campaign, which aims to promote and advance green infrastructure stormwater management projects in parks that are working to address equity. The campaign specifically highlights the multiple benefits these projects can bring to surrounding communities, including improved community health, access to green space and nature, and opportunities for education and employment. Meaningful and ongoing community engagement and a collab-

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orative approach with a multistakeholder group are essential to realizing these benefits and ensuring that green stormwater infrastructure projects in parks are embraced by nearby residents.

Over the past two years, in four urban communities across the country, largescale green infrastructure projects in parks have commenced as part of NRPA’s Great Urban Parks Campaign initiative. Slated to finish by late fall 2018, these projects have served as case studies highlighting the best practices and sometime missteps of cre-

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ating multiple-benefit green stormwater infrastructure projects in parks. Their community engagement experiences demonstrate the value and challenges associated with meaningful community engagement and how such engagement can benefit the overall project. Through this initiative, NRPA has learned some valuable lessons in successfully collaborating with communities on green infrastructure projects.

Cast a Wide Net From the earliest design and planning phases, it is critical for green stormwater infrastructure projects to be seen by all stakeholders as a continuing partnership.

Park agencies must cast a wide net from the outset and collaborate with a diverse set of traditional partners (such as water utilities, environmental nonprofits and watershed associations), as well as

Rely on Community Expertise Allow local residents to lend their skills, knowledge and insights to the project efforts. After all, no one knows a community better than those who live in it.

Carve out elements of the larger project specific to local partners and residents, and make sure those partners are given proper credit. This ensures that the project will receive higher public profile and community acceptance.

Local residents will also be able to educate you on the community’s history and past experiences. These facts may help to inform your engagement strategy and raise awareness to sensitives that may exist within a community. For instance, local GUPC partners in both Pittsburgh and Baltimore expressed concern over a proposed civic engagement survey to measure how park improvement projects affect residents’ attitudes toward local government. They explained that many underserved communities are historically “over-surveyed, over-promised and under delivered,” and, as a result, local residents tend to be skeptical about proposed community projects. Sensitivities to these issues and histories can be critical in the project’s success.

Photo courtesy of Jeremy Marshall

less thought of partners (such as local housing authorities, schools and health care centers). This silo-busting approach adds to the overall success and impact of green infrastructure projects and contributes to higher-performing public spaces.

In Baltimore, Great Urban Park Campaign (GUPC) partners looked to The 6th Branch, a returning veterans service organization, to take on weekly site maintenance that the city could not provide.

The 6th Branch now conducts regularly scheduled cleanup days, while Rebuild Johnston Square, a local neighborhood organization, also plans biweekly cleanup and planting days to foster stewardship and community involvement.

Water basins along this streamside trail on Phipps Run in Pittsburgh’s Schenley Park, help control the flow of stormwater into the stream.

Connect to Existing Efforts Do not assume that the community will come to you to offer input and knowledge.

It is import that your engagement efforts look to already planned events and other existing community infrastructure as a way to connect and share information.

The public participation process must take place on the community’s terms, not on the Monday to Friday workday schedules of the project managers. This may mean hosting booths at neighborhood festivals, attending local church gatherings and weekend events. Community engagement can also be enhanced when social, recreational or celebratory events are held at the project site for community members, project partners and investors.

Be Willing to Let Go of Expectations The ability to listen, be adaptive, reevaluate and work together develops true community-inspired visions. In Atlanta, partners received pushback from the community on initial project designs. Their redesign took the community’s desires fully into consideration by removing a large pond from the plan. Community members felt the pond would be a magnet for trash, and some feared for the safety of children and youth.

The eventual vision was substantially different than what was envisioned at the start. It required flexibility and willingness to go back to the drawing board to incorporate community feedback.

Community Collaboration Isn’t Easy or Quick “Early, often and sometimes messy” is a motto often expressed when it comes to community collaboration. Meaningful community engagement takes time, and it’s important for project teams to stay adaptive and flexible, even if this means that timelines might change. Projects that offer opportunities for the community to engage in regular project visioning and planning reach goals more smoothly and gain much higher community acceptance and ownership.

According to the EPA’s Green Infrastructure in Parks: A Guide to Collaboration, Funding and Community Engagement: “When community members come together to correct environmental damage or to rehabilitate and redesign parks, they are able to actively participate in the decision-making process and gain a voice in improving the local environment and community livability.”

Thanks to ongoing support from Southwest Airlines, NRPA continues to identify best practices and innovative strategies that effectively empower the community to influence the design of a green infrastructure project as part of the Great Urban Parks Campaign. Stay tuned for additional lessons learned and updates from our community partners through fall 2017.

Lori Robertson is NRPA’s Director of Conservation (lrobertson@nrpa.org).

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Photo provided by the City of Jackson Parks and Recreation Department

HEALTH AND WELLNESS

Celeste Scott, horticulturist from the University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture Extension Service, teaches kids at Westwood Community Center in Jackson about gardening.

Community and Home Gardening Develop Lifelong Healthy Habits

By Allison Colman

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ardens have long been a staple of parks and recreation. Ranging from individual community garden plots available to residents, to public-private partnerships between restaurants, food banks and local government, to out-of-school time (OST) sites planting and harvesting produce for snacks, meals and nutrition education, gardens are an exceptional community asset and provide a number of benefits to individuals and families.

Gardens can be used to foster a love and appreciation of nature. They can bridge connections to other cultures and provide opportunities for social engagement. They are proven to reduce stress and promote heart health and brain function. They offer low-cost solutions to fresh food deserts and increase access to nutritious foods for underserved populations. And, they can be used to educate youth about growing healthy and sustainable produce, creating life-long healthy habits.

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encourages local park and recreation agencies to implement a set of Healthy Eating and Physical Activity (HEPA) standards at their OST sites. Since 2014, more than 1,500 park and recreation sites have pledged to “Commit to Health,” impacting more than 280,000 children across the country. The HEPA standards focus on changing program environments and policies to increase opportunities for youth to be physically active and increase access to healthy foods. While agencies have experienced great success in creating healthier en-

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vironments, implementing the HEPA standards is a process that can present some challenges.

From creating staff buy-in, evaluating and adapting menus and program schedules, encouraging positive role modeling, and offering nutrition education and physical activity while navigating the day-to-day challenges of an OST program, there is not a one-sizefits-all strategy to success. Agencies use a variety of tactics and resources to achieve the standards, including utilizing nutrition education curricula (like NRPA’s Foods of the Month - http:// www.nrpa.org/our-work/partnerships/ initiatives/commit-to-health/foods-ofthe-month/april-foods-of-the-month/), partnering with local nonprofits and the private sector to offer additional enrichment activities and, more recently,

using community gardening programs to engage youth and families in healthy eating initiatives, educate youth about growing sustainable produce and provide a connection to nature and the outdoors. Combining gardening with nutrition education has proven to be a popular and successful way to meet many of the HEPA standards.

One local park and recreation agency leading the way to healthier outcomes through community gardening is the city of Florence in South Carolina. At Northwest Community Center, located in a neighborhood once riddled by gun violence and gang activity, community members have come together to establish a garden where kids and families have safe access to nutritious foods and educational opportunities. Over the past few years, the recreation department has partnered with the Clemson University Extension office and a local master gardener to show children in summer camp programs how sustainable food is grown and how eating healthy can impact their daily lives. Kids in the program were immediately intrigued by the lessons and eager to learn more. According to David Caldwell, program coordinator with the city of Florence, “Before long, kids were pointing out to park and recreation staff what needed to be done in the garden each day — planting, watering, harvesting produce and composting.” In addition to the lessons during the camp day, kids have the opportunity to return to the garden site with their families and utilize the produce that is available. The park and recreation department credits the establishment of the garden with a rise in positive social interactions, family engagement and healthy eating, and an increase in neighborhood safety.

In Chicago, Illinois, the Chicago Park District operates several gardening programs in conjunction with its Commit to Health sites — some focused on nutrition

education and sustainability, others on engaging teens in work development opportunities and building lifelong health and wellness skills. At-risk youth in the Atgeld Garden Chicago Housing Authority community can engage in handson gardening and cooking programs at Carver Park. The Chicago Park District partnered with local nonprofit Growing Power, Inc., to employ teens and teach them about sustainable urban farming, culinary skills, healthy meal preparation and composting. In the summer months, more than 100 teens spend their mornings working on the farm and their afternoons enjoying the fruits and vegetables of their labor by preparing healthy meals under the supervision of a chef. Through this partnership, teens are learning lifelong culinary skills and developing healthy habits that will follow them throughout their adult years. In addition, the program offers youth employment opportunities, keeping them engaged and learning during the summer months.

In a more traditional community garden setting, the park and recreation department in the city of Jackson, Tennessee, has witnessed the direct impact that gardening can have on its youth in summer camp and afterschool programs.

With funding from the Walmart Foundation and under the guidance of local horticulturist Celeste Scott, from the University of Tennessee Extension Office, the park and recreation department constructed several raised garden beds at Westwood Recreation Center. Westwood is home to one of the largest afterschool programs in the city and offers a plethora of enrichment activities for youth, including cooking classes and nutrition education. The garden was an additional element to enhance its existing programs and to give kids the chance to experience hands-on planting and harvesting of fresh produce. According to program staff, the kids can barely contain their

excitement when it comes to gardening, eagerly awaiting the produce to be ready each season! As an added benefit, the garden offers children the chance to taste fruits and vegetables, helping the sites to meet the HEPA standards that focus on access to healthier foods.

Programs like these in Florence, Chicago and Jackson help to reinforce the positive effects that gardening can have on individuals and families. With feedback from the field strongly indicating that gardens are a useful educational tool in the OST environment, NRPA launched the new Community and Home Gardening curriculum (http:// www.nrpa.org/our-work/partnerships/ initiatives/commit-to-health/community-home-gardening/) this summer. The curriculum supports the creation and year-round programming of gardens in OST settings and at home to reinforce the healthy behaviors youth are learning in summer camps and afterschool. A variety of different gardening topics, including starting seedlings, winter gardening, preserving your harvest, composting, gardening to reduce grocery bills, exploring farmers markets and more are featured! Each month contains newsletters that can be sent home with parents and caregivers, as well as age-appropriate experiential activities that encourage hands-on exploration, coloring and activity sheets for youth. In addition, four seasonal posters and gardening tip sheets are also available covering a wide range of gardening topics. All materials are free and downloadable.

While many agencies already have gardens established and others are just beginning, the curriculum, available at www.nrpa.org/committohealth, is designed to have something for everyone, so check it out.

Allison Colman is NRPA’s Health and Wellness Program Manager (acolman@nrpa.org).

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SOCIAL EQUITY

The Empty Bowls Soup Tale How you can help fight hunger in New Orleans

By Anica O’Neil and Rae Wallace

Y

ou never see it coming. In fact, it almost always sneaks up on you. As it creeps up on you, knowledge of its presence intensifies. You start to feel empty. Then, the wooziness sets in, and that is when you know it’s close.

But, by that time, it is already too late. It growls. And, as its thunderous voice roars, waves of ache rip then echo through your core. It’s got you.

But, unlike many stories that begin like this, the main characters in this story have the best armament to defend themselves. Their secret strength is a mean bite. Their armory is stocked with nunchucks of celery, apple grenades and onion tear gas. A well-stocked refrigerator and pantry along with a few bowls are all that’s needed to defeat the villain — hunger. But not everyone in our communities has the ingredients needed to fill their bowls.

So, at this year’s Annual Conference, during a pre-lunch “Soup-Tail Hour” fundraiser, NRPA’s Ethnic Minority So-

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ciety (EMS) is offering you an opportunity to help. Purchase a ticket to the Ethnic Minority Luncheon or the pre-lunch fundraiser, scheduled for Thursday, September 28 at 11 a.m. at the Hilton Riverside Hotel, and proceeds will help support local New Orleans food banks.

But, the story of this “Soup-Tale” didn’t begin here, it began with a mission.

The Mission: Social Equity In Prince George’s County, Maryland, more than 130,000 residents struggle to get the food they need. Nationwide, 42 million Americans struggle with hunger.

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People often question how hunger and parks and recreation connect. The answer is equity.

NRPA invests in protecting vulnerable communities and believes that by building communities, regardless of socio-economic standing, age, race or ability, our communities can thrive. According to FeedingAmerica.org, 43.1 million people in America are living in poverty.

That number is nearly identical to the number of Americans who struggle with hunger. No community can thrive when its neighbors are hungry, and turning a blind eye makes us all vulnerable. At the M-NCPPC Department of Parks and Recreation in Prince George’s County Maryland, we realized this, and we were not the only ones.

We realized that the mission of the Commit to Health grant from NRPA,

our partnership with our local Capital Area Food Bank, and our Formula 2040 Master Plan aligned. We knew that by pooling our resources and fighting hunger as a united front, we could help create healthier, more sustainable, vibrant communities.

The Strategy and Implementation: Collaboration We worked with youth, artists, business owners, community leaders and seniors to create dynamic, original and beautiful bowls. Through the process, they also learned how their actions through this initiative directly impact hunger. We aligned ourselves with NRPA’s commitment to health and wellness and social equity. While our youth were crafting the bowls, they learned about the importance of nutrition, not only inside the classroom, but also in the soil. They got their hands dirty growing fruits and vegetables they would later use to make healthy meals. We even worked with a few of our youngest residents through video to tell the community, in their words, why fighting hunger is so important.

The community was then invited to a fundraiser that included a catered lunch. They sampled different soups that were prepared and then donated by local restaurants and caterers. After finishing their meal, guests received one of the uniquely crafted bowls as a reminder that there are always empty bowls in our communities that need to be filled.

major sponsor of this event, and will provide a variety of soups and breads, but don’t think we won’t capture the local spirit of New Orleans. Local restaurants are also contributing a variety of soups with a Cajun flare.

