Parks & Recreation Magazine October 2021

O C TO B E R 2021 N R PA .O RG

WELCOME TO PLAY!

KIDS OF ALL ABILITIES ACCESS NEW INCLUSIVE PARK

Walking the Autism Nature Trail The New Parks Movement

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contentsoctober 2021

PHOTO COURTESY OF AJ WALTZ

volume 56 | number 10 | parksandrecreation.org

The City of Lawrenceburg (Indiana) recently reopened Arch Street Park, and the new park features a number of inclusive play elements.

FEATURES

34 More Than Access: Designing Inclusive Parks Logan Garrett

Learn how Arch Street Park in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, goes beyond Americans with Disabilities Act standards to provide a truly inclusive play experience.

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38 An All-Inclusive Trail Julia Garstecki

At Letchworth State Park in Castile, New York, the firstof-its-kind Autism Nature Trail is making nature accessible for all.

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44 The New Parks Movement: Resilient Park Access Jared Mummert

Grantees of NRPA’s 10 Minute Walk program are working to ensure their community members have close-to-home access to highquality park and recreation spaces.

WE COME BACK TO PLAY. Remember the moments that got your heart racing?

Your imagination swirling?

Your body moving?

Our best moments—the moments that define our childhoods—begin in play.

That’s why we always come back to it.

Watch our newest video and find inspiration for your play spaces at playlsi.com/shapedbyplay

©2021 Landscape Structures Inc. All rights reserved.

contents october

columns 6

departments 10 We Are Parks and Recreation NRPA Welcomes New Chair-Elect, Three Members to 2021-2022 Board of Directors 10 Member Benefit: Join the NRPA Education Network 12 National Recreation and Park Ethnic Minority Society Marks 50th Anniversary 12

Perspectives Access and Equity Michael P. Kelly

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Editor’s Letter Think Inclusive, Not Exclusive Vitisia Paynich

16 Finance for the Field How Does Your City Interpret Equity? (Part Two) John L. Crompton, Ph.D.

18 Finance for the Field Extra

14 Research Engagement With Parks Report Shows Parks and Recreation Is Vital Melissa May

. Conversation With Dr. John L. Crompton A Kevin Roth

20 Advocacy

15 Park Pulse Reduce Stress With Parks and Recreation

Why We Support Transgender Inclusion in Youth Sports Elvis Cordova

22 Health and Wellness

49 Products

Parks, Recreation and Mentoring: What’s the Catch?

Lauren Kiefert

50 Operations ADA Construction: Best Practices and Lessons Learned Gary Logue

51 Park Essentials 55 Advertiser Index 56 Park Bench Whatever Floats Your Pumpkin Boat!

Jenna Brinkman

24 Equity . orging Pathways to Park and Green Space Equity F .Manal J. Aboelata, MPH, and Rachel Bennett, MPH, MURP

26 Conservation Investing in Safe Streets Natali Fani-González

28 Law Review Parkland Sale Contract for Shopping Center James C. Kozlowski, J.D., Ph.D.

Page 20

Cover image:

Photo courtesy of AJ Waltz

Parks & Recreation is printed using soy ink on at least 10 percent post-consumer recycled paper and is mailed in a wrap — only when required — that is plant based and certified compostable. If you are interested in helping us go even greener, email us at prmagazine@nrpa.org and ask to opt out of receiving the print magazine. Parks & Recreation is always available to read in an ezine format at ezine.nrpa.org.

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NRPA has directed some of its advocacy resources to complement the work of local civil rights organizations that are working to overturn unjust laws.

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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 P A’ S L E A D E R S

Access and Equity As we reflect on this past summer, I am grateful that so many of our members stepped up to welcome back our residents and patrons into parks across the country. During the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, parks were one of the most reliable public spaces for people to get out and have a sense of normalcy. Moving forward, parks continue to play a critical role in our communities. And, our park and recreation professionals continue to strive to make our public spaces more accessible and equitable for all our residents, guests and visitors.

Access to recreation begins with proximity of our residents to a park or open space. NRPA is part of 10 Minute Walk, a national effort dedicated to improving access to safe, quality parks and green spaces. The goal is to provide everyone with convenient access to a park within a 10-minute walk of their home by 2050. This is an ambitious goal to be sure, but we all know the importance of parks to the health and wellness of our communities.

Once someone gets to a park, their experience can be impacted by how accessible the park landscape and features are. We are all familiar with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, which prohibits discrimination based on disability and has led to many changes in the way our spaces, buildings and parks are designed and built. We continue to consider not only physical limitations, but other challenges people face, such as sensory or cognitive issues, and strive to make inclusivity a conscious effort.

Our programs and recreation also are designed to allow everyone to participate. I am proud that Chicago was home to the first-ever Special Olympics held at our very own Soldier Field in 1968, and that we have hosted multiple Paralympic and adapted-sport national championships over the past two decades.

Recently, the focus of the field has been on equitable access, and rightly so. Equity is a core pillar for NRPA, which notes we must acknowledge the past and recognize the systemic inequities that have created very different lived experiences in communities across the country. Park and recreation departments and other organizations are now embedding diversity, equity and inclusion into our work and approach to program delivery. It is important to ensure that programs, infrastructure and opportunities are equitable in those communities that need it most.

See you in a park!

MICHAEL P. KELLY Chair, NRPA Board of Directors

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2377 Belmont Ridge Rd. | Ashburn, VA 20148 2 703.858.0784 | nrpa.org

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

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE Chair of the Board of Directors Michael P. Kelly Chicago Park District Chicago, Illinois

Chair-elect Carolyn McKnight-Fredd, CPRP Eagle Methods Management Consulting Dallas, Texas

Susie Kuruvilla Gurnee Park District Gurnee, Illinois

Joanna Lombard University of Miami School of Architecture; Miller School of Medicine Department of Public Health Sciences Miami, Florida

Mollie Marsh-Heine

Treasurer Xavier D. Urrutia

Earthjustice Boulder, Colorado

Alamo Colleges District San Antonio, Texas

Carolyn McKnight-Fredd, CPRP

Secretary Joshua Medeiros City of Bristol Parks & Recreation Bristol, Connecticut

At Large Nonet T. Sykes Atlanta Beltline, Inc. Atlanta, Georgia

At Large Mike Abbaté, FASLA, LEED AP Abbaté Designs Portland, Oregon

President and CEO Kristine Stratton, Ex Officio National Recreation and Park Association Ashburn, Virginia

BOARD OF DIRECTORS Michael Abbaté, FASLA, LEED AP Abbaté Designs Portland, Oregon

Kathy Abbott Boston Harbor Now Boston, Massachusetts

Jesús Aguirre, CPRE Seattle Parks and Recreation Seattle, Washington

Eagle Methods Management Consulting Dallas, Texas

Joshua Medeiros, Ed.D., CPRP, AFO City of Bristol Parks & Recreation Bristol, Connecticut

Arnold L. Randall Forest Preserve District of Cook County Chicago, Illinois

Nonet T. Sykes Atlanta Beltline, Inc. Atlanta, Georgia Alamo Colleges District San Antonio, Texas

Lakita Watson, CPRP Richland County Recreation Commission Columbia, South Carolina

Greg A. Weitzel, M.S., CPRP City of Las Vegas Parks and Recreation Las Vegas, Nevada

Philip Wu, M.D. (Retired) Kaiser Permanente Northwest Region Portland, Oregon

Fort Mill, South Carolina

James H. Evans

Jose Felix Diaz

New York, New York

Ballard Partners Miami, Florida

Rosemary Hall Evans

Victor Dover

Earl T. Groves

Richard Gulley San Diego Parks and Recreation San Diego, California

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Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Ashburn, Virginia

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EDITOR’S LET TER

Think Inclusive, Not Exclusive Nearly every day, we hear about the amazing projects that park and recreation agencies across the country are working on, especially newly completed park projects that often set a higher bar for our profession. These projects challenge all of us to think differently about how we plan and design our open spaces, so that we can make them more inclusive to all community members rather than exclusive to a select group. This month, we illustrate that sentiment with our Access issue.

In the cover story, “More Than Access: Designing Inclusive Parks,” on page 34, contributor Logan Garrett takes a closer look at the completion of newly renovated Arch Street Park in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, which takes the standards of the Americans with Disabilities Act to a whole new level. “Accessible playgrounds allow people with disabilities to visit the play area, whereas fully inclusive playgrounds provide the opportunity for everyone to actually use and interact with the playground equipment,” Garrett writes. “In other words, inclusive play is not solely about physically accessing an environment, but also intensely focused on what happens once an individual gets there.” What’s more, the park’s inclusive playground features elements, such as swings, seesaws and ziplines, that are accessible to people in mobility devices.

Letchworth State Park in Castile, New York, is a prime example of inclusivity. Voted Best State Park in the United States by USA Today, the park earned a reputation for having the most inclusive trail in the nation. Much of that is likely due to its Autism Nature Trail, which is profiled in the feature article, “An Inclusive Trail,” on page 38. Author Julia Garstecki offers greater insight into this first-of-its-kind trail — which was designed to meet the needs of those with autism spectrum disorder — and highlights the individuals who helped to make this project possible.

In the feature article, “The New Parks Movement: Resilient Park Access,” on page 46, NRPA’s Jared Mummert checks in with some of the grantees of NRPA’s 10 Minute Walk grant program to see how their park-access work has evolved and how they are supporting a new phase of the parks movement. “Lacking access to parks and recreation is an injustice,” Mummert writes. “To achieve just and fair park access for all people, agencies must acknowledge, harness and celebrate the unique power and resilience that dwell within communities while working to remove the barriers that perpetuate the inequities that exist between them.”

As you read these powerful stories in the October issue, I hope they bring inspiration to you and your park and recreation agency when developing your community’s master plan. Remember — think inclusive, not exclusive.

VITISIA “VI” PAYNICH Executive Editor Director, Print and Online Content

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PRESIDENT AND CEO Kristine Stratton VICE PRESIDENT OF COMMUNICATIONS AND CHIEF MARKETING OFFICER Gina Mullins-Cohen gcohen@nrpa.org EXECUTIVE EDITOR AND DIRECTOR OF PRINT AND ONLINE CONTENT Vitisia Paynich vpaynich@nrpa.org ASSOCIATE EDITOR AND WRITER Lindsay Hogeboom lhogeboom@nrpa.org MANAGER OF ONLINE CONTENT Jennifer Fulcher-Nguyen jnguyen@nrpa.org PUBLICATION DESIGN Kim Mabon/Creative By Design CreativeByDesign.net SENIOR CORPORATE DEVELOPMENT OFFICER Michelle Dellner 949.248.1057 mdellner@nrpa.org DEVELOPMENT COORDINATOR Melissa Hunter 703.858.2199 mhunter@nrpa.org PHOTOGRAPHY Dreamstime.com or NRPA (unless otherwise noted) MAGAZINE ADVISORY BOARD MEMBERS Anthony-Paul Diaz, Chair Michael Abbaté, FASLA Neelay Bhatt Ryan Eaker Beau Fieldsend Kathleen Gibi Paul Gilbert, CPRP Tim Herd, CPRE Brian Johnson, CPSI Denise Johnson-Caldwell Roslyn Johnson, CPRP Michele Lemons Sam Mendelsohn Maria Nardi Lisa Paradis, CPRP Paula Sliefert Shonnda Smith, CPRP, AFO Ronnetta Spalding Anne-Marie Spencer Stephen Springs

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The Latest Park and Recreation News and Trends On the Go

NRPA Welcomes New ChairElect, Three Members to 2021-2022 Board of Directors

E

ach year, during the NRPA Annual Conference, NRPA officially welcomes its incoming class of board members. The NRPA Board of Directors reflects our membership, which includes professional and advocate leaders in the park and recreation movement; park and recreation agencies and organizations representing the public, private, voluntary, commercial and industrial sectors; firms supplying park and recreation products and services; and individuals and civic groups interested in the park, recreation, conservation, health and equity fields.

Welcoming Carolyn McKnight-Fredd, CPRP, as Chair-Elect NRPA proudly welcomes Carolyn McKnight-Fredd, CPRP, as chairelect of the 2021-2022 NRPA Board of Directors. McKnight-Fredd has served as an NRPA board member since 2017 and has volunteered in Carolyn McKnightFredd

numerous additional leadership roles for NRPA, including CAPRA accreditation commissioner, committee chair for the NRPA Baltimore Maryland Conference Education Program, Directors School instructor, and chair of the National Recreation and Park Ethnic Minority Society, among others.

In the November 2021 issue, we will be sharing more information about McKnight-Fredd, as well as additional news about the 2021-2022 Board of Directors and its Executive Committee.