If you are unable to attend the EMS luncheon but still want to fight hunger in New Orleans, you can do so by purchasing a ticket to the pre-lunch “Soup-Tail Hour.” The cost is only $20 and proceeds will go to the Second Harvest Food Bank of Greater New Orleans. You will also receive a guide on how to recreate or expand the Empty Bowls model in your hometown.

Making communities healthier is core to the services park and recreation agencies provide, which means, fighting hunger is part of that too. Together, we have the ingredients needed to fill communities. When you see a bowl, remember it is not meant to be empty. How will you fill it?

See you at “Soup-Tail Hour,” Thursday, September 28 at 11 a.m. at the Hilton Riverside Hotel in New Orleans.

Anica O’Neil is the Youth Specialist, Special Programs Division for M-NCPPC Department of Parks and Recreation (anica.oneil@pgparks.com). Rae Wallace is the Marketing Manager, Public Affairs and Marketing Division for M-NCPPC Department of Parks and Recreation (rae.wallace@pgparks.com).

The Impact: Ongoing Efforts During our first Empty Bowls event, we raised more than $10,000, and all the proceeds from the event went to support local food bank programs. Donations to local food banks provide families with fresh fruits and vegetables and nonperishable food items. Our second annual Empty Bowls event will be held in October.

But, we acknowledge our efforts cannot end here. Fighting hunger requires many communities and stakeholders working together, sharing ideas and supporting each other’s efforts. Together, we can take steps toward a healthier community.

How Can You Help Fight Hunger?

Cocktail Hour with a Twist: “Soup-Tail Hour” If you’re heading to the NRPA 2017 Annual Conference in New Orleans, we’d love for you to join us and the Ethnic Minority Society (EMS), Thursday, September 28, 2017, at 11 a.m. at the Hilton Riverside Hotel for the Empty Bowls pre-lunch “Soup-Tail Hour” fundraiser. Admission to the fundraiser is included in the price of the EMS’s luncheon ticket, thanks to our presenting sponsor. For every ticket purchased, a sponsor will fund your Empty Bowls “Soup-Tail Hour” admission. Whole Foods Market Veterans Mandeville and Arabella Station is a W W W. PA R K S A N D R E C R E AT I O N . O R G | A U G U S T 2 0 1 7 |

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Unleashed: Creating Successful, Lasting Arts Programs

By Paula Jacoby-Garrett

Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.

— Thomas Merton

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hether in a small town or large metropolis, our park and recreation programs can be integral in tying our community together and vital for the success of our youth. Those who regularly participate in the arts are more likely to have academic achievement, be elected to a class office position, win awards, read for pleasure and perform community service. For those at-risk youth, the arts can deter truancy and delinquent behavior and increase academic performance, according to Americans for the Arts.

Understanding the community’s interest in the arts is paramount in prioritizing program depth and breadth. Americans

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for the Arts suggests first determining what your community wants from an arts program, what it wants to achieve and where interest lies; then determining how the arts are supported politically and financially in your community and what funds are, or could be, utilized for programs. Americans for the Arts also has resources for marketing, establishing a local network and creating relationships with local businesses.

Arts programs come in many shapes and sizes — from traditional summer camps and afterschool programs to highly specialized and focused programming.

Finding the right fit for your community is the key to a successful program.

Afterschool Arts While there is often a plethora of activities and classes available for preschooland elementary-school-aged children, our middle and high school students seldom have much available to them.

According to Afterschool Alliance, “On

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school days, the hours between 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. are the peak hours for juvenile crime, and quality afterschool programs for young people offered during those hours can help prevent youth violence.”

The city of Austin, Texas, created the Totally Cool, Totally Art program specifically to reach this age group. The Harvard Family Research Project says the goals of the program are to “increase youths’ (1) sense of belonging and feeling that they have safe, positive and creative environments in which to participate during free time; (2) opportunities to expand knowledge, skills and possible career interest in art; (3) trust and respect for other youth, adult mentors, artists and other authority figures; (4) ability to work cooperatively with other youth and communicate effectively in a group; and (5) ability to make creative and positive choices through self-expression.”

The Totally Cool, Totally Art program was established in 1996, originally to thwart gang violence. To date, the program has re-

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Photograph courtesy of Town of Cary

ARTS UNLEASHED

The Town of Cary, North Carolina, provides a variety of programming for those from 18 months to seniors.

ceived the Nickelodeon Television Award for Best Local Teen Art Program, and several NRPA awards, among others. Offerings have included culinary arts, fashion design, soft sculpture, painting, STEAM, ceramics, metalsmith, jewelry making, mask making, drumming and urban painting. Each session runs five weeks, with instructors rotating between recreation centers.

“We just finished our 21st year of this regional and national award-winning program,” says Kelly Hasandras, program specialist for the city of Austin. “We serve 150 teens a week, ages 12– 18, in eight recreation centers, and we create different classes every year to keep it fresh. We are trying to help two different communities with this program. We hire emerging artists in the community to teach these classes so they get valuable experience teaching. And, it is valuable for the students who take the classes.”

Arts and Culture As the recipient of the 2016 National Gold Metal Award for Excellence in Park and Recreation Management, the town of Cary, North Carolina, takes its cultural resources very seriously. “Our arts programs run the gamut from hands-on class40

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es in painting, pottery, fused glass, metals, woodworking and textiles to performance classes in drama and dance, and various music areas, including guitar, piano, voice and our popular bluegrass summer camps. In addition, we offer classes in filmmaking, video game production and history camps,” says Lyman Collins, cultural arts manager. Programs are available for those 18 months old to seniors.

The Town of Cary also hosts a robust film festival, national musical and theatrical acts, and cultural events such as the Diwali Festival, which is celebrated with the local Indian-American community.

“A new off-season program at the amphitheater is the North Carolina Chinese Lantern Festival, where incredible Chinese ‘lanterns’ — tall, intricate cloth-covered figures lit internally — are built on-site by Chinese craftspeople and then left on-site for six weeks. [They] drew over 90,000 visitors this past holiday season,” says Collins.

“Because the Cary Arts Center brings together the visual and performing arts in one facility, we have nurtured opportunities for programs to complement each other. For example, for a performance with a touring artist in our Marvelous Music series, our arts classes have

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worked with young people on drawing to the music — expressing their art based on the music they hear,” says Collins.

The city also works with more than 30 local arts organizations to assist in facilitating its programs and goals. This wide range of arts programs and activities are what has made the Town of Cary successful and nationally recognized. As Collins says, “variety is our strength.”

Art not only can engage our youth, but also can work toward social change. Along the Lafitte Greenway in New Orleans, a team of young community members created a mural that not only documents the history of the greenway, but also incorporates themes of hope and reconciliation. Truly a team effort, the project was spearheaded by the Welcome Table New Orleans MidCity Circle, the Young Artists Movement (YAM) and Prospect New Orleans.

“The lead artist, Keith Duncan, led workshops with young people to teach skills in mural-making. [After community engagement], he worked with them to create the ultimate image that would be created at Lemann Pool,” says Alphonse Smith, director of the Arts Council New Orleans.

“We had over 100 community members participate, putting on the initial coats of paint. We had people from ages 5 to over 60 coming out to kick off the project. From there, the young people who were chosen to participate in the project completed the rest of the mural.” Today, the mural stands as a reminder of the talent of our youth and the power of community arts projects.

Dance When a program is successful, it lasts, and the San Diego Civic Dance Arts program has done just that for 75 years.

Through the years, the program has introduced hundreds of thousands to the art form of dance, and has been lauded as the standard by which other citywide dance programs nationwide measure themselves. The program serves San Diego residents from 3 years old to senior citizens across 20 locations.

nies, Broadway, and film and television to uplift and inspire our dance community.”

Filmmaking For the Camacho Activity Center in Austin, Texas, outdoor education and nature-based programing are its usual fare, but it has expanded its horizons into filmmaking and photography. There are filmmaking camps during winter and spring break and several during the summer for students ages 5–18.

“Each week-long camp incorporates filmmaking education, including writing, camera operation, sound, lighting, acting, editing and more. Each camp films an original story that is later showcased in our annual film festival in the fall,” says Ryan Eaker, Camacho activity supervisor. “In addition to these filmmaking camps, we lead nature photography outreach programs throughout the school year to primarily underserved populations, lower-income schools, recreation centers and community groups.”

Filmmaking and photography are popular with youth, and today’s cellphone technology has allowed students to take high-quality images and video without the

added cost of expensive equipment. These classes are extremely popular. For Eaker, it is about staying current: “It’s crucial to stay on the forefront of the technological front, and remain pioneering in the ways that you teach and educate the public.

“Now it’s about teaching those participants to look at the world around them in a different way and expose the art and beauty in the objects and environment that surround them, which they honestly aren’t noticing with their heads buried in their phones,” says Eaker. “We allow kids to take a handful of selfies to get that out of the way and then focus (so to speak) on getting physically close to natural objects and playing with perspective and vantage points, lighting and storytelling through photography.”

Theatre For Hasandras, her latest challenge is expanding an already successful program in a new direction. This is the second year of the Totally Cool, Totally Art Theatre Camp.

This fast-paced theatre camp takes students ages 12–17 through the process of creating a theatrical production.

Continued on page 43 Filmmaking and photography classes at the Camacho Activity Center in Austin, Texas, are offered during the summer and during winter and spring break.

Photograph courtesy of Camacho Activity Center

The program runs more than 200 classes weekly from ballet to hip-hop to Bollywood, and many other classes in between.

It provides youth summer camps, advanced training camps, master classes, an adult workshop, and a workshop specifically to increase the participation of boys.

“There is less interest in the traditional arts programing, such as ceramics and crafts, and more interest in performance-based arts, including dance, singing and dramatic arts,” says Deputy Directors Kathy Ruiz and David Monroe.

A large part of the program’s success is the caliber of instructors it brings to the program each year. World-class instructors and choreographers give the classes a level of quality and professionalism not typically seen in a city-run program. Beyond the number of classes it offers, this program has successfully secured more than 25,000 hours of volunteer support on an annual basis. This volunteer support helps offset personnel costs and establish community support. Financially, the San Diego Civic Dance program holds its own — in 2016, the program netted more than $300,000.

The program has received a multitude of awards, including the 2017 nomination for Bravo Award for Best Dance Concert, 2016 Bravo Award for Best Dance Concert, 2016 Presidential and Mayoral Volunteer Awards to two long-term volunteers, 2014 Bravo San Diego Award, and the 2013 Presidential Volunteer Award from Barack Obama, among others.

“The program is successful because the staff and I are dedicated to its success,” says Andrea Feier, dance specialist. “Many of the staff have grown up in this program and now teach for it out of a love for both the program as well as a passion for dance and the arts.” “Three of my staff have been teaching for 38 or more years, and most of the others have been here 10-plus years. As a graduate of The Juilliard School, I utilize my contacts in the world of dance to bring in guest artists from major modern dance compa-

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ARTS UNLEASHED

When Art Imitates Park Life “The Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature” animates land conservation

Characters TM & ©2017 Redrover Co., Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

By Vitisia Paynich

E

ach summer, people in towns across America flock to their local parks to partake in an evening of fun and entertainment. Armed with folding chairs, blankets and picnic baskets, families and friends gather outdoors to socialize and enjoy a movie experience under the stars. It’s the best of both worlds: arts and nature uniting as one.

But how would you feel if the same venue that hosts “Movies in the Park” were to suddenly disappear? More to the point, imagine your park overtaken by a greedy developer intending to demolish your neighborhood green space in order to make way for a dangerous amusement park. That’s exactly what Surly and his fellow animal friends encounter in the animated feature film, “The Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature.”

Opening in theaters on August 11, 2017, this much-anticipated sequel to the 2014 hit movie, “The Nut Job,” presented by Open Road Films, reunites most of the original cast, including Will Arnett as the voice of Surly, the smart-aleck, self-serving squirrel; Katherine Heigl as Andie, his problem-solving partner; and Precious, the lovable bulldog voiced by “Saturday Night Live” alum Maya Rudolph.

“The Nut Job 2: Nutty by Nature” also wel-

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comes new characters like, Mr. Feng, played by action star Jackie Chan, and the mayor, voiced by Bobby Moynihan.

Cal Brunker, known for his work on “Despicable Me,” “Escape from Planet Earth” and “Minions,” directed this latest incarnation of “The Nut Job” story — and even cowrote the screenplay with fellow writers Scott Bindley and Bob Barlen.

“I really liked the characters in the first film, and this was an opportunity to tell a story with my own spin on those characters,” explains Brunker. He adds that the studio wanted to take the “Nut Job” franchise in a slightly new direction, thus giving him “the freedom to do that with [these] amazing actors that are in the movie.”

While the story, again, takes place in Liberty Park located in the fictional city of Oakton, the antagonist this time is a nefarious mayor with a scheme to bulldoze the animals’ home and replace it with a poorly constructed amusement park. This prompts Surly and his furry friends to join forces in a fight to save their home from destruction.

Tapping Universal Themes Although “The Nut Job 2” is chiefly meant to entertain audiences, Brunker points out the

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movie’s universal theme of protecting one’s home. He explains that people might empathize with these animals’ predicament because it, perhaps, reflects their personal experiences. “And while the [characters’] home happens to be a park,” says Brunker, “we think about our own homes.”

The movie’s plot “is all about preserving green space in our cities,” explains Jeffrey Dickson, the film’s storyboard supervisor.

However, doing so could prove challenging.

Yet in order to be triumphant, “you should not be intimidated by overwhelming odds against you. That’s another important theme that comes across,” he says.