PHOTO COURTESY OF CAROLYN MCKNIGHT-FREDD

Three Members Join the Board

10 Parks & Recreation

Rebecca Armstrong Co-founder and CEO, North Portland, Oregon With a career in agency and design management spanning 30 years, Rebecca Armstrong has seen trends come and go. But to her, two key marketing tenets endure: tell the truth and make the truth fascinating. She is most proud of the work she has done | O C TO B E R 2 02 1 | PA R K S A N D R E C R E AT I O N .O R G

PHOTO COURTESY OF CHRIS HORNBECKER

WE ARE PARKS AND RECREATION

Rebecca Armstrong

with her partners at North to build an advertising powerhouse known for the craft of strategic thinking, its insistence on close collaboration with clients and its uniquely differentiating and effective creative product. In its 16 years, North has served Columbia Sportswear, Hydro Flask, Clif Bar, Peet’s Coffee and Pacific Foods, among many others.

Armstrong has served on boards for Big Brothers Big Sisters, Portland Advertising Federation and Providence Cancer Institute. She is a passionate advocate for access to the outdoors for all, having been the lucky beneficiary of its restorative effects her whole life.

Mollie Marsh-Heine Senior Vice President of Development, Earthjustice Boulder, Colorado Originally from Tennessee, Mollie Marsh-Heine attended high school, college and graduate school in Colorado. She received her undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado in 1993, followed by a master’s in business administration in 1999. Part of Marsh-Heine’s college experience included a year and

PHOTO BY ERIN L. COX, COURTESY OF MOLLIE MARSH-HEINE

Mollie Marsh-Heine

Marsh-Heine is delighted and enthusiastic about the continuation of both her path as a philanthropy professional and passionate environmentalist in her newest role as vice president of development with Earthjustice.

When not trying to save the planet, Marsh-Heine lives in the foothills of Boulder County, Colorado, with her partner Seth, their children and Scout the Airedale Terrier. She enjoys just about every outdoor sport there is, live music, theater and art, wine and laughter with friends, and time with her family.

Arnold L. Randall General Superintendent, Forest Preserve District of Cook County Chicago, Illinois Arnold L. Randall is the general superintendent of the Forest Preserve District of Cook County (Forest Preserves) and is responsible for the day-to-day management of one of the nation’s oldest and largest forest preserve systems. During Randall’s tenure, which began in December of 2010, the Forest Preserves has made notable strides in becoming a more transparent, accountable and strategic government agency, with an increased focus on restoring and protecting Cook County’s most precious natural areas. Key accomplishments include the ambitious Next Century Conservation Plan; a multi-year Centennial celebration to bring new and diverse audiences to the preserves; developing and launching strategic plans for camping, recreation, trails and habitat restoration; creating an independent advisory Conservation and Policy Council comprised of civic and business leaders; and opening five new campgrounds that re-

PHOTO COURTESY OF FOREST PRESERVES OF COOK COUNTY

a half at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania.

From an early age, MarshHeine has been drawn to the nonprofit world — working as an outdoor educator with the Denver Public Schools, Outward Bound instructor, youth intervention specialist, child advocate, outdoor education director, and, eventually, moving into more challenging leadership roles.

From 1999 to 2004, MarshHeine worked for the Colorado Chapter of The Nature Conservancy (TNC) as director of operations, followed by three and a half years as the executive director for The Dairy Center for the Arts, a multi-disciplinary arts center in Boulder, Colorado. Her true passion stayed in environmental work, and she returned to TNC as director of philanthropy to lead its fundraising efforts for the continent of Africa. Her tenure with TNC culminated in a promotion to partner with the CEO and various vice presidents of TNC as a senior principal gifts officer — working with donors at the highest levels of philanthropy in complex and sophisticated donor engagement.

Arnold L. Randall

establish the legacy of camping in the preserves.

Randall previously served as director of the Office of Civic Engagement at the University of Chicago (UChicago), where he helped plan and coordinate major public projects undertaken by the university, working as a liaison between UChicago and the city, neighbors and other concerned parties. He was a key part of the Chicago 2016 Olympic Bid Committee’s community outreach team and previously worked as commissioner of the City of Chicago’s Department of Planning and Development, where he directed the department’s leadership responsibilities for promoting economic development in Chicago by helping new and existing businesses meet their goals for growth while creating new jobs for city residents.

In addition, Randall served in a number of roles with the Chicago Park District between 1995 and 2007, including director of legislative and community affairs, director of planning and development, and lakefront area and southeast region manager.

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W E A R E P A R K S A N D R E C R E AT I O N

National Recreation and Park Ethnic Minority Society Marks 50th Anniversary

T Member Benefit: Join the NRPA Education Network

By Kim R. Beason, Ed.D.

T

he NRPA Education Network, or EdNet, is a forum for discussion, sharing knowledge, and posing questions unique to the needs and interests of professionals devoted to the interests and concerns of park and recreation education. EdNet, like all NRPA Networks, serves as a conduit and pathway for park and recreation practitioners, researchers and educators to interact. While the network does attract individuals affiliated with universities, all NRPA members benefit from its purpose: to move our profession forward. EdNet promotes the research-topractice continuum, which is a basis for learning in collegiate classrooms, earning continuing education units (CEUs) and pursuing in-service training.

Each year, the NRPA Research Sessions (NRS) present research findings based on the practitionerresearcher-educator continuum that illuminate evidence-based results that make us better professionals. I suggest all professionals review the NRS topics and presentations offered. By attending research sessions at the NRPA Annual Conference, you can earn CEUs and discuss the research topics pertinent to you.

EdNet is easy to join. Participate in our discussion forum, visit our annual conference meetings and socials, tune in online for our meetings and more. For more information, visit connect.nrpa.org/ Education.

Kim R. Beason, Ed.D, is NRPA Education Network Chair, Sport and Recreation Professor, and Director of the Senior Adult Aquatic Program at the University of Mississippi.

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his year, the National Recreation and Park Ethnic Minority Society (NRPEMS) celebrates its 50th anniversary. On July 22, NRPA signed an official proclamation commemorating this significant milestone (see page 13).

NRPEMS is an organization that brings together minority members of NRPA who collaborate to productively represent the park, recreation and related leisure service interest and rights of minorities, while participating in the overall effort of the park and recreation profession to serve the park, recreation and related leisure service needs and desires of the public.

The organization’s objectives are: • To unite all persons concerned with ethnic minorities in the park and recreation profession. This includes those in municipal, state, federal, private, voluntary and religious institutions; correctional facilities; academic communities; commercial, tourism and industrial organizations; and interested individuals • To serve as an exchange media of information on all ethnic matters pertaining to park, recreation, leisure programs and activities • To maintain high standards of professional ethics and ensure an accurate reflection of the history and culture of ethnic minority people in our profession and organization • To function in a manner that will expand NRPEMS influence within local, state and national organizations Among NRPEMS’s many achievements is its Mentor Program, a professional development program for young professionals and first-time Congress attendees. Many of our nation’s most respected executives, in both the public and private sectors, cite the support, influence and encouragement of a mentor as a contributing reason for their success. NRPEMS is dedicated to preparing minority professionals for the challenges of senior management positions in the field of parks and recreation and is firmly committed to fostering mentoring relationships that will prepare its mentees to be the next generation of leaders.