Brunker admits that his own park experiences as a child influenced the storyline somewhat. “Growing up, most of my friends and I spent a lot of time outside; we went to camps in the summer.” Brunker, who lives in Canada, often visited Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario. “I think all of that time in nature really makes you appreciate this amazing planet that we live on. And…when you see the destruction of the park in the movie, you’re really rooting for the characters to fight back and protect [their home],” he says.

Breathing Life into the Story Developing an animated film is a creative endeavor that could take months, if not years, to complete. For Brunker and his team, “The Nut Job 2” was a three-year project — from beginning the script to handing over the finished movie. Before working on any of the animation or storyboards, he concentrates on the first draft of the screenplay. “Once we’ve got that, we start working on the storyboard process so that we can start to see the visuals come to life and see these characters acting in the situations that they are going to be in,” he says. It’s at that point when you actually begin to see the film take shape and make changes accordingly.

When it comes to the animation, the devil is in the details. “We’re really interested in how things look in the animal world, so we would go to parks and shoot photographs close up of little clusters of animals and [observe] how they interact because all of it has to be built by hand by an artist and then by computer,” Brunker says.

“Our research, which took place in actual

parks, was really more about specific things: How does moss grow on the roots of a tree? How do pebbles collect in clusters, what do they look like, and how do we make that look natural? While it seems effortless, when you’re placing pebbles by hand in a 3D environment, it’s very difficult to make those things appear natural.”

Careful attention was also paid to the natural attributes of the characters. For example, the squirrels featured in the film walk around on two legs and gesture with their arms. Brunker says that when they are running, however, they’re always seen moving on all fours. “We try to keep certain animal behaviors consistent.”

Hollywood Thinks Green Surprisingly, Tinsel Town has long embraced stories that center on environmental themes. In fact, these types of animated movies date back decades, entertaining children while educating them about green issues like land conservation and climate change.

They include classics such as: “Bambi” (1942), “FernGully: The Last Rainforest” (1992), “Over the Hedge” (2006), “Happy Feet” (2006) and “WALL-E” (2008).

Dickson contends there are Hollywood directors and writers who believe they have a moral obligation to bring awareness about these issues through storytelling. However, “the real challenge is to do that without hitting the audience over the head, because people tend to act negatively when they think they’re being preached to. It’s not our job to tell people how to think; it’s our job to make people aware of issues. And, if we offer a solution, it’s just our solution for our characters. Everyone has to make up his or her own mind,” he says.

Surly Across America To promote the film’s August theater release, Surly and “The Nut Job 2” gang have embarked on a 30-city tour across the United States, participating in a series of Park Day events. The first Park Day event kicked off on June 10 during National Get Outdoors Day at Sloan’s Lake Park in Denver. On July 4, Surly appeared at Kansas City’s Corporate Woods for its Star Spangled Spectacular, taking photos with children while encouraging them to clean up the park. Other stops included Heritage Park in Las Vegas (July 6), Pancakes in the Woods at Chicago’s Emily Oakes Nature Center (July 9), and Dallas End of Summer Bash at Dallas Parks & Recreation (July 21). This month, fans of the movie can meet Surly in person at Seattle Seafair in Genesee Park, August 5–6.

Students attend workshops in acting, directing, improv comedy, dance, design and puppetry. They also visit a professional theatre to see a show and tour backstage. The students then create their own production and take it to local parks.

“We bring together kids from all over Austin. We have four weeks to write, cast, direct, write songs, and make costumes and set pieces for the production. Then, we take the production out to our summer playgrounds program, a free outdoor playground camp for children 6–12, primarily for kids with high needs, most of whom have never seen a play before,” says Hasandras.

Conclusion Regardless of the size of your budget, number of constituents or type of facilities, the key to creating and maintaining a successful arts program is finding what works for you and your residents.

“Give them a ‘tribe’ to belong to that instills discipline, commitment, integrity, artistry, self-expression and teamwork. Find teachers who are dedicated to teaching and to continuing to learn themselves,” says Feier. The programs mentioned all have one thing in common: they cultivate ties within the community, resulting in a strong, healthy community for years to come.

Paula Jacoby-Garrett is a Freelance Writer based in Las Vegas, Nevada (paula. jacoby.garrett@gmail.com).

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Dickson says “The Nut Job 2” is about the strength of friendship and the commitments we make. “It’s more than just a story about a squirrel,” he points out. “It’s a story about Surly dealing with something bigger than himself for the betterment of the community.”

Brunker agrees. “It happens to be a story about animals, but the theme is really about us all taking care of each other. We’re all human beings and we’re all in this together. We’ve got one world and we have to look out for each other by looking out for our planet.”

Vitisia Paynich is a Freelance Writer based in Chino Hills, California (vpaynich@gmail.com).

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Creating a Vibrant Public Space on the

Lafitte Greenway Parks Build Community project to add several amenities to the southeast portion of the greenway

By Paula Jacoby-Garrett

S

ince 2008, the NPRA community has been spreading the message of the transformative value of parks by annually creating a park, or revitalizing an existing park, in an area of need through its Parks Build Community initiative. Locations of the parks correspond to NRPA’s annual conference locations. This year’s Parks Build Community project will enhance a portion of the Lafitte Greenway, located in New Orleans, Louisiana.

The Lafitte Greenway runs several miles from Armstrong Park just outside of the historic French Quarter to City Park along Lake Pontchartrain. In the past, this area was a transportation canal, bustling with people walking along the canal, visiting the local gardens and businesses. It went through a myriad of changes over the years and was eventually decimated after Hurricane Katrina hit in 2005.

After the hurricane, local citizens and the New Orleans Recreation Development Commission (NORDC) pulled together to come up with a plan for the space. “We had the participation of the community, and through years of work and public engagement, we came up with a plan,” says Victor N. Richard III, chief executive officer of the New Orleans Recreation Development Commission.

Community members formed the Friends of Lafitte Greenway and, along with the NORDC, created a master plan for the greenway and its development. The plan calls for a multiuse transportation corridor, a linear park and the purchase of private inholdings to create a contiguous greenway. To date, installations have included a path for cyclists and pedestrians complete with lighting, shade trees, lawns, ADA-compliant crosswalks and signaling, and land has been purchased through the Trust for Public Lands. While current funding has allowed some improvements to be made, creating the greenway is an ongoing process with more improvements and funding needs to come.

Improvements to the Lafitte Greenway have resulted in revitalization of the area beyond the greenway, connecting communities and businesses in the adjacent areas and neighborhoods. “The city as a whole is ecstatic about the progression” of the greenway, Richard adds. It “meets the master plan for the entire city and the intentionality of connecting communities.

For example, near the greenway is a new medical corridor that includes LSU Medical Center, the Louisiana Cancer Research Center and the new

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L A F I T T E G R E E N W AY

Veterans Affairs hospital. Doctors, lawyers, the everyday citizen, grandparents with their grandchildren and families are all using the greenway to walk to work or to just exercise.”

To enhance the community connection, the Friends of Lafitte Greenway have developed public programs focusing on health, nature, community and place.

“Our goal is to improve opportunities for health and well-being for all New Orleans residents and Lafitte Greenway communities,” says Sophie Harris, executive director of the Friends of Lafitte Greenway.

“We offer monthly…garden classes at a nearby community garden geared toward children and families and are working to advocate for and create community gardens along the Lafitte Greenway. In addition, we offer free outdoor fitness classes.

“On the Lafitte Greenway on a sunny afternoon,” Harris continues, “the trail is humming with students strolling home, families with grocery bags in hand, bikers in slacks and skirts headed one way, others with instruments on their backs passing the other way. Tourists use the Greenway as well, which is wonderful. It is great to see tourists exploring neighborhoods outside the French Quarter, riding the Greenway up to City Park and Bayou St. John, and stopping at local businesses.

“Our goal is to connect people to the Greenway and to each other,” Harris adds.

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Photograph courtesy of Friends of Lafitte Greenway

Photograph by Hunter King

Programs, such as “Hike the Greenway,” educate the public about current initiatives and improvements along the green space.

Friends of Lafitte Greenway provides community gardening classes along the greenway.

Lafitte Greenway event, as well as through the Greenway Ambassadors Program — we engage area residents who become stewards of the Greenway and engage their communities to guide our work, and to co-lead our programs and events.”

For Felix Rainey, Friends of Lafitte Greenway Ambassador and lifetime community member, there have been many positive things happening in the area. “I grew up in the Lafitte area and have seen a lot of changes for the good.

We used to have two parks in the 1960s, one for whites and one for blacks. Now, you see all kinds of people — blacks, whites, Mexicans — it’s like jambalaya

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— a mix — and I like seeing that. There’s a lot of history in the area, and people can see how far Lafitte Greenway has come when they walk along the trails.”

NRPA’s Parks Build Community project “is part of the city’s initiative to convert the 3.1-mile right of way into a greenway with publicly accessible open space, recreation areas and other amenities. At the heart of the Greenway is a bicycle and pedestrian trail that facilitates travel among diverse, adjacent neighborhoods,” says Graham Hill, an architect for Concordia. “The Lafitte Greenway vision is to provide a safe, publicly accessible open space that reflects the needs and desires of the surrounding neighborhoods.”

“For the Lafitte Greenway to be selected as a Parks Build Community was a great honor. There were many other sites and projects across the city that could have been chosen,” says Richard.

The project site encompasses 15 acres on the southeast portion of the greenway between North Galvez Street and North Claiborne Avenue. The amenities to be installed — outdoor basketball courts, LED high-mast field lights, athletic fields with bleachers, open lawn for outdoor festivals and events, accessible walkways and benches, two sets of play equipment, and outdoor fitness equipment — will complement a nearby existing pool facility.

If you are planning on attending the NRPA Annual Conference in New Orleans this year, please join us for the Lafitte Greenway unveiling on September 24 and help us celebrate this historic event.

There’s still time to be involved with the 2017 Parks Build Community project. It is made possible through donations of funds, materials, equipment and manpower from our NRPA community. If you would like to be involved with this year’s Parks Build Community project, please contact Gina Mullins-Cohen at 703.858.2184 or at gcohen@nrpa.org.

Paula Jacoby-Garrett is a Freelance Writer based in Las Vegas, Nevada (paula.jacoby.garrett@gmail. com).

NRPA’S PARKS BUILD COMMUNITY 2017 LAFITTE GREENWAY NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA

This September, NRPA takes Parks Build Community to the city of New Orleans for the 8th annual lot-to-park transformation.

This year NRPA, with the generous assistance of our donors, reimagines a large segment of Lafitte Greenway, the parkway connecting one end of the city to another.

NRPA’s Parks Build Community 2017 will connect people of all ages from several underserved communities to state-of-the-art playgrounds, sports fields, fitness zones, water features, walking trails and family gathering spots.

Join us for the Dedication Ceremony 2 p.m. Sunday, September 24, 2017 THANK YOU TO 2017 NRPA’S PARKS BUILD COMMUNITY SPONSORS ® ™

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Local Officials’ Opinions About Local Park and Recreation Services

By Austin G. Barrett, M.S., and Andrew J. Mowen, Ph.D.

I

t’s safe to say this past presidential election has been unlike any other in recent memory.

Wall-to-wall coverage of political rallies, debates and even candidates’ tweets permeated every layer of the American consciousness. Largely missing from this presidential preoccupation was the critical importance of electing officials charged with leading local governments (i.e., council members, commissioners, mayors). As the saying goes, policy decisions made at the local level often have the most direct impact on a citizen’s life.

The business of local government, however, is not only carried out by elected officials, but also by those who are appointed or hired to fulfill specific jobs or duties. Common appointed officials within local governments include town or city managers, county administrators and department or division chiefs. Together, local elected and appointed officials are the individuals most responsible for setting policy and distributing revenues to a variety of public services. Quite often, local officials are required to make difficult fiscal trade-offs when drafting and approving municipal budgets.

As John L. Crompton, distinguished professor of Recreation, Park and Tourism at Texas A&M University, argued, for park and recreation services to be prioritized in the local government budgetary process, they must be perceived by decision makers as an essential service that addresses critical problems facing communities. If park and recreation services are not viewed as a potential solution to community problems, they run the risk of being viewed as “nice to have

if they can be afforded.” This predicament is particularly troubling when local governments experience fiscal stress (i.e., a decline in revenues or a shrinking tax base). Emerging evidence indicates during times of economic stress, local government investments in park and recreation services decline disproportionately to other governmental services.

Given the influence local officials wield in shaping and approving municipal budgets, there is remarkably little scientific evidence concerning their opinions regarding local park and recreation services. To our knowledge, only one research project has broached this topic systematically. In a 2002 survey of California governmental officials, the California Department of Parks and Recreation Planning Division found governmental leaders

possessed generally positive opinions about park and recreation services. In particular, leaders agreed park and recreation services were valued by their residents because they provide safe, wholesome and fun activities for families. Leaders also strongly believed park and recreation areas increase the value of residential and commercial property values. However, many questions remain: Do local officials believe parks and recreation provide benefits that address critical community needs? What level of priority do these officials place on park and recreation investment (of both facilities and other funding priorities)? Finally, do elected and appointed officials value and prioritize park and recreation services differently?

A Pennsylvania Perspective In 2014, we conducted a study to address these questions for Pennsylvania. Working in cooperation with the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, as well as four state-level professional associations, an online survey was distributed to a diverse sample of appointed

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LOC AL OFFICIALS

and elected local officials throughout the state. In total, 489 appointed officials and 414 elected officials participated in the study.