For more information about NRPEMS, visit nrpems.org.

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RESEARCH Engagement With Parks Report Shows Parks and Recreation Is Vital

By Melissa May

P

eople love parks. We know this in our hearts, we see it with our own eyes, and, year after year, we have the data to prove it. Since 2016, the NRPA Research team has surveyed U.S. adults to better understand how they connect with parks and recreation. The results from these surveys form the basis of NRPA’s annual Engagement With Parks Report (nrpa.org/Engagement). The 2021 report highlights the public’s strong and broad-based support for parks and recreation.

Parks and recreation is an essential part of the lives of people coast to coast. Even a global pandemic did not keep people away from their favorite parks, trails and recreation opportunities. Seventy-nine percent of survey respondents — the equivalent of 260 million people — visited a local park or recreation facility at least once during the 12-month period ending in May 2021.

The reasons people visit their local park and recreation facilities track closely with what they identify as their favorite activities. Whether it is an afternoon at the park to experience nature or the myriad of sporting options, there is a seemingly endless amount of possibilities from which to choose. For more than six in 10 people, this means visiting a local park, playground, dog park or some other local open space.

Even as the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic disrupted nearly every facet of life, parks and recreation remained open and available. Seventy-two percent of U.S. adults either maintained or increased the frequency of their visits to outdoor parks, trails and other public spaces during the past year compared to before the pandemic.

Access to high-quality park and

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recreation opportunities is a vital factor in improving quality of life for all. It is not surprising then that four in five U.S. adults indicate access to high-quality parks and recreation is an important factor in choosing a place to live.

More than seven in 10 U.S. residents have at least one local park, playground, open space or recreation center within walking distance of their homes, and one-third of survey respondents have two or more nearby parks and/or other recreational opportunities. Unfortunately, 29 percent of people do not live within walking distance of at least one park or recreational opportunity. This means approximately 100 million U.S. residents do not have walkable access to the lifesaving and lifeenhancing benefits that parks and recreation offers people. Removing any inequity in park access is critical to building strong, healthy and resilient communities. One crucial step is greater and more sustainable funding of local park and recreation agencies.

Nearly nine in 10 people agree that it is important for local, state and federal governments to fund local park and recreation agencies sufficiently in order to ensure every member of the community has

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equitable access to amenities, infrastructure and programming.

The people and their lived experiences make the United States a diverse nation. Hence, the public’s needs and desires from parks and recreation vary greatly by location.

What may work in one part of a city may not work in another part of town or in a rural county.

Acknowledging the individuality of communities and creating a safe space for all residents to present their needs is vital in establishing lasting public involvement. Eighty percent of U.S. adults agree that park and recreation leaders should engage directly with their communities to deliver appropriate facilities and programs.

Parks and recreation transforms our cities, towns and counties into vibrant, healthy and resilient communities thanks to the tireless efforts of more than 10,000 agencies and more than 160,000 full-time park and recreation professionals across the United States. The 2021 Engagement With Parks Report makes this point clear: people place a high value on the programs and services that park and recreation agencies deliver to their local communities every day, strongly support their mission and desire their voice be heard in decision making.

Check out more in-depth key findings from the 2021 Engagement With Parks Report in our upcoming blog series beginning in October (nrpa. org/Blog).

Melissa May is NRPA’s Senior Research Manager (mmay@nrpa.org).

NRPA PARK PULSE

Reduce Stress With Parks and Recreation Whether sitting on a park bench or walking local trails, spending

20 to 30 minutes outside reduces stress levels.

Nearly all (96%) U.S. adults spend time outdoors daily More than half spend more than 30 minutes outdoors daily

1 in 3 spend more than an hour outdoors daily

Park and recreation professionals and their agencies are primary providers of outdoor spaces and activities that help to reduce stress and improve mental health.

Each month, through a poll of 1,000 U.S. residents focused on park and recreation issues, NRPA Park Pulse helps tell the park and recreation story. Questions span from the serious to the more lighthearted. The survey was conducted by Wakefield Research (www.wakefieldresearch.com).

Visit nrpa.org/ParkPulse for more information.

FINANCE FOR FIELD FINANCE FORTHE THE FIELD How Does Your City Interpret Equity? (Part Two) The market/benefit equity and demand perspectives

By John L. Crompton, Ph.D.

L

ast month’s column (tinyurl.com/66uw6tmp) described the compensatory equity and equality operationalizations of equity, but many communities adopt neither. Rather, they embrace market/benefit equity or demand as their guiding principle for allocation resources.

Market/Benefit Equity This interpretation of equity is similar to the private-sector market mechanism used to allocate goods and services (i.e., those who receive a service should pay the cost of providing it). The number of services sought by different beneficiary groups that could be provided by a park and recreation agency

If a neighborhood desires to have a higher level of service than the norm, then a special taxing district may be established to enable those residents to pay for it.

invariably exceeds the resources it has available, so priorities have to be identified.

If a neighborhood desires to have a higher level of service than the norm, then a special taxing district may be established to enable those residents to pay for it. More commonly, it suggests that, whenever possible, a full-cost recovery pricing policy should be adopted for recreation services.

Two mechanisms are available for equitably prioritizing which services should be offered. First, when users pay a break-even price for all recreation services, they prioritize services with their wallets.

Advocates of this mechanism

Many organizations embrace market/benefit equity or demand as their guiding principle for allocation resources.

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argue it is a fairer (more equitable) and more responsive mechanism than the alternative, which is an administrative and political process that frequently is cumbersome and controversial. The administration option too often results in inequities whereby some services are underresourced or discarded, while others are over-resourced. Thus, priority is given to “wrong” services, in “wrong” quantities and delivered to “wrong” groups.

When a recreation service is subsidized, it is likely to result in people demanding an unreasonably high supply of it for two reasons.

First, some who use the service would not do so if a break-even price were charged. Second, those who benefit from a program correctly perceive that increasing its supply occurs at little or no cost to themselves. Investments in one service means those investments

cannot be made in another service, which, therefore, is not offered — so the subsidies create inequities.