Among appointed officials, the vast majority were township, borough or city managers/secretaries (97 percent). The remaining 3 percent were county chief clerks/administrators. Borough council members accounted for the majority (55 percent) of elected officials, followed by township supervisors/ commissioners (21 percent), mayors (11 percent), city council members (7 percent) and county commissioners (6 percent). The majority of officials classified their communities as rural (53.5 percent) and served a population of less than 5,000 residents (62 percent). Based on this predominantly rural sample, it was not surprising that three quarters of officials stated their local government owned less than four parks.

We first asked about the benefits local officials’ believed park and recreation services provide in their community. Collectively, both elected and appointed officials believed that park and recreation services provided a moderately high degree of benefit to their local communities; 10 of the 12 survey benefit items rated above a three on the five-point scale (Table 1). The benefits perceived as most frequently delivered were “provides children with a safe place to play” (Mean=4.06) and “makes the community a more desirable place to live” (Mean=3.91). Officials were less likely to believe their local park and recreation services provided benefits, such as “helps attract new residents and businesses” (Mean=3.10), “preserves historical and cultural heritage” (Mean=2.98), and “helps reduce crime” (Mean=2.73).

Table 1. Comparing the Extent that Local Parks and Recreation Provide Various Types of Benefits Appointed Officials Benefits Provided

Elected Officials

All Officials

Mean

SD

Mean

SD

Mean

SD

Improves physical health and fitness**

3.43

1.26

3.72

1.15

3.56

1.22

Reduces stress/improves mental health***

3.19

1.19

3.59

1.10

3.38

1.16

Makes the community a more desirable place to live***

3.75

1.26

4.09

1.03

3.91

1.17

Enhances a sense of community*

3.57

1.25

3.78

1.11

3.67

1.19

Provides children with a safe place to play**

3.96

1.25

4.18

1.07

4.06

1.17

Promotes positive youth development**

3.51

1.29

3.80

1.17

3.65

1.24

Increases property values in the community***

3.26

1.26

3.63

1.19

3.43

1.21

Helps attract new residents and businesses***

2.93

1.21

3.29

1.22

3.10

1.23

Health

Community

Youth Development

Economic

Resource Conservation Protects the natural environment**

3.31

1.28

3.56

1.16

3.43

1.23

Preserves historical and cultural heritage***

2.79

1.25

3.19

1.26

2.98

1.27

3.35

1.30

3.77

1.17

3.54

1.26

2.54

1.18

2.96

1.15

2.73

1.18

Equity Provides equitable and accessible recreation opportunities to a broad constituency*** Crime Reduction Helps reduce crime***

t-value: *<.05, **<.01, ***<.001; NS = Not Significant, SD = Standard Deviation Scaled from: 1=Not at all to 5=A great deal.

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Comparisons were then made based on type of official (i.e., elected vs. appointed). For all 12 benefit items, elected officials believed park and recreation services provided a significantly higher level of benefit than appointed officials (Table 1).

These differences were particularly pronounced for the following benefit items: “reduces stress/improves mental health,” “preserves historical and cultural heritage,” “provides equitable and accessible recreation opportunities to a broad constituency,” and “helps reduce crime.”

Next, we asked officials about the level of importance they placed on funding specific recreation and conservation initiatives or priorities. There was strong agreement among appointed and elected officials about the importance of maintaining existing park and recreation areas (Table 2). Not only did maintenance receive the highest overall mean score (4.30), but there also was no significant difference between the two types of officials. Providing programs at park and recreation areas was viewed as moderately important by all officials (Mean=3.42), with elected officials being more prone to prioritize programming than appointed officials.

Both types of officials placed less importance on land acquisition for open space protection (Overall Mean=2.80) and for developed recreation (Mean=2.37). While there was no difference between appointed and elected officials in importance placed on land acquisition for open space, elected officials placed a significantly higher level of importance on acquisition of land/water for developed recreation.

Finally, we asked officials about their level of priority for investing in specific types of recreation facilities over the next five years. We found that investing in playgrounds received the highest level of priority from local officials (Mean=3.55; Table 3). Next, neighborhood parks and community or regional parks received moderate investment priority scores (Mean=3.19 and 3.00, respectively). Community or regional trail systems (Mean=2.85), as well as developed recreation areas, such

Table 2. Comparing the Importance of Various Park and Recreation Priorities for Funding as team sports facilities (Mean=2.95) and especially swimming pools (M=1.94), received lower levels of priority. When we compared facility investment priorities based on type of official, we found elected officials prioritized investment in nearly all of these facilities at a higher level than appointed officials (except community or regional trail systems). In particular, elected officials placed much more priority on community recreation areas such as team sports facilities and swimming pools.

Implications This is one of few studies that not only assessed local officials’ views on parks and recreation, but also compared and contrasted the views of elected and appointed officials.

What we found was that local officials believe that park and recreation services provide a moderately high level of benefit for their local communities. Local officials agreed these benefits were numerous, including positive youth development, a sense of community, promoting health, economic prosperity, resource conservation and social equity. Our findings suggest that local officials do not merely view park and recreation services as “fun and games,” but believe they offer a high level of benefit for their communities.

The survey also highlights the central importance or priority that both elected and appointed officials placed on maintaining existing park and recreation areas (taking care of what they have). Large capital investments may grab headlines, but officials preferred funding to be directed toward maintaining facilities their local government already operate. Playgrounds, emblematic of local parks and recreation, were also prioritized by officials over and above other specific facility investments. This prioritization corresponds with the previously identified perception that parks provided a high level of benefit for local youth.

Other than providing a snapshot of how local officials view and prioritize investment in parks and recreation, a major finding from this survey was the differences that existed between elected

Appointed Officials

Elected Officials

All Officials

Funding Initiatives

Mean

SD

Mean

SD

Mean

SD

Maintain existing park and recreation areas - NS

4.26

1.22

4.36

0.98

4.30

1.11

Provide recreation programs**

3.27

1.43

3.59

1.30

3.42

1.38

Acquire/protect open space (as undeveloped conserved land) - NS

2.79

1.40

2.82

1.44

2.80

1.42

Acquire additional land/water for developed recreation**

2.23

1.23

2.52

1.42

2.37

1.33

t-value: *<.05, **<.01, ***<.001; NS = Not Significant, SD = Standard Deviation.

Scaled from: 1=Not at all important to 5=Extremely important

Table 3. Comparing Specific Facility Investment Priorities Appointed Officials

Elected Officials

All Officials

Facility Investment Priorities

Mean

SD

Mean

SD

Mean

SD

Playgrounds*

3.45

1.35

3.66

1.14

3.55

1.26

Neighborhood parks*

3.09

1.43

3.30

1.29

3.19

1.37

Community or regional parks*

2.91

1.40

3.11

1.31

3.00

1.36

Community or regional trail systems – NS

2.75

1.50

2.96

1.45

2.85

1.48

Team sports facilities***

2.73

1.47

3.20

1.35

2.95

1.43

Swimming pools***

1.76

1.31

2.14

1.46

1.94

1.39

t-value: *<.05, **<.01, ***<.001; NS = Not Significant, SD = Standard Deviation.

Scaled from: 1=Lowest Priority to 5=Highest Priority

and appointed officials. For nearly every question, elected officials responded significantly more positively than appointed officials toward park and recreation services. Why would this be? One explanation is elected officials may be more apt to paint a rosier picture than appointed officials. While elected officials can readily espouse the benefits of a widely valued public service and advocate noble intentions to invest in these services, appointed officials are directly faced with the difficult realities of providing a variety of public services on tight municipal budgets.

Another explanation could be that elected officials are more in tune with the values of their community than appointed officials. Therefore, they may hold park and recreation services in a higher regard because they recognize how their community is enhanced by these services.

As Crompton has pointed out, communicating the value of local park and recreation services to elected officials should continue to be a priority for the profes-

sion. These findings, however, suggest that park and recreation advocates should also focus their education and advocacy efforts on appointed officials.

As a public service, dependent on the support of local officials, parks and recreation should devote more resources toward understanding and engaging local officials. NRPA has done just that, and in a future issue of Parks & Recreation, will convey the results of a national study of local government officials’ view on park and recreation services.

Note: Detailed references for this article can be found at www.parksandrecreation. org/2017/August/local-officials-opinionsabout-local-park-and-recreation-services.

Austin G. Barrett, M.S., is a Ph.D. candidate at Pennsylvania State University Department of Recreation, Park and Tourism management (austin@psu.edu). Andrew J. Mowen, Ph.D., is a professor at Pennsylvania State University Department of Recreation, Park and Tourism management (amowen@psu.edu).

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2017 Education Highlights: The Golden Thread of Parks and Recreation

By Tom Crosley

I

t’s NRPA’s position that our nation’s public park and recreation services should be equally accessible and available to all people regardless of income level, ethnicity, gender, ability or age. Public parks, recreation services and recreation programs, including the maintenance, safety and accessibility of parks and facilities, should be provided on an equitable basis to all citizens of communities served by public agencies. And, each of us plays an important role in the support of this, our Social Equity Pillar.

Think of Social Equity as the “golden thread” that pulls together all of our hard work and lifts up the profession. Sometimes described as nebulous or hard to describe, a clear understanding of our roles and responsibilities in the support of the Social Equity Pillar can raise our spirits and bring meaning to even the most mundane tasks.

For a better understanding of the Social Equity Pillar and your role, please take some time at the 2017 NRPA Annual Conference to sit in on a few social equity-themed sessions. Here are just a few suggestions:

Inclusive Outreach for Equitable Results: Using a Logic Model for the Get Moving Initiative This session is a fusion of equity and results-based accountability, with two key themes: (i) inclusive outreach strategies to effectively reach underserved communities, and (ii) using performance measurement tools for equitable results. We will profile Seattle Parks and Recreation’s Get Moving initiative, which used equity goals and a logic model as tools to guide and track inclusive outreach strategies for its community fitness grant program.

Spray Play for All: Designing Inclusive Spray Grounds and Splash Parks Communities across the country are adding spray and splash parks as one of the most highly requested and utilized recreation amenities. How can these be universally designed to be inclusive for people of all ages and abilities to participate equally? This session will examine the best practice recommendations for creating spray parks that are fun and functional for all people; that is, truly inclusive spray play for people with and without disabilities, children, parents and grandparents alike.

A Communications Frame to Replicate CA’s Green Justice Work Green justice is equitable development, healthy use of green land, and planning by and for the community.

It is concrete action — like creating new parks, greening urban rivers and keeping public beaches public to promote equal access and health. The session will explore the struggle for green justice in California. Attendees will learn how to frame green justice efforts through NRPA’s three Pillars in order to effectively engage different audiences and build a diverse base of support for their work.

See you in New Orleans!

Tom Crosley is NRPA’s Senior Manager of Education, Conferences and Schools (tcrosley@ nrpa.org).

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Can' t make it to New Orleans this year?

EXPERIENCE THE NRPA ANNUAL CONFERENCE FROM ANYWHERE

www.nrpa.org/NRPAlive

2017 NRPA Annual Conference Exhibit Hall Highlights

By Ted Mattingly

T

he 2017 NRPA Exhibit Hall is filled with exciting opportunities for all attendees. It is a must-see with the awesome exhibits, products and resources available from more than 400 exhibitors — plus lots of fun stuff, too!

With our new floor layout providing more aisle space, attendees will have two days to network with potential service providers and fellow attendees, participate in education sessions, visit the NRPA Connect Zone, try out the challenge course sponsored by Professor Play Inc. (3618) take a chance to win gift cards, pick up cool tchotchkes — like the NRPA 2017 limited-edition Hurricane glass, participate in our popular EXPOdition scavenger hunt, sponsored by Burke Playgrounds (1439), and experience our popular evening Happy Hour with a chance to win one of three $500 cash prizes sponsored by Toro (2329). Finally, attendees will have a chance at the big NRPA Cash Bonanza, where one lucky attendee will walk away with $2,000 in cash in our grand finale drawing Wednesday, September 27.

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On Tuesday, September 26, following the NRPA General Session, the exhibit hall will open at 10:30 a.m. and will remain open until 6:30 p.m., with our Happy Hour scheduled from 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. On Wednesday, the exhibit hall will be open from 10:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. The first 1,500 people to arrive each day will receive a giveaway item — Tuesday’s prize is sponsored by Background Investigation Bureau (3350) and Wednesday’s is sponsored by Burke Playgrounds (1439).

Don’t forget to visit the NRPA Membership Area (3257) to register for the NRPA Cash Bonanza. $2,000 cash will be given away between 1 p.m. and 2:30 p.m., you must be present to win, so be sure to mark your schedule to be on the exhibit hall floor on Wednesday afternoon!

Networking Fun During the Happy Hour, we invite you to network with exhibitors and attendees and enjoy fun activities, food and drink. To get your free drink ticket for the Happy Hour, make sure you visit the Jacobsen booth (1127) during exhibit hall hours on Tuesday. Three lucky attendees will walk away with $500 cash in our drawings sponsored by Toro. Make sure to register at the Toro booth (2329).

Every attendee has the opportunity to participate in the EXPOdition scavenger hunt. Prizes include two free registrations for the 2018 NRPA Annual Conference in Indianapolis, two iPads, four FitBits, T-shirts and gift cards, but they’ll only be available to a select few who get all their squares stamped and turn in their scavenger hunt card by 2:30 p.m. on Wednesday at the Burke Playgrounds booth (1439). Drawings for $100–$200 American Express gift cards will take place every hour, while you check out the extreme inflatable challenge course sponsored by Professor Play Inc. (3618). Don’t forget to pick up your limited edition 2017 NRPA Annual Conference hurricane glass, but you must visit the NRPA Member Experience area (3257) for details.