Demand The important principle underlying this approach is that the market, not the agency, determines the pattern of service delivery. Demand may be viewed as transposing the central role of cash in market equity into the context of the participants’ investments in time and effort in services that are subsidized. It allocates services on the basis of demands or “requests,” not on fees or taxes paid. This interpretation of equity is manifested in one of three forms: • Demonstrated use, which means allocating resources to those park and recreation services that have most participation. For example, parks that receive the most use receive the most maintenance resources.

• Demonstrated interest, by which allocations are based on residents’ responses to surveys or similar measuring instruments. It differs from demonstrated use in that it embraces latent potential participation as well as actual use.

• Advocacy, by which administrators and elected officials prioritize services (and make equity decisions) by the intensity of residents’ engagement in the democratic process.

Ostensibly, demand sounds fair (equitable), but it often harbors a hidden allocation bias since economically disadvantaged residents are likely to make less use of park and recreation services, are less likely to respond to surveys, and tend to be less

actively and assertively engaged with government (tinyurl.com/ hxrmjfjf).

The demand interpretation of equity does not guide the allocation of services in a pre-determined agreed direction. Rather, it is a pragmatic, reactive approach that park and recreation managers and elected officials use because it is administratively convenient. Its use is likely to result in an unpredictable and inconsistent set of winners and losers.

However, it is consistent with the utilitarian philosophy that states, “the sole foundation, the end and aim of all good government, should be the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people.” The utilitarian focus is on maximizing aggregated community benefits. It does not address social goals, such as the distribution of those benefits.

Budgetary pressures have led many park and recreation agencies to embrace this interpretation of equity. In essence, it emphasizes efficiency and asks: What programs will generate the most participants at the lowest cost per participant?

Long Timeframe A commitment to an equity policy is likely to require consistency over a period of many years before the intended changes are accomplished. Three factors make it inevitable that short-term, annual shifts will be small.

First, park and recreation department annual budgets invariably are set by making relatively small incremental increases or decreases from an existing year’s budget.

Thus, it is likely that, for example, 95 percent of resource allocations reflect historical patterns of an

agency’s interpretation of equity in its delivery of services.

Second, the difficulty of substantive changes when using incremental budgeting is reinforced by most park and recreation services being based in existing facilities, which are immovable assets that often were a function of opportunity taxpayer-funded purchases (e.g., funded by bonds and located where land was relatedly inexpensive) or philanthropic donations.

Consequently, elected officials are likely to feel obligated to give funding preference to maintaining and operating these fixed assets, even though this may be inconsistent with a new equity policy.

A commitment to an equity policy is likely to require consistency over a period of many years before the intended changes are accomplished.

Third, cities are organic. There is regular turnover of elected officials, and it is likely that the value systems of new officials will differ to some degree from those of their predecessors. There also is turnover in neighborhoods, so the profile of communities will change over time because of residents’ changes in preferences and perceptions. The changing membership of both these stakeholder groups make retention of a consistent policy over a multiyear period challenging.

John L. Crompton, Ph.D., is a University Distinguished Professor, Regents Professor and Presidential Professor for Teaching Excellence in the Department of Recreation, Park and Tourism Sciences at Texas A&M University and an elected Councilmember for the City of College Station (jcrompton@tamu.edu).

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FINANCE FOR THE FIELD EXTRA

A Conversation With Dr. John L. Crompton

By Kevin Roth

I

n both the September issue and this issue of Parks & Recreation magazine, we have featured columns from John L. Crompton, Ph.D., the university distinguished professor of recreation, park and tourism sciences at Texas A&M University, on the topic of equity. Dr. Crompton has had an illustrious academic career, spanning more than 45 years, preparing park and recreation students for their future careers and publishing articles and books on marketing and financing public leisure and tourism services. Well respected in academia, he also has provided park and recreation consulting services for many jurisdictions and currently serves as a member of the city council in College Station, Texas.

Dr. Crompton’s recent columns describe four ways that agencies and their jurisdictions operationalize equity and allocate finite park and recreation resources: compensatory equity, equality, market/benefit equity and demand. He concludes this month’s column by noting communities must play the long game in their commitment to equity — whatever definition they follow — as it may take years to achieve desired outcomes. Recently, I followed up with him to better understand how park and recreation professionals and advocates can promote greater equity. Following is a synopsis of our discussion.

You Have to Ally With What’s Important Dr. Crompton notes that many cities have limited abilities to grow their budgets year to year due to a lack of 18

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voter or political will to raise taxes and, in some states, caps that limit revenue increases. Further, changes in the relative size of each department’s slice of the budget pie are incremental at best. For example, he used his experience as a political leader in College Station, noting that “their mandate is to health, safety and welfare… with safety being number one.” As a result, the city spends 54 percent of its annual budget on police and fire, with him declaring, “that’s not going to get lower.” With so much of his city’s budget essentially locked down, parks and recreation is one of many local government services vying for funding among the remaining 46 percent.

Dr. Crompton states that, in this environment, “[i]t all comes down to positioning.” Park and recreation agencies must position themselves to be a solution to local political leaders’ chief concerns.

He notes that a mayor, city manager or council member thinks, “if you [all] are on the side of assisting in these, then I’m going to do everything I can to push money your way. But if you [all] are not on my side, then I can’t help you.”

For his community, political leaders’ and voters’ chief concern has been economic development.

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“And so, over the [past] 15 years, the parks and recreation department in our community is central to economic development and everybody recognizes it,” he says.

If You Want Equity, Ally With a Local Political Problem What is important to political leaders may differ significantly by community, and history may provide insight on how parks and recreation can support its mission. Dr. Crompton notes that the initial driver for publicly funded recreation in the United States more than a century ago was to reduce youth crime.

Similarly, improving public health was a primary spark for the creation of public urban parks. “Building a massive urban park like [New York City’s] Central Park or others in major [polluted] cities was because they created clean air.”

He contends the strongest “making the case” argument [would] be that “parks are essential to the health of the population.” The past two years have well demonstrated this point, as the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic led to record levels of park visitation in many communities across the United States. Parks and recreation not only was the sole physical activity opportunity for many people during the early days of the pandemic, but also was a significant contributor to many communities’ emergency response.

For many political leaders, park and recreation professionals and their agencies can be a robust solu-

tion for critical public health challenges. This view will grow even stronger as parks and recreation broadens its mission to serve as community wellness hubs that connect every community member to essential programs, services and spaces that improve health outcomes and enhance the quality of life.

The Key Is Acquiring Designated Revenue Streams To further deliver on its mission, park and recreation agencies must diversify their funding model. Dr. Crompton posits that park and recreation’s reliance on general tax fund revenue will become even more challenging in the years to come, as growing populations and an inabil-

ity (or unwillingness) to raise taxes will stress local government finances further. “We are not going to compete in the future in the general fund and, as this becomes more pernicious, we will be squeezed more and more. The key is independent revenue funds,” he says.

According to Dr. Crompton, the key to this is park and recreation leaders gaining greater clarity of the cost of providing services to the community. “You can’t make any sensible decision unless you have in place a real cost accounting system.”

A firmer grasp of costs helps agency directors and local policymakers make informed decisions on potential new programming and services.

Dr. Crompton notes that a cost accounting system would help park and

recreation agencies potentially operate some or all of their operations as an enterprise fund, where the agency generates and owns the revenue to fund operations. Informed pricing for programming and services could lead to a reduced reliance (but not eliminate) on tax dollars to fund expanded services — especially since, as he notes, many local governments’ funding models can be regressive (e.g., property and sales taxes). To ensure income is not a barrier to accessing park and recreation programming, agencies can use scholarships and graduated pricing mechanisms to ensure that all residents of a community may access the program.

Kevin Roth is NRPA’s Vice President of Research, Evaluation and Technology (kroth@nrpa.org).

Creating Equity-Based System Master Plans NRPA’s online tool can help you create master plans grounded in equity and inclusion. nrpa.org/ParkMasterPlanning

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ADVOCACY

NRPA has directed some of its advocacy resources to complement the work of local civil rights organizations that are working to overturn unjust laws.

Why We Support Transgender Inclusion in Youth Sports

By Elvis Cordova

N

RPA is deeply committed to ensuring that all people have fair and just access to high-quality local parks and recreation.

That is why when the state of Tennessee enacted a rash of anti-LGBTQ+ laws earlier this summer, we had a decision to make. The 2021 NRPA Annual Conference — a national gathering of park and recreation professionals from across the country — was set to take place in Nashville, Tennessee, at the end of September.

These newly enacted discriminatory laws — including SB 228, SB 1229, HB 1182, HB 1027 and HB 1233 — stand in direct opposition to NRPA’s values of equity and inclusion by cruelly harming an already marginalized community and promoting the exclusion of some children from enjoying the myriad benefits of public recreation spaces and programs.

Our initial thought was to move our conference to a state without 20 Parks & Recreation

discriminatory laws. However, this action would only further harm Tennesseans already negatively impacted by this legislative decision through no fault of their own, and also would not solve the root cause of discrimination. Instead, we channeled our efforts into publicly standing with the LGBTQ+ community by making a public statement to affirm, unequivocally, that legislation seeking to discriminate and marginalize any group of peo-

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ple has no place in our communities. We outlined our opposition in a letter to Tennessee’s state leadership, including Governor Bill Lee, Lieutenant Governor and Speaker of the Senate Randy McNally, and Speaker of the House of Representative Cameron Sexton.

Such discriminatory laws are not an isolated incident. Since the passage of Idaho’s controversial law in 2020 banning transgender (or trans) student athletes, more than half of the states in the country have introduced laws that would ban transgender athletes from playing on school sports teams that correspond with their gender identity, several of which have passed. However, many LGBTQ+ advocates and allies have mobilized to challenge these laws in

court as violations of students’ privacy and right to equal protection under the law. As these challenges move forward, we also must speak out in the court of public opinion.

For us, that effort begins with educating ourselves and others on how these discriminatory laws are unfair to trans youth who deserve to be treated with respect and fairness. We encourage our readers to learn more and discover what gender-inclusive sports policies from across the United States look like. One resource to get started is transathlete.com/k-12.

Not only have we added our voice to this effort, but also we have directed some of our advocacy resources to complement the work

of local civil rights organizations that are working to overturn these unjust laws. Such groups as Athlete Ally, The Trevor Project, PFLAG, GLSEN, TransAthlete and The National Center for Transgender Equality are doing the critical work of organizing their communities to stand against hate and prejudice.

We are proud to stand with allies who share this vision.

While we ultimately decided to hold our conference in Nashville, NRPA has committed to not holding future conferences in Tennessee while these anti-LGBTQ+ laws remain on the books. We also will continue to push for trans-inclusive policies and strongly oppose any efforts that attempt to exclude trans

youth from being able to play sports.

As historical social change and civil rights movements demonstrated, this goal will take considerable time, energy and dedication to be realized. Yet, we are encouraged that this movement already has strong public backing as demonstrated by a recent national poll (tinyurl.com/ 22bndv9k), which shows that twothirds of people support the rights of transgender students to play on the sports teams aligned with their gender identity. We are committed to putting in the time and energy to ensure that all people have fair and just access to the benefits of high-quality, local parks and recreation.

Elvis Cordova is Vice President of Public Policy and Advocacy for NRPA (ecordova@nrpa.org).

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HEALTH & WELLNESS

Parks, Recreation and Mentoring: What’s the Catch?

By Lauren Kiefert

P

ark and recreation professionals and their agencies protect and support the health of all people and the communities where they live, learn, work and play. Park and recreation professionals nationwide have begun to embrace their role as public health leaders — meeting community members where they are and connecting them to various health services. These professionals continue to expand programming and work to fill gaps regarding access to physical activity, healthy food options, chronic disease prevention and management, and social connections — while also supporting academic and cultural enrichment opportunities. As community-based providers of social-emotional development services for youth, local park and recreation professionals also function as mentors and role models. Staff often mentor and nurture youth in their communities, including troubled, at-risk youth. In times of emerging public health threats, including substance use and mental health disorders, trauma, adverse childhood experiences, and rising rates of depression and suicide, parks and recreation is well suited to build protective factors around youth and families and create connections community-wide.

Keeping Youth on the Right Path Formal one-on-one and group mentoring programs, as well as 22 Parks & Recreation

informal mentoring opportunities, support youth in establishing strong connections with compassionate, caring adults and positive role

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models. Youth who are at risk of falling off track but have a mentor are 55 percent more likely to enroll in college (tinyurl.com/2k5nvk9h), as well as 52 percent less likely to skip a day of school than their peers and more likely to maintain better attitudes toward school (tinyurl.com/ fdbdtv4h). Mentoring also plays a role in preventing young people from engaging in risky behaviors. Youth with mentors are 46 percent less likely than their peers to start using drugs (bbbs.org/research). Unfortunately, one in three young people in the United States reaches the age of 19 without having a mentor of any kind (tinyurl.com/2k5nvk9h). This number includes 9 million at-risk youth who are missing out on the critical support and connections

that mentoring can provide. Park and recreation agencies are closing this gap by offering one-on-one and group youth mentoring programs and helping at-risk youth gain access to quality mentors.