Engaging, Hands-on Activities The 2017 Exhibit Hall is packed with great solutions for all your park and recreation requirements and has fun activ-

ities, as well! Back by popular demand, The Learning Playground will host our most popular interactive education sessions that are guaranteed to get the juices flowing — make sure to try “If You’re Happy and They Know It, Happy Staff!

Positive Psychology and Authentic Leadership” on Tuesday from 11 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. and “Stack the Deck in Your Team’s Favor” on Wednesday from 11 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. New for 2017, the NRPA Connect Zone will offer attendees the opportunity to relax and network with colleagues, make new friends and enjoy fun games, as well as attempt to conquer a rock climbing wall provided

by Vertical Reality (3209). The BREC mobile playground unit (3100) will also be on the floor with demonstrations and education sessions.

Meet the NRPA Team Your dedicated NRPA Membership team will be on hand to answer any

questions you may have or provide information you may require in the NRPA Membership Area (3257). Talk to our dedicated staff about NRPA’s programs and initiatives and how to maximize your member benefits. You will find areas dedicated to Membership, Research, Career Center, Parks & Recreation magazine, Parks Build Community, Partnerships and the New NRPA Park Path app. You can engage with colleagues and NRPA staff and relax in the lounge, learn about our research tools from experts, check out career opportunities or discuss interesting topics and stories with our editorial staff.

Visit www.nrpa.org/conference2017 for details and updates. We can’t wait to see you in New Orleans! Laissez les bons temps rouler!

Ted Mattingly is NRPA’s Director of Facilities and Administrative Services (tmattingly@nrpa.org).

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Exhibit Hall at a Glance The exhibit hall at the 2017 NRPA Annual Conference features hundreds of our industry’s top vendors and experts from across the field and around the country.

Below, find a list of exhibitors that will join us in New Orleans this September.

This listing is current as of July 21, 2017, and is subject to change. Check your program guide, our handy Conference App or visit www.nrpa.org/conference2017 for updates and details.

Company Name Booth Number 2by2 Industries ........................................................2756 9 Square In The Air .................................................2906 Academy of Model Aeronautics ........................1643 ACAPULCO POOLS .................................................3246 ACCESSREC, LLC . ....................................................2845 Action Play Systems, LLC .....................................2056 ACTIVE Network ......................................................2127 Adolph Kiefer & Associates .................................3128 Adventure Golf Services, Inc. .............................2947 Aerial Designs ..........................................................2820 AGCO Corporation .................................................1738 AllChem Performance Products ........................1557 Allsite Structure Rentals .......................................2943 Alpha Automation Inc. .........................................1822 American Carnival Mart .......................................1664 American Council on Exercise............................1727 American Earth Anchors ......................................2413 American Heart Association ...............................2312 American Park Network .......................................1857

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Parks & Recreation

Company Name Booth Number American Pool Enterprises ..................................3127 American Ramp Company ..................................2319 American Red Cross...............................................3248 Americana Building Products ............................3638 Ameristar Perimeter Security .............................1639 Amish Country Gazebos, Inc. .............................1347 Amusement Products ...........................................3022 Anchor Audio, Inc. .................................................2822 Animal Care Equipment and Services, LLC ...1150 Aquatic Design Group ..........................................3218 Aquatics International ..........................................1647 AQUAWORX ..............................................................1625 Artificial Ice Events .................................................1629 Astroturf.....................................................................1451 Athletic Business.....................................................1825 Atlas Holdings, Inc. ................................................1243 Axio Soccer ...............................................................3043 Background Investigation Bureau ....................3350 Batting Cages Inc. ..................................................2706

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Company Name Booth Number Beacon Athletics .....................................................1730 Beam Clay®/Partac Peat Corp. ...........................2025 Bedford Technology, LLC .....................................2060 Berliner Seilfabrik Play Equipment Corp. ......2221 Berntsen International, Inc. ................................2047 Best Carnival Games ..............................................3230 Betson Enterprises .................................................3124 Big Toys ......................................................................2110 Billy Casper Golf, LLC ............................................3057 Bison Inc. ...................................................................1633 Bisque Imports ........................................................3530 Blick Art Materials...................................................2806 Bobcat Company ....................................................3438 Bona US ......................................................................2023 Book King Software ...............................................1820 Bright White Paper Company.............................2919 Brinkley Sargent Wiginton Architects .............2718 BSN Sports ................................................................1619 Burke Playgrounds .................................................1439 CAB Communications, Inc. .................................1959 Cale America, Inc. ...................................................3129 California Sports Surfaces ...................................1428 CampDoc.com .........................................................1645 CardConnect ............................................................2026 Cedar Forest Products Co. ...................................2908 Cemer Kent Ekipmanlari ......................................2203 Central Park Conservancy ...................................1325 Century Industries, LLC . ......................................1839 CEW Enterprises/Sport Fence Int. ....................2020 Champlin Tire Recycling, Inc. .............................3018 Chemtrol ....................................................................2946 Cintas Corporation .................................................1340 CivicRec ......................................................................1422 Classic Recreation Systems, Inc. ........................2701 Clear Comfort...........................................................1357 Cochrane USA ..........................................................1321 Commercial Recreation Specialists ..................2702 Community Pass .....................................................1823 Connect-A-Dock Inc. .............................................1424 Connor Sport Court ...............................................1247 Contech Engineered Solutions LLC ................1828 CORCL .........................................................................3533 Corworth/Restroom Facilities Ltd. ...................2857 Counsilman-Hunsaker ..........................................2827 Courage League Sports........................................1047 Coverworx - Recreational Architecture ..........2505 Cre8Play .....................................................................2838 Creative Playthings, Ltd........................................1120 Criterion Pictures ....................................................1447

Company Name Booth Number Custom Ice Inc. ........................................................3318 CXT Precast Concrete Products .........................2508 Daktronics .................................................................2924 Dalton Enterprises, Inc. ........................................2910 DARICE........................................................................3444 DASH Platform.........................................................1848 Daxko ..........................................................................1929 Deacero ......................................................................2921 Disc Golf Association Inc. ....................................3039 Disc Golf Park ...........................................................1641 Discraft Inc. ...............................................................1319 DOGIPOT....................................................................2349 Dog-ON-It-Parks......................................................1731 Douglas Sports Equipment.................................1418 DuMor, Inc. ................................................................2049 DunRite Playgrounds ............................................2163 DuraPlay, Inc. ...........................................................3122 Dynamic Discs .........................................................2948 Earth Network..........................................................1426 Easi-Set Worldwide ................................................2833 EMG .............................................................................2802 EMPEX Watertoys ...................................................1429 Emuamericas, LLC ..................................................3119 Engineered Wood Structures .............................2057 Ephesus Lighting ....................................................1420 Epic Outdoor Cinema............................................2200 eTrak-plus ..................................................................2022 Eversan .......................................................................3118 Ex-Cell Kaiser LLC ...................................................1844 Exeloo Public Restroom Solutions ...................1344 Fahr Industries Ltd. ................................................2123 Fibar Systems ...........................................................1729 FlagHouse .................................................................1518 FlexGround, LLC .....................................................1651 ForeverLawn Inc. ....................................................1749 Forte Product ...........................................................3139 Fountain People/Water Odyssey ......................1808 Freenotes Harmony Park .....................................2112 Fun Express ...............................................................1743 GameTime .................................................................1603 Gared Sports ............................................................2829 GatorBridge and GatorDock ...............................1726 Geographic Technologies Group ......................2805 Gifts Galore ...............................................................1250 Glasdon, Inc. .............................................................2918 Glide ............................................................................1144 Go Ape Treetop Adventure .................................2818 Gopher Sport ...........................................................2021 Graffiti Solutions Inc. ............................................1956

Company Name Booth Number Grasshopper Company ........................................2821 Grassmats USA LLC ................................................2522 Green Business Certification Inc. (The Sustainable SITES Initiative)......................3025 Greenfields Outdoor Fitness Equipment .......2438 Greenshine New Energy ......................................1023 GT Grandstands ......................................................2002 Guangzhou TRAUST Envir. & Tech. Co., Ltd. ..2900 Guardian Innovations ...........................................2926 Henderson Recreation Equipment ..................2301 HGACBuy ...................................................................1525 Hitchcock Design Group ......................................1941 Human Kinetics .......................................................1246 Hustler Turf Equipment (Excel Industries) .....1039 Hydrorider .................................................................1757 ICON Shelter Systems Inc. ...................................2157 ID Edge Inc. ..............................................................1248 ID Sculpture ..............................................................1444 Imagination International, Inc. ..........................2150 Imagination Playground ......................................2901 Impact Melanoma/Bright Guard.......................1829 Imprint Plus ..............................................................3040 INC Outdoor Living ................................................1821 InCord .........................................................................2213 Indigo Aquatics Inc. ...............................................2927 Industrial Test Systems, Inc. ................................2503 INNOVA Disc Golf....................................................1548 Intelligenz .................................................................3310 Invisible Structures ................................................2507 iZone Imaging .........................................................2808 Jacobsen ....................................................................1127 Jambette Playground Equipment Inc. ............3030 Jayhawk Plastics Inc. .............................................1432

Company Name Booth Number Jaypro Sports, LLC ..................................................1856 K&K Insurance Group, Inc. ...................................1342 K.B. Industries ..........................................................1859 Kasa Can ....................................................................2559 Kay Park Recreation Corp. ...................................3138 KENGURU PRO Limited Liability Company ...3232 KirbyBuilt ...................................................................1741 KITTRICH CANOPY..................................................1145 KOMPAN, Inc. ...........................................................1223 Kwik-Covers ..............................................................2942 Lake Country Corporation...................................2124 Landmark Studio & Design .................................2358 Landscape Architect and Specifier News ......2944 Landscape Structures Inc. ...................................2139 Landscape Structures Inc. ...................................2039 Laykold by APT ........................................................1449 Leathers & Associates............................................2957 Life Floor ....................................................................2949 Lincoln Aquatics .....................................................2410 Little League Baseball & Softball.......................1842 Little Tikes Commercial ........................................2526 Lose & Associates, Inc. .........................................2456 LTR Products .............................................................2548 Madrax/Thomas Steele ........................................1440 MAIS Software .........................................................2028 Major League Baseball - Youth Programs ......3548 Marathon Kids .........................................................2809 Mateflex .....................................................................3120 Maximum Solutions Inc. ......................................1528 Mid-America Sports Construction....................2807 Midwest Elastomers Inc. ......................................1921 Miracle Recreation .................................................2638

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Company Name Booth Number Miroad Rubber USA ...............................................1419 Mitchell Rubber Products ....................................1147 Mity Lite .....................................................................2126 Modern Shade LLC ................................................2956 Most Dependable Fountains Inc. .....................2031 Murdock/Super Secur Mfg. Company.............2213 Musco Sports Lighting Inc. .................................2229 MyRec.com ...............................................................2019 MyTCoat Commercial Outdoor Furniture ......2148 National Alliance for Youth Sports ...................3226 National Center on Health, Physical Activity and Disability (NCHPAD)......................2945 National Construction Rentals...........................2307 National Cooperative Leasing............................2520 National Golf Foundation ....................................2804 National Joint Powers Alliance ..........................2518 National Recreation Systems..............................2004 Neighboring Concepts .........................................1346 Nicros Climbing Walls ...........................................2856 Nirbo Aquatic Inc. ..................................................2251 No Fault Sport Group ............................................2748 Noratek Solutions Inc. ..........................................1846 North West Rubber ................................................1556 Notts Sport Ltd. ......................................................2359 NPPGov ......................................................................2846 NRPA Connect Zone ..............................................3004 NRPA Learning Playground .................................1057 NRPA Membership Area .......................................3257 NRPA Sales Office....................................................3646 Oglebay......................................................................3249 One Beat CPR + AED..............................................1239 OpenAire ...................................................................3430 Outdoor Aluminum Inc. ......................................2218 OutdoorLink, Inc. ....................................................1958 Paris Site Furnishings & Outdoor Fitness .......2656 ParkInk ........................................................................1742 PDC Solutions ..........................................................3433 Peak Software Systems.........................................1045 Pentair Commercial Aquatics .............................1824 Percussion Play Ltd. ...............................................1547 PerfectMind ..............................................................1925 Pet and Playground Products ............................1019 Pet Waste Eliminator .............................................1527 Pilot Rock Park Equipment ..................................1838 Plastic Recycling of IA Falls .................................1338 Play & Park Structures ...........................................1901 Play4Life.....................................................................2913 PlayCore .....................................................................1607 Playcraft Systems ....................................................2608 58

Parks & Recreation

Company Name Booth Number Playground Guardian ............................................1649 PlayGuard Safety Surfacing ................................1847 PlayMax Surfacing, Inc. ........................................2663 Playworld...................................................................2627 Poligon .......................................................................1802 Porous Pave Inc. ......................................................2557 Porter Athletic..........................................................2450 Power Systems.........................................................1703 Precision Playgrounds ..........................................1219 Premier Polysteel Outdoor Furniture ..............2312 Profitable Food Facilities ......................................1433 Progressive Trail Design, LLC .............................1118 ProMinent Fluid Controls, Inc. ...........................3539 Protect Youth Sports .............................................3024 Pucuda Leading Edge ...........................................1724 PW Athletic Mfg., Co. ............................................3639 Qitele Group Co. Ltd. ............................................2519 QNC, Inc./Quik n’ Crispy........................................3351 QR F.I.T. Trail, LLC ....................................................2801 Qualite Sports Lighting LLC ...............................1027 Quality Tablegames, Inc. ......................................3228 QuickScores LLC .....................................................2700 Rain Bird Corporation ...........................................1919 Rain Deck...................................................................1244 Rain Drop Products, LLC ......................................1519 Randolph Rose Collection ...................................1339 REACH .........................................................................2911 RecDesk Software...................................................3020 ReCPro Software .....................................................1926 Recreation Accessibility Consultants LLC .....1918 Recreonics, Inc. .......................................................1830 REI Corporate Sales ................................................1744 RenoSys Corporation ............................................1345 Ride Entertainment ...............................................2831 Robertson Recreational Surfacing ...................1902 Rocky Mountain Sunscreen ................................3208 Romtec, Inc. ..............................................................1327 Rubber Designs .......................................................2662 Rubberecycle ...........................................................2602 Rusty Oak Nursery Ltd. .........................................2803 S&S Worldwide, Inc. ...............................................2556 Safe Sitter ..................................................................1748 Safeslide Restoration.............................................3251 Schmitz Foam Products Inc. ...............................1656 SCORE SPORTS ........................................................1827 Scoremaster Goals .................................................2720 Security Lines US ....................................................2819 SeeCoast Manufacturing Company Inc. ........1858 Shade Creations by Waterloo .............................2118