To learn more about how park and recreation professionals are tackling these issues — as well as what role the coronavirus (COVID-19) has played in their current approach and future plans — the NRPA Research team conducted a survey in February 2021. Sixty-one percent of park and recreation agencies offer in-person academic and enrichment programs for area youth, and 52 percent of agencies offer similar services virtually.

In addition, many agencies provide leadership programs (45 percent) and mentoring opportunities (43 percent) for their communities’ youth. Highlighting the tremendous impact such programs can have on youth and young adults — as well as considering the immense academic and social-emotional impact of COVID-19 on these groups — many additional agencies (29 percent) anticipate launching these services in the next two years (nrpa.org/HealthReport).

encompassing direct feedback from youth, park and recreation staff, and subject matter experts in the mentoring field. It considers common assets found in park and recreation agencies, as well as feedback on the need for self-care, reflection and mindfulness for both mentors and mentees. In addition, the YM Framework is grounded in the Search Institute’s Developmental Assets Framework (tinyurl.com/5chv5ycb).

It outlines 40 research-based, positive experiences and factors that influence youth development and lead to positive life outcomes.

The YM Framework can be used in both group and one-on-one mentoring settings. It provides suggested guidance for weekly discussions, activities, reflection and self-care.

While the framework provides 16 weeks of lesson guidelines, mentoring activities can be repeated or expanded on with the goal of supporting a mentor/mentee relationship for a minimum of one year. The YM Framework includes weekly conversation starters related to the overarching themes and sample activities for mentors and mentees, as well as community service projects, family engagement and self-care tips.

Have you been integrating youth mentoring into your agency’s services? Let us know! Contact me at lkiefert@nrpa.org or NRPA Program Manager Rafael Torres at rtorres@nrpa.org.

Lauren Kiefert is Program Manager for NRPA (lkiefert@nrpa.org).

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Youth Mentoring Framework NRPA developed the Youth Mentoring (YM) Framework to help local park and recreation agencies craft their own unique, individualized mentoring programs. It is designed to help agencies leverage local park and recreation assets that build protective factors around at-risk youth, while also forming strong social connections and positive relationships to address trauma, adversity and other challenges that youth experience. The YM Framework is rooted in data collected and analyzed across the profession,

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EQUITY

Forging Pathways to Park and Green Space Equity

By Manal J. Aboelata, MPH, and Rachel Bennett, MPH, MURP

T

he past 20 months dealing with the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic have shown us all that parks and green spaces are essential community infrastructure that protect public health by providing opportunities for physical activity, time in nature, social connection and respite (tinyurl.com/2c9ap7hr) — as well as access to lifesaving resources, like vaccines and emergency food. In cities, parks and green spaces also offer climate benefits: they filter air, remove pollution, buffer noise, cool temperatures, filter stormwater and replenish groundwater (tinyurl.com/ 68umjnn). Yet, not all communities have access to safe, well-maintained, and programmed parks and green spaces. Many studies across multiple geographic areas show that Blacks, Latinos and people who live in low-income, urban neighborhoods have less access to green spaces than people who live in more affluent or predominantly white communities (tinyurl.com/tw839dzx).

Green spaces should serve every community in a fair, just, safe and healthy manner. For more than a century, park and green space inequities have unfairly affected lowincome communities throughout the United States, especially people living in predominantly Black and Latino neighborhoods. These inequities reflect historical and currentday policies and practices. As shown

in Figure 1, the historical factors contributing to park inequities include racial segregation, biased planning decisions, exclusionary zoning and redlining, among others (tinyurl.com/pxf34yww) (tinyurl. com/8tccraf). Present-day drivers of park inequities include tax and fiscal restructuring, shifting responsibility for public services, and reduced ability of cities with limit-

ed tax bases and large low-income populations to provide park and recreation services (tinyurl.com/ r8h92sh6) (tinyurl.com/xdfusd5z).

Achieving Equitable Outcomes Just as green space inequities have been produced, there are pathways to equity. In June 2021, Prevention Institute, a national health equityand racial justice-focused nonprofit, released a paper, Changing the Landscape: People, Parks, and Power, which lays out three key dimensions of producing more equitable outcomes in the park and green space arena (tinyurl.com/4dva5557): • Procedural equity covers processes that support the equitable and just provision of green spaces services and relates to all aspects of green space, from placement to design, construction and programming.

Figure 1

Biased Planning

Redlining

Racial Segregation

Interstate Highway System

Divestment in Urban Core

Suburban Investment

Sitting of Hazardous Land Uses

Devolution

Increased Park Inequity

Anti-Tax Movement

Selected policies, practices and procedures that have produced inequities in Parks and Green Space. Adapted from: Prevention Institute’s Countering the Production of Health Inequities: An Emerging Systems Framework to Achieve an Equitable Culture of Health.

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• Distributional equity primarily pertains to distribution and accessibility of green spaces across communities and the spread of facilities, amenities and features within green spaces.

• Structural equity addresses underlying systems-level factors and policies that give rise to green space inequities in the first place. This includes operationalizing equity and racial justice across agency staff and leadership and deepening a commitment to using accountability metrics to redress spatial and operational disparities.

While the traditional approach to addressing these inequities would have focused on creating new parks or improving existing

ones, an emerging national park equity movement also emphasizes the need to transform the underlying policies, institutional practices, power dynamics and problematic narratives that have led to pervasive green space inequities in Black, Latino and low-income urban communities across the United States. Signaling a welcome turning point in the field of public health, in fall 2021, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation — the nation’s largest health-focused philanthropy — will launch a new funding program: People, Parks, and Power: A National Initiative for Green Space, Health Equity, and Racial Justice. Recognizing that people and power drive policy and systems change, this new ini-

Recognizing that people and power drive policy and systems change, this new initiative will invest in the capacity of communities closest to the problem to accelerate long-overdue progress toward health equity, park equity and racial justice. tiative will invest in the capacity of communities closest to the problem to accelerate long-overdue progress toward health equity, park equity and racial justice.

Manal J. Aboelata, MPH, is Deputy Executive Director at Prevention Institute (manal@preventioninstitute.org). Rachel Bennett, MPH, MURP, is a Program Manager at Prevention Institute (rachelb@preventioninstitute.org).

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CONSERVATION

By reshaping the ways our community resources are linked, we can provide community members with safe and effective access to spaces and opportunities that advance the health, well-being and quality of life for all.