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Company Name Booth Number Shade Systems, Inc. ...............................................2446 SHANDONG FEIERKANG SPORTS FACILITIES CO., LTD. ................................................1351 Shaw Sports Turf .....................................................2458 SICO .............................................................................1922 Simkar .........................................................................1920 Skylogix ......................................................................3042 SlidePros ....................................................................2757 SMARTfit ....................................................................3540 Sof’Solutions Incorporated.................................2844 SofSurfaces, Inc. .....................................................2406 Soil Tech Corporation ............................................1631 South Padre Island (SPI) Nets, Inc. ....................1245 SpectraTurf................................................................1840 Spectrum Aquatics ................................................1812 Spikeball, Inc. ...........................................................1456 Spohn Ranch Skateparks .....................................2030 SportsEdge ...............................................................2120 SportsPlay Equipment, Inc. ................................2939 SSCI - Background Screening Solutions .........1939 Stageline Mobile Stage, Inc. ..............................3338 StandGuard Aquatics ............................................3247 Stantec’s Sport Group ...........................................3019 Stars N Stripes Scooters .......................................1945 Stern-Williams Co., Inc. .........................................3038 Stewart Signs ...........................................................2018 StopSpot, LLC ..........................................................3123 SUBWAY .....................................................................2257 Sunstation USA .......................................................2146 Superior Recreational Products.........................1119 Surface America, Inc. ............................................2259 Swank Motion Pictures .........................................1561 Sybertech Waste Reduction Ltd. ......................2847 Tangent Technologies, LLC ................................3145 TensionStructures.com.........................................1819 Texas Utility Engineering, Inc. ...........................1746 The Inflatable Depot .............................................3333 The Lifeguard Store ...............................................2922 The Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission Department of Parks and Recreation, Prince George’s County ........1924 The Miracle League Association........................2261 the ParkLab ...............................................................2356 The Public Restroom Company .........................1423 The Sports Facilities Advisory|The Sports Facilities Management ...................................................2357 The Toro Company .................................................2329 The Trust for Public Land .....................................3250 Themed Concepts ..................................................2712 Think Green Promos ..............................................1438

Company Name Booth Number TifTuf Bermuda Southeast...................................1448 TMA Systems, LLC ..................................................2027 TOWELHUB.COM ....................................................3056 TownSuite Municipal Software (PROCOM Data Services Inc.) .............................3045 TriActive America ...................................................1719 Trident Enterprises Deerbusters Fence ..........1957 Trigon Sports............................................................2912 True Pitch...................................................................1457 Tuff Coat Mfg., Inc. .................................................1546 Turf Rail LLC ..............................................................1049 Turf Tank ....................................................................3330 Turfmaster Industries ............................................3231 Tyler Technologies..................................................1430 Ultimate RB, Inc. .....................................................1329 Ultra Play....................................................................2010 Ultra Site ....................................................................2011 UM International.....................................................1624 United Pool Management ...................................1818

Company Name Booth Number United States Tennis Association ......................3256 Unity Surfacing Systems ......................................1750 University Row.........................................................2964 US eDirect Inc. ........................................................2347 USA Management ..................................................3044 USA-Shade ................................................................2538 USJACLEAN ...............................................................3439 Valmont Composite Structures – Carsonite Brand.......................................................2904 VenTek International .............................................1349 Ventrac .......................................................................1139 Vermeer Corporation ............................................3331 Vermont Systems, Inc. ..........................................2038 Victor Stanley, Inc. .................................................2800 Virco Inc. ....................................................................1626 Vortex Aquatic Structures Int’l., Inc. ................2930 Wabash Valley ..........................................................2540 WATER SLIDES DE MEXICO, S.A. DE C.V. ..........1756 Water Technology, Inc. .........................................1532

Company Name Booth Number Waterplay Solutions Corporation .....................2648 Water’s Edge Aquatic Design .............................2119 Weber Group, Inc. ..................................................3027 Wenger Corporation .............................................1931 Whitewater West Industries, Ltd. .....................3238 Wickcraft Company ...............................................2923 Williams Architects.................................................1739 Willoughby Industries...........................................1529 WM Holdings, Inc. dba WM Polymers .............1765 WOW Company.......................................................3144 YONGLANG GROUP CO., LTD. ............................3048 Zagster .......................................................................1657 Zamboni ....................................................................2206 Zamorins Solutions Inc. .......................................1241 Zeager Bros., Inc. ....................................................2938 Zhengzhou Wolong Amusement Equipment Co., Ltd. ..............................................2063

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NRPA Update Summer Camp on Capitol Hill: Play On to Protect Programming at Parks

By Maureen Acquino

W

hat do a day of play and a day of work on Capitol Hill have in common? For one day in June, they were one in the same.

On Thursday, June 29, congressional staffers were treated to a taste of a typical day in a park and recreation summer program as part of the National Recreation and Park Association’s (NRPA) Summer Camp on Capitol Hill. The event was designed to reinforce the fact that communities across the country rely on safe and quality out-of-school time programming offered through local parks and recreation, but these same communities also rely on the support of key federal funding streams like the 21st Century Community Learning Center program and the Summer Food Service Program.

To put words into action, NRPA invited Hill staff to experience what a child

typically experiences in a summer camp or out-of-school time program offered by

Caroline County Recreation and Parks counselors in training were on-site to facilitate typical summer program activities.

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local parks and recreation. They were able to see firsthand how federal funding is critical to fostering healthier youth through out-of-school time.

Keith A. Anderson, director of the District of Columbia Department of Parks and Recreation (DPR), said he hoped the event showed the community what parks and recreation has to offer.

“DPR offers meaningful activities to keep kids active and prevent learning loss in the summer, and I hope Congress sees that we support what’s most

Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX), (l) with NRPA staff member Kate Sims.

Revolution Foods provided a typical summer program meal for lunch for the event attendees.

important in America, and that’s our children,” Anderson says. He adds that park and recreation programming is the great equalizer for kids: “No matter the background, kids are all equal when playing.”

NRPA and DPR were joined by Prince George’s County Department of Parks and Recreation, Caroline County (Maryland) Recreation and Parks, and the Maryland-National Capital Park Police for out-of-school time summer-program activities and for a typical program lunch offered through the federal summer meals program.

The local agencies brought mobile units to the event and showcased examples of their activities, like soccer, yoga, arts and crafts, and youth empowerment programs.

Prince George’s County Department of Parks and Recreation Arts on a Roll mobile arts service was on-site leading some typical craft projects it brings to parks. Jesse Kirkland, Arts on a Roll coordinator, says the mobile unit is beneficial because “sometimes it’s important to go where people are. Parks have had arts programs for years, but if we can get to people who don’t typically have access to parks and show them what’s available, it’s more likely they’ll come to our facilities when they have the chance,” Kirkland adds.

Caroline County Recreation and Parks showcased to decision makers the skills gained through park and recreation programming through its counselor in training (CIT) program. The agency brought a dozen of its trainees, all in their early teens, to the event to run its booth and activities. The trainees all agreed that programming in parks is important because it helps kids gain social and leadership skills, as well as a shared sense of responsibility. And, W W W. PA R K S A N D R E C R E AT I O N . O R G | A U G U S T 2 0 1 7 |

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Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee chats with children from area summer programs.

Caroline County Recreation and Parks counselors in training lead an activity for area kids.

the one thing they wanted decision makers to know was that parks and recreation means more than summer camp — it’s a way to engage kids and families through experience and opportunities.

Desiree Hoffman, associate director in the government of the District of Columbia’s executive office of the mayor and office of federal and regional affairs, felt it was important to attend the event so she and other decision makers could see how the funding of out-of-school time programs helps residents and kids.

“Communities thrive when kids are supported and have access to quality programs,” she says. “With park programming, they learn and have fun at the same time, and that keeps them sharp.”

Revolution Foods, which provided lunch for the event attendees, showcased a typical summer program meal. The company’s Human Resource Coordinator, Alysha Groghan, says its program meals far exceed the health requirement guidelines. “We use wholesome ingredients, low sodium and whole grains to get healthy meals to kids who may not get a balanced meal,” she explains.

Leading up to the event, NRPA co-sponsored a briefing with the National Summer Learning Association, followed by Hill visits. The Summer Camp also kicked off July as Park and Recreation Month, a month that officially celebrates the importance of play and how much can be discovered at local park and rec facilities.

Co-sponsors for the event included the Afterschool Alliance, After-School All-Stars, the Food Research and Action Center, the National Afterschool Association and the National Summer Learning Association.

— Maureen Acquino is the Assistant Editor for Parks & Recreation magazine.

The Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission’s mobile unit.

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Congratulations to the 2017 National Award, Fellowship and Scholarship Recipients

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he NRPA Awards and Scholarship Committee is pleased to announce the recipients of the 2017 NRPA National Awards, Diversity Scholarship, Student Scholarship and Young Professional Fellowship. Please join NRPA in congratulating the following award recipients:

National Awards NRPA’s National Awards recognize the inspirational people and outstanding programs that highlight the phenomenal work being done in the field of parks and recreation.

The award recipients will be acknowledged Wednesday, September 27, at the Best of the Best Ceremony, during the 2017 NRPA Annual Conference in New Orleans, Louisiana.

The 2017 National Award Winners Individual Awards: • Robert M. Artz Advocacy Award Cora Masters Barry, Washington, D.C. • Robert W. Crawford Young Professional Award Dr. Joshua Medeiros, Canton, Connecticut • RWJF-NRPA Award for Health Equity Patti Solano, Riverside, California • National Distinguished Professional Award Phillip Rea, Raleigh, North Carolina • Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt Award for Excellence in Recreation and Park Research Award Mark Havitz, Waterloo, Ontario Hall of Fame Clifton French Clifton French has been selected as the recipient of the 2017 Robert W. Crawford Recreation and Park Hall of Fame award. The Recreation and Park Hall of Fame recognizes individuals who have made outstanding and lasting contributions to the advancement of recreation and parks.

Agency Awards: • Excellence in Inclusion Award Madison School Recreation, Wisconsin • Excellence in Innovative Programming Award Recreation and Park Commission for the Parish of East Baton Rouge, Baton Rouge, Louisiana

• Facility or Park Design Award Vigo County Parks and Recreation Department, Terre Haute, Indiana • Barb King Environmental Stewardship Award Recreation and Park Commission for the Parish of East Baton Rouge, Baton Rouge, Louisiana • Kudos Marketing Award Denver Parks and Recreation, Colorado • National Partnership Award Durham Parks and Recreation, North Carolina Fellowship and Scholarship Program The Fellowship and Scholarship Program’s primary focus is to inspire future participation and leadership in NRPA, and to develop professional contacts with NRPA leadership. These programs provide selected recipients with a mentor as they explore the operation of the NRPA Annual Conference.

The Diversity Scholarship recognizes individuals from historically underrepresented groups in the park and recreation community, as well as those who demonstrate outstanding contributions serving diverse communities.

The 2017 Diversity Scholarship recipients: • Leslyn McBean-Clairborne, Ithaca, New York • Kobeyeh Riley, Mint Hill, North Carolina The Student Scholarship is presented to an outstanding undergraduate or graduate student in recognition of continuously extraordinary community service or contributions to the field.

The 2017 Student Scholarship recipients: • Mary Elise Conzelmann, Humboldt State University, Arcata, California • Dakota Hewlett, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan The Young Professional Fellowship recognizes individuals who have made exceptional contributions to the field of parks and recreation during their first years in the profession.

The 2017 Young Professional Fellowship recipients: • Brianne Baglini, Fairfax, Virginia • Derek Donlevy, Milwaukee, Wisconsin • Nicole Fields, Buffalo, New York • Kevin Witte, Mountlake Terrace, Washington.

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NRPA Update

In Appreciation of David Lose

By Richard J. Dolesh

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RPA lost one of its much-loved members last month with the passing of David Lose of Nashville, Tennessee, who died unexpectedly at age 77 while on a trip to Ireland with his wife Betti. Widely known and always a little bit larger than life, he served as member of NRPA’s Board of Directors from 1997 to 1999, and chairman of the board from 2000 to 2004, during a time of great change for the association.

Lose was a landscape architect by profession who founded one of the bestknown park design firms in the southeast — Lose and Associates — which now employs nearly 60 people. Founded in 1982, the business grew under his direction to offer services in landscape architecture, architecture, civil engineering and land planning. The firm has completed more than 600 park projects in planning, design, master planning and system-wide analysis, totaling more than $1 billion of work.

it and breathed it, and it came back into his designs in many ways.”

“His service to NRPA was not work for him,” says Camp. “I remember when he was about ready to take on the chairmanship of the NRPA board he said, ‘This might take some of my time away from work,’” says Camp ruefully.

“He never told me that it would be a four-year job!”

Though he was highly respected for the quality of his professional work, it was his warm and engaging personality

‘He was probably the best people-person I have ever known. He had the ability to talk to anyone, and he was especially effective on Capitol Hill, working with members of Congress and staff.’

Lose’s longtime business partner, CEO Chris Camp, who worked with him for more than 30 years, says, “First and foremost, he was an advocate and passionate promoter of parks. He just loved parks and really believed that parks made people’s lives better.” As many who knew him remarked, he loved the outdoors and spent much of his free time hunting, fishing, kayaking and enjoying the outdoors. Marvin Billups, interim director of DeKalb County, Georgia, says Lose’s love of nature infused his park design work. “He lived 64

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that most people remember him by. “He had a joie de vivre that was infectious,” says Barbara Tulipane, NRPA CEO. Alice Conkey, former NRPA president who served when Lose was board chair, says, “He was probably the best people-person I have ever known. He had the ability to talk to anyone, and he was especially effective on Capitol Hill, working with members of Congress and staff.”

Penny Randel, commissioner of Northbrook Illinois Park District and longtime NRPA board member, says she really appreciated Lose for the very

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gentlemanly and direct way he could say things. “He didn’t spin it,” she says.

“He had the ability to see the big picture and deal with it directly. He could remain a gentleman and still be honest in saying difficult things. David was also able to see the value of parks and recreation to a community outside of his personal perspective as a landscape architect. But, it was his ability to work with people that made him so important to NRPA. He had that ability to make everyone feel their point of view was important and valued.”

Bob Farnsworth, retired CEO of Playcore, says, “David was a true Tennessee gentleman. I was proud to have called him friend, colleague and fellow advocate for parks, recreation and conservation. He had a special gift for communicating the value of parks and recreation to everyone. He will be really missed by all of us.”

Rich Dolesh is NRPA’s Vice President of Strategic Initiatives (rdolesh@nrpa.org).

Five Reasons to Post Your Open Position on the NRPA Career Center

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all can be a great time to hire new employees. It is also the perfect time to assess your agency’s team and find new employees to fill in the gaps. Hiring is a large obstacle to tackle, but starting off right can make the process much easier.

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Share your open position with 7,000 people — The NRPA Career Center will have a booth (#3257) at the 2017 NRPA Annual Conference in New Orleans, and if you post your open position between August 8 and September 8, it will be featured at the booth. Job seekers will be encouraged to apply on the spot!

Fall Job Posting Discount Available — Post your open position starting August 1 through September 22 and use code 2017CONFERENCE to get 20 percent off an NRPA Single 7-Day Job Posting Package or NRPA Single 30-Day Job Posting Package.

Career Center Now Integrated with Google’s New Job Search Feature — Jobs posted to the NRPA Career Center are automatically searchable through Google for Jobs, creating even greater exposure. The Google for Jobs application appears before Google’s standard search results — prioritizing your positions over other employers, job boards and staffing agencies that do not have an established partnership with Google.

1,093 Average Views Per Job — There’s no better place to find a qualified park and recreation professional. Employers receive an average of 10 applications per posting. The Career Center provides access to almost 7,000 searchable résumés. There are

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3

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new resources for employers, such as sample job descriptions, tips to conduct a successful interview and background screening information.

Easily Manage Your Applications — After your job listing is posted, it then becomes time to manage all the applications you’ve received. Stay organized by marking candidates you are interested in and deleting applicants who don’t fit the position. Don’t forget to check out your job statistics to find actual numbers of views, applications, apply clicks and job forwards.

The NRPA Career Center is the place to help you find your next team member. Be sure to post your open position in time for the NRPA Annual Conference, and don’t forget members always get a 33 percent discount on job posting packages. NRPA’s own human resources manager, Martin Dease, will be on-site in booth #3257, helping job seekers apply for your open position(s). Now is the time to post your job! Have questions?

Contact Hayley Herzing at hherzing@ nrpa.org.

5

Hot Topics Have you posted on NRPA Connect? It allows you to network, share resources, ideas and inspirations with your peers in parks and recreation. See a preview of what you’re missing: Swim Suit Water Extractor at Indoor Pool — It’s the middle of pool season for many members. One question posed this month is about aging swim suit extractors (for drying swim suits, we’re wondering if they are worth replacing?

Does anyone have experience with this, or other alternatives? Do you provide this at your pool?) If you have suggestions, chime in!

Pickleball Courts on Existing Tennis Courts — Pickleball is always a hot topic among our professionals. Your colleagues are seeking to incorporate pickleball lines on their existing tennis courts. Some questions include, what was the general consensus taken by the tennis players? How did you overlay the lines-blended colors? Portable nets vs. adjustable nets?

Park Maintenance Standard Manual — If you’re looking for suggestions on updating your Park Maintenance Standard Manual, NRPA Connect is a great place to start. Park and recreation professionals share their examples and suggestions for updating the manual. Do you have one to share?

Parks and Recreation Career Interest — A new member requested testimonials about why fellow NRPA members work in parks and recreation. They’re interested in tips on entering the field, different job opportunities and general career advice.

Read more to learn why others have dedicated their careers to parks and recreation and to share your story!

Don’t get left behind, visit www.nrpaconnect.org to join the conversation.

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NRPA Update

The Outdoor Alliance for Kids Holds Capitol Hill Briefing

By Maureen Acquino

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he Outdoor Alliance for Kids (OAK) recently held a briefing and panel discussion on Capitol Hill to shed light on the issue of the dwindling amount of time our nation’s children are spending outdoors and the corresponding increase in childhood obesity, along with a number of other health issues, and to brainstorm some solutions. The briefing, held July 11, provided an opportunity for OAK members to discuss programs across the federal government that support opportunities for children, youth and families to learn, play and serve in the outdoors.

OAK is a national strategic partnership, made up of nearly 100 organizations, including the National Recreation and Park Association (NRPA), who have a common interest in connecting children, youth and families with the outdoors in a safe and accessible way.

With nearly 90 Capitol Hill staff in attendance, the event kicked off with remarks from Jackie Ostfeld, cofounder and chair of OAK; Evie Elliot and Louise Reyes-Gavilan, students at Creative Minds International Public Charter School and participants in Every Kid in a Park; Loren Blackford, president of the Sierra Club; and Barbara Tulipane, CAE, president and CEO of NRPA. “OAK has been at the forefront of advocating for our kids and the outdoors at a time when the future of parks and pub-

lic lands are uncertain. The importance of getting kids outdoors is something we can all agree on,” says Blackford.

A panel of OAK members and leaders in the industry completed the briefing.

Participants included Kristy Anderson, American Heart Association; Robert Pullen, Great Appalachian Valley Conservation Corps; Diane Wood, National Environmental Education Foundation; Roland Richardson, NRPA; and Katie Adamson, YMCA. “We understand how critical it is to engage the next generation if we’re really going to ensure the long-term protection of public parks, recreation and conservation efforts that benefit all people,” says Richardson. But, as Richardson acknowledges, that engagement is not without barriers. Park and recreation

NRPA President and CEO, Barbara Tulipane, CAE, addresses Capitol Hill staff at the July Outdoor Alliance for Kids briefing.

Barbara Tulipane, CAE, president and CEO of NRPA, greets Evie Elliot (r) and Louise ReyesGavilan (l), Every Kid in a Park representatives.

agencies are competing with digital distractions, and tackling safety issues and stereotypes that minorities shouldn’t engage in nature. “This is a very urgent issue,” says Richardson.

To help combat this issue, panelists urged decision makers to support funding for out-of-school time programs in local park and recreation agencies.

Wood likened the lack of funding to pulling the keystone out of a bridge. “A lot comes tumbling down with it,” she says.

Programs, such as school and community gardens and Safe Routes to School, are “the spending items that come up in budget cuts, but are so critical to community health,” says Anderson.

“Putting money aside, think about the health of our nation,” Tulipane says, citing a recent Washington Post report that claims 19-year-olds are as sedentary as 60-year-olds. “If that isn’t enough to want to support policy and legislation to get kids outside and active, I don’t know what is.”

The briefing was hosted in partnership with the Honorable Niki Tsongas (DMA), the Honorable Scott Tipton (RCO) and the Honorable Diana DeGette (D-CO).

Maureen Acquino is the Assistant Editor for Parks & Recreation magazine (macquino@nrpa.org).

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THE

Path TO

Leadership STARTS HER E

November 5-9, 2017 Oglebay Resort and Conference Center Wheeling, West Virginia

Register Now at www.nrpa.org/SMS

NRPA Update

Member Spotlight: Laura Bauernfeind

By Eric Moreno

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hile she is reluctant to admit it, Laura Bauernfeind is every bit a trailblazer. Women in the world of golf, both on and off the course, are nothing new. In the case of Bauernfeind, the matter is something different entirely.

Born and raised an Angeleno, Bauernfeind and the outdoors have been virtually inseparable her entire life. Taking her love of the outdoors with her to college, she graduated from Humboldt State University with a degree in forest resource management and began working for the Parks and Recreation Department in 1986, working as a greenskeeper at the Encino Municipal Golf Course.

In December of 2015, Bauernfeind was hired to be the City of Los Angeles Parks and Recreation Department’s golf manager. She is in charge of every aspect of running and maintaining the 13 municipal golf courses in the city of Los Angeles. By all accounts, she is the first woman to hold this position, but she is also the only woman in a major city to currently have this role.

In nearly every step of her career path, she has been an outlier. While it has made the journey difficult at times, overcoming preconceived notions and, at times, prejudices has made her successes all the sweeter.

“Laura is exceptionally talented at operations and has a forward-thinking mindset to making L.A. the best run municipal golf agency in the nation,” says Anthony Paul-Diaz, executive officer and chief of staff for City of Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks. “She is passionate about the sport of golf and committed to ensuring that our patrons always come first. Pride of work, commitment to excellence and her can-do attitude make her the best person for this job.”

Parks & Recreation magazine recently chatted with Bauernfeind to learn about her path to the course.

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Parks & Recreation magazine: How did you find your place in the parks system?

Laura Bauernfeind: I was always doing something at the parks as a kid. Whether it was playing softball or soccer or just hanging out with my friends. I would also be there because my parents were participating in sports. I was always at the parks. It would be fair to say that my life has been greatly influenced by the parks. I pretty much worked in the park all through college. When I graduated, there really wasn’t a lot of work in

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my field, so I came back to L.A. and I took a civil service exam to be a gardener caretaker for the city, and I spent the first five years of my career as a greenskeeper at various courses in the city.

P&R: What challenges did you face as a woman in your field?

Bauernfeind: Being taken seriously was something I had to overcome initially.

Once people see me out there and learn that I won’t ask them to do anything that I won’t do myself, it helps build my credibility and earn the respect of my male co-workers and subordinates. Whether it was spreading fertilizer or mowing greens, I was ready to prove myself to anyone and everyone. This attitude truly served me well in every stage of my career. When something needed to be done, I was ready to put my gloves on and put my boots and get out there with the team. I found that the more time I spent doing that physical work helped build trust.

P&R: Has golf always been a part of your life?

Bauernfeind: I played golf off and on for almost my whole life, but I was never what you would call hardcore about it.

Like most women, when I was raising my children, I honestly didn’t have time to play. Now that my children are out of the house, my husband and I are playing a lot of golf, especially as it is the major part of my job.

Prior to assuming my current position, I worked as the principal forester for the parks department. I made one more lateral move in my career before assuming the golf manager role. I was glad to have taken that position because it got me back into golf. When the previous golf manager retired, there was a nationwide search to fill the position, and I threw my hat in the ring. I was, ultimately, offered the job, and I found it to be very exciting.

I like to think my parks career has come full circle.

P&R: How do you succeed in making your golf courses stand out among others?

Bauernfeind: There is a lot of competition out there in the golf world, so it is important for us to position ourselves.

I think it is important for us to not rest on our laurels. We have to adapt and change with the industry and the consumer. My main role in this is simple.

We have a great system in place, now how do we make it even better? It’s an exciting challenge, really.

One of my main focuses as golf manager is encouraging more diverse golfers to take up the sport. Golf is one of the few sports that any person, no matter their age or gender, can play for virtually their entire lives. I want to use that concept to attract more people to the game. Encouraging women to take up the sport is one of the main initiatives I am undertaking.

Griffith Park

Roosevelt Park

Another group I want to bring to the course is golfers who are physically disabled. As part of the 100th anniversary of the Men’s City Championship, the competition was made available to adaptive golfers for the first time ever.

We’re excited for this opportunity and are really looking forward to seeing where we can go with it. The adaptive

golf community is one that we are fortunate to partner with. I think the more people we can bring to our courses the better. Firsthand experience and wordof-mouth are the best advertisers for our courses. Golfers go where other golfers recommend.

Eric Moreno is a Freelance Writer based in San Antonio, Texas (ericmoreno6477@gmail.com).

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©Myles Mellor

Parks & Recreation Crossword

Across 1 Organized outing offered by many parks, 2 words 6 Barbecue site 9 Tomorrow in Spanish 11 Park staff work outfit 13 Popular leisure activities for families 14 Can 15 Yes, in Spanish 16 Esthetically appropriate 19 Energy-efficient type of light 22 Alternative word 24 Made a mark on a survey 26 Keynote speaker at NPRA’s 2017 Annual Conference and host of “American Ninja Warrior,” Matt ____ 29 Hereditary unit 31 Big hit in Little League, 2 words 32 The L in LWCF 34 Suffix with final or solo 35 Areas for kids to have fun 39 Goal 40 Very long time 41 Assets for use in improving a park’s services and income

Down 1 It sends out water jets 2 Ways out of a building 3 Flier under remote control 4 Letters before balance and patience 5 Doggie feet 6 Friend 7 Printer’s need 8 Item for the to-do list 10 Fastener 12 Strong and healthy 17 Enjoyment 18 NRPA’s has a tree in it 20 Classes offered by many parks for older people 21 French for of 23 Scraps 25 Giving money or time for free 27 Period in history 28 Assist 30 Compass point 31 Brave in the face of disaster 33 Rigging support on a ship 36 Remain in a position 37 Morning hrs.

38 African antelope with tufted tail

Check the answers to the crossword at www.nrpa.org/crossword. As an added bonus for completing the crossword, you can enter a drawing to be one of three lucky individuals to get a stainless steel insulated tumbler when you check your answers. The winners will be randomly selected and notified August 31, 2017.

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NRPA is dedicated to providing learning opportunities to advance the development of best practices and resources that make parks and recreation indispensable elements of American communities.

Find out more at www.nrpa.org/education.

SCHOOLS AND CONFERENCES

September 26-28, 2017 New Orleans, Louisiana

www.nrpa.org/education

CPSI PROGRAM 7-9 22-24

Wheat Ridge, Colorado Livermore, California

6-8 13-15 13-15 18-20 20-22 23-25 27-29

Honolulu, Hawaii Leesburg, Virginia Saratoga Springs, New York Griffin, Georgia Dublin, Ohio New Orleans, Louisiana Grand Rapids, Michigan

3-5 11-13 16-18 17-19 24-26

Homewood, Illinois Jersey City, New Jersey College Station, Texas Statesville, North Carolina Phoenix, Arizona

SEP

14-15 20-21 21-22 24-25

Jupiter, Florida Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania Littleton, Colorado New Orleans, Louisiana

5-6 19-20 25-26

City of Clearwater, Florida West Palm Beach, Florida Hampton, Virginia

AUG

Milpitas, California

OCT

AFO PROGRAM 29-30

November 5-9, 2017

AUG

Registrants have the option of attending the entire three days of education sessions, a single day of education events or register for individual sessions. For more information and a list of the streamed sessions, please visit https://learning.nrpa.org/nrpa-live-2017.

August 27-September 1, 2017

SEPT

The 2017 NRPA Annual Conference is rapidly approaching and, while we would love for everyone to attend in-person, we understand that is not always an option. NRPA is proud to present an alternative method for attending: NRPA Live! This year, NRPA will be streaming 10 full education sessions and three speed sessions from New Orleans. This is your or your agencyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s opportunity to virtually attend a curated set of sessions streamed live. Each session allows for direct interaction with the speakers through a live-chat, continued access to the session archive and resources, and the opportunity to gain up to 1.1 CEUs.

All NRPA Schools are held at Oglebay Resort in Wheeling, West Virginia, unless otherwise noted.

OCT

NRPA LIVE!

www.nrpa.org/CPSI

www.nrpa.org/AFO

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Operations Artificial Intelligence: Not Your Father’s Toolbox Some new artificial intelligence business tools to help park and rec agencies

By Joe Dysart

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lthough it may be a while before we all have an IBM Watson supercomputer on our desks, there are a number of artificial intelligence (AI) business tools that park and recreation agencies can use right now to help them run smarter and faster.

“It is inevitable that within five years most businesses and agencies will host some sort of AI tool,” says Adolfo Cruz, director of parks, recreation and community services in Riverside, California. “AI technology will infiltrate even the public sector.”

It’ll be a while before we all have the equivalent of an IBM Watson supercomputer sitting atop our desks.

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Cory Long, special events and marketing coordinator for Central Point Parks and Recreation in Oregon, adds, “It’s my opinion that artificial intelligence tools will become a major part of daily operations within parks and recreation.

Some of the influences for the transition to a more AI-integrated system are water conservation, fiscal responsibility and efficiency.”

Essentially, these next-generation AI wonders tap into the technology’s ability to do a lot of the thinking and strategizing for you. Of course, it’s always your call if you want to trust an entity whose heart literally beats with all the warmth of an Intel, or similar, multiprocessor. But if you’re curious about what the future of business software will look like for park and rec agencies, here’s a sampling of what’s coming down the pike: AI App Makers You can start dabbling in artificial intelligence right now — and for free — with open source software like Datumbox (www.datumbox.com), Lexalytics (www.lexalytics.com) and Bitext (www.bitext.com/). Targeted at organizations with one or more programmers on staff — or an extremely brave PC power-user — Datumbox is an AI platform that enables you to design and build your own AI apps from scratch. Specific tools you can create with Datumbox include: AI Sentiment Analyzers: These tools en-

able you to unleash an app on the web, social media and similar digital locations that will see what people are saying about your agency and/or programs and services, and also determine if the sentiments behind those posts are positive, negative or neutral.

AI Text Readability Analysis: This tool can be used to ensure that your marketing copy is extremely accessible or, conversely, appeals to a more discriminating audience.

AI Gender Analysis: Whether it’s soaring praise or withering criticism, this tool will enable you to determine who’s behind posts about your agency and whether that person is male or female.

AI Dashboard Maker One of AI’s notable characteristics is its ability to retrieve data from all corners of the web and then package it in easy-to-understand graphic dashboards.

Qlik (www.qlik.com/us), for example, enables you to develop AI dashboards that can monitor dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of websites and/or web properties across cyberspace, and then retrieve all that data for instant analysis.

With Qlik, you can compare and contrast the performance of all your websites in terms of clicks, visits, purchases, successful calls-to-action and more. Plus, the software promises to bring back associations and insights you may not have thought to consider. Similar products include Metric Insights (www.metricinsights.com/how-it-works/) and Tableau (www.tableau.com/).

AI Self-Designing Websites Not all of us are Da Vincis in the making but, fortunately, with Grid (https:// thegrid.io) or Wix (www.wix.com) — online services that will auto-design a website for you — that doesn’t matter

To spur AI innovation, Google is offering select AI researchers free cloud access to its machine learning computers.

anymore when it comes to designing your online presence.

With Grid, you simply upload the content you want on your website — text, images and video — and the service does

‘It is inevitable that within five years most businesses and agencies will host some sort of AI tool.’ the rest, placing everything just where it’s supposed to go. Once all of your components are in place, you have the ability to tweak the resulting design.

In the same way that there now seems to be an app for everything, very soon there may be AI software for everything, from software that can find

personality matches between your department’s customer service reps and your customers, to software that analyzes every single email your employees send or receive from the outside world and then studies those emails for telltale signs of trouble ahead, such as potential lawsuits.

Michael Black, director of parks and recreation in Ashland, Oregon, makes the following statement about the coming age of AI: “Over the next five years, we believe the use of artificial intelligence in parks and recreation will increase as organizations find ways to reduce labor costs and utilize technology to create a more enjoyable experience for park users, and as an opportunity for organizations to gather data.”

Joe Dysart is an Internet Speaker and Business Consultant based in Manhattan (joe@joedysart. com).

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Products Battery-Powered, Wireless, Portable Line Array Systems Anchor Audio, Inc.’s newest arrival to the Anchor AIR product line is the Bigfoot and Beacon AIR. The Bigfoot and Beacon AIR systems are battery powered, operate 6 – 8 hours or more on a single charge, and can be placed 150 feet or more from one another. The Bigfoot and Beacon portable line arrays are durable and easy to transport with built-in wheels and handles. Delivering 130 and 120 dB of clear sound, respectively, these portable sound systems are ideal for both music and voice amplification, making them truly versatile. ANCHOR AUDIO, INC., 800.262.4671, WWW. ANCHORAUDIO.COM

The Weaver: Hammock Lounge The Weaver is a steel structure designed to hold eight hammocks for up to 16 people. It is perfect for napping, relaxing, spontaneous conversations or group meetups. Made from recycled steel, it not only keeps people from damaging the trees with their hammocks, but also keeps material out of the landfills. The Weaver is designed and manufactured by Nido Structures in Austin, Texas. Nido Structures’ goals are to keep people outside and stay on Mother Nature’s good side. Come hang with us! NIDO STRUCTURES, 512.763.0649, WWW. NIDOSTRUCTURES.COM

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Fitness and Waterproof Headset Packages AmpliVox Sound Systems now offers wireless microphone headset packages specially designed for aquatics and fitness instructors. These durable accessories allow teachers to lead large swim and exercise classes without vocal strain or worry about sweat or water damage.

Available in both waterproof and moisture-resistant styles, the new packages include headset microphones, transmitter beltpacks and wireless transmitters to pair with AmpliVox portable PA systems.

AMPLIVOX SOUND SYSTEMS, 800.267.5486, WWW.AMPLI.COM

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Impact Safety Systems barrier technology is one of the safest solutions for athletic facilities, stadiums and many other areas. These energy-absorbing barriers were developed based on rigorous testing and have a proven track record of reducing injuries and damage, while withstanding demanding conditions in both permanent and temporary applications. ISS is dedicated to providing barrier systems that are not only safer, but more durable, versatile, easier to install, faster to repair, customizable and presentable, yet are still more economical than any other barricade available. IMPACT SAFETY SYSTEMS, WWW. IMPACTSAFETYBARRIERS.COM, 781.752.1220

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Gyms for Dogs/Living the Dog Life .....................................................77

Aquatix ..........................................................................................................19

Jayhawk Plastics, Inc. ................................................................................77

Asphalt Anchors Corporation ................................................................75

Kay Park Recreation ...................................................................................78

Bright Idea Shops, LLC ..............................................................................76

Landscape Structures, Inc. ....................................................................... 5

Cemrock .........................................................................................................29

Most Dependable Fountains, Inc. ....................................................... C2

Classic Recreation.......................................................................................13

Nido Structures ...........................................................................................37

Disc Golf Association.................................................................................76

Pacific Sportswear and Emblem Company .......................................78

DOGIPOT®...............................................................................................61, 76

Pilot Rock/RJ Thomas ...............................................................................27

Easi-Set Buildings .......................................................................................75

Play & Park Stuctures................................................................................ C4

Epic Outdoor Cinema................................................................................43

Salsbury Industries....................................................................................... 9

Exeloo Corporation ...................................................................................... 7

Scoremaster Goals ....................................................................................78

Fountain People/Water Odyssey .........................................................17

Shade Systems Inc. ...................................................................................... 1

Go Ape............................................................................................................76

sofSURFACES ................................................................................................78

Gothic Arch Greenhouses .......................................................................77

Subway.......................................................................................................... C3

Grassmats USA ............................................................................................77

The Nut Job 2/Open Road Films ..............................C1 (French Door)

Green Flush Technologies .......................................................................59

Vortex USA ...................................................................................................... 9

Greenfields Outdoor Fitness ................................................................2, 3

Waterplay Solutions ..................................................................................21

advertiser index

Amish Country Gazebos ..........................................................................75

(ISSN 0031-2215) is published monthly by the National Recreation and Park Association, 22377 Belmont Ridge Rd., Ashburn, VA 20148, a service organization supported by membership dues and voluntary contributions. Copyright ©2017 by the National Recreation and Park Association. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited. Opinions expressed in signed articles are those of the writers and not necessarily those of NRPA. Issued to members at the annual subscription price of $30, included in dues. Subscription: $46 a year in the U.S.; $56 elsewhere. Single copy price: $7. Library rate: $58 a year in the U.S.; $68 elsewhere. Periodical postage paid at Ashburn, Virginia, and at additional mailing offices. Editorial and advertising offices at 22377 Belmont Ridge Rd., Ashburn, VA 20148. 703.858.0784. Postmaster, send address changes to Parks & Recreation, 22377 Belmont Ridge Rd., Ashburn, VA 20148.

PARK AND RECREATION CROWDFUNDING PROJECTS ARE LIVE NOW

Donate to your favorite project and learn more at www.nrpa.org/FundYourPark

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Park Bench

‘In Tune’ with the Community

By Maureen Acquino The city of Ames, Iowa, hit all the right notes this summer with the installation of two donated public pianos. The aim of this public piano project is to promote the joy of music making while advocating for the benefits of music on the brain, bridging the link between the arts and sciences, commonly known as STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics).

Through a partnership with the City of Ames Parks and Recreation and Patricia Izbicki, a graduate student studying neuroscience at Iowa State University (ISU), the pianos came to life. Izbicki’s inspiration came from her involvement with a public piano project while an undergraduate in Florida. “Music, just like park and recreation activities, has beneficial effects on the mind and body,” says Izbicki.“The combination of the two make for a very special environment to not only be outdoors, but also to be able to make music outdoors.”

The community has been involved from the beginning, with volunteers jumping in to spruce up and weatherproof the pianos. An ISU Focus Artist Grant paid for the moving expenses, paint and other supplies to decorate the pianos, and middle school students who participated in a summer “Neuroscience of Music” course at the university and campers from the First Baptist Church of Ames Music Camp did the artwork.

The first piano was unveiled at Tom Evans Plaza on June 2 during the annual Ames ArtWalk, with the second at the Campustown Court during the city’s Summerfest on June 3. Both unveilings had quite a large community turnout, with people taking turns playing the pianos. “It seems the pianos have been a hit with the community. I’ve seen them played while bystanders listen and even sing along,” Izbicki adds.

The city of Ames will assess the pianos at the end of the summer to decide the next step. If they are still in playable condition, they will likely be stored or used at a local business for the winter. If they are not in great condition, they will be disassembled.

While the city is unsure if the pianos will become an annual summertime tradition, they’ve at least brought the arts alive in parks for one musical summer. To read more about this project, visit www.amestrib.com/news/outdoor-public-pianos-coming-ames.

— Maureen Acquino is the Assistant Editor for Parks & Recreation magazine.

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This Inclusive Playground has been designated as a National Demonstration Site for meeting best practices that promote inclusive play and recreation.

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