Investing in Safe Streets

By Natali Fani-González

I

remember arriving in the United States with my mom in the late 1990s when I was 16 years old. Similar to many immigrant kids who could not speak English, I struggled, along with my mom, to make ends meet and adapt to our new home. I attended high school during the day, worked at a shoe store in the evenings, and I cleaned houses with my mom on weekends. One particular challenge was walking to the store or even our local park, which proved nearly impossible given the multiple lanes of fast-moving cars. We had to ride three buses from our apartment in the Langley Park/Long Branch corridor in Prince George’s County, Maryland, to clean mansions in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Although it was no more than 12 miles away, it took almost two hours to ride buses each way — that’s nearly four hours in a single day dedicated to transportation. But that was not the only problem. Add to the situation: streets with high-traffic flow; lack of sidewalks, bus shelters and streetlights (particularly during the winter time when it got dark by 6 p.m.); and the incredibly frustrating infrequency of buses, disregarding the needs of working people who relied on them.

Indeed, we were facing an inefficient and dangerous anti-people, anti-worker, anti-environment, antiprogress transportation network.

So, as one can imagine, my life experience helped me develop an

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acute desire for improving our streets and land use for people.

Challenging the Status Quo The status quo continues to be a set of disconnected and piecemeal im-

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provements that fail to effectively manage our streets as a system of public spaces that embraces people of all abilities. It is an unacceptable tragedy every time someone dies or is severely injured in a traffic collision that could have been prevented if streets had been designed for people. These tragedies affect more than the victims of the crashes; they severely impact entire communities by creating barriers to achieving physically healthy communities.

Solutions to overcome these tragedies must be among environmental justice efforts. People reject walking and biking for recreation or transportation purposes if they perceive them as unsafe in their neighborhoods. That’s why we need a community revolution — from coast to coast — to break the status quo of violent street designs.

Today, we are seeing several projects to efficiently connect our communities, including the awaited Purple Line light-rail linking Montgomery and Prince George’s counties in Maryland, protected bike lanes connecting to bike trails, and dedicated bus lanes. Yet, we are not moving fast enough — as communities remain heavily dependent on automobiles, making our transportation system a major contributor of greenhouse gas emissions while climate change threatens our future.

Our dependence on driving is rooted in decades of efforts to facilitate the movement of cars as quickly as possible at the expense of making spaces accessible for people to walk, roll and bike; developing dedicated transit lanes; and designing spaces to plant vital street trees that also contribute

to making our communities safe, healthy and enjoyable.

We must invest in safe streets to move people to parks, trails, restaurants, transit stops, schools and jobs. This is about creating a sense of belonging in our communities that sparks economic and environmental sustainability.

The low-density development near transit and the auto-centric shopping centers that are accompanied by multiple lanes of highspeed roads need to be redeveloped and redesigned, and soon. Currently, they limit access to the commercial core and create a safety hazard for people traveling, regardless of the transportation mode.

Reimagining Our Public Spaces Furthermore, when we combine this traffic violence with rising

inequality, the loss of jobs due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic — including in the restaurant and childcare industries, in which a significant number of people of color worked — and the ongoing threat of climate change, we must understand that our economic recovery and our environmental justice responsibility must include reimagining a crucial public asset: our streets.

By reshaping the ways our community resources are linked, we can provide community members with safe and effective access to spaces and opportunities — such as parks and recreation — that advance the health, well-being and quality of life for all.

Natali Fani-González is former Vice Chair of the Montgomery County (Maryland) Planning Board and an advocate for environmental and economic justice.

Our dependence on driving is rooted in decades of efforts to facilitate the movement of cars as quickly as possible at the expense of making spaces accessible for people to walk, roll and bike.

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L AW R EV I EW

In the case of Immel v. Tulsa Public Facilities Authority, the plaintiffs claimed the defendants lacked the legal authority to sell a parcel of land because it was held in a public trust.

Parkland Sale Contract for Shopping Center

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

I

n the case of Immel v. Tulsa Public Facilities Authority, 2021 Okla.

LEXIS 41 (Okla. Sup. Ct. 6/22/2021), the issue on appeal before the Oklahoma state supreme court was “whether Defendants/Appellees Tulsa Public Facilities Authority (TPFA) and the City of Tulsa (City), Oklahoma, can sell 8.8 acres of parkland held in a public trust to a private developer for construction of a commercial shopping center.” The plaintiffs, a group of Tulsa citizen taxpayers (Taxpayers), claimed TPFA and the City lacked the legal authority to sell the land because the parcel was “held in a public trust expressly as a park for the people.”

Helmerich Park History The 8.8 acres of parkland in dispute (hereinafter “Tract A”) is a small part of 67.3 total acres of unimproved land acquired by the City from the First National Bank of Oklahoma for $4.5 million in 1991. The City’s acquisition of the 67.3 acres of land is the result of a public/private endeavor to pur28 Parks & Recreation

chase the riverfront property for the specific use as a city park.

The City provided tax funds of $2.25 million for half of the purchase price, and the other half of the purchase price was donated to the City by private parties, expressly for the purchase of the land to be used as a city park. The City used $2.25 million from its

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surplus 1985 sales tax funds to pay for half of the purchase price for the parkland. The sales tax funds were designated for “Park Facilities Improvements.” The $2.25 million the City received from private donors for half of the purchase price for the parkland was placed in the City’s “Park and Acquisition Fund” pursuant to ordinances adopted in May 1991.

The City transferred the $4.5 million in funds to the TPFA, so that it could be used to purchase the land from the bank. Under state law, the TPFA is a public trust and the City is its sole beneficiary. Legal title to the land also was placed in the name of the TPFA. On June 27, 1991, the City’s park

board met and named the park “Helmerich Park” after Walter Helmerich III, the principal private donor. Helmerich Park is a public park in Tulsa and has operated as such from 1991 to the present.

From 1991 to April 2017, all 67.3 acres of Helmerich Park was operated, maintained and managed by the City’s park department as a public park.

During this same time period, improvements were made to Helmerich Park under the supervision of the City. The improvements included: 10 volleyball courts, a playground, a splash pad, a picnic area, restrooms, a parking lot and a driveway. The improvements were ultimately made possible by private funds donated by Walter Helmerich III; however, the City’s park department also sought $1,175,000 in improvements specifically earmarked for Helmerich Park as part of its 2015-2019 capital improvements plan.

Economic Development Land Sale In 2013, the City’s economic development director decided to try and sell or lease some of the City’s unused or underutilized property in an attempt to, hopefully, increase sales tax revenue and generate revenue based on recommendations from an outside third party who prepared a study of the City’s property. Helmerich Park was identified as a potential candidate by the outside third party’s study to be leased or sold.

Once identified as a potential candidate to be leased or sold, the City’s economic development director discovered legal title to Helmerich Park was held by the

TPFA, not by the City. As a result, the City’s economic development director and the City’s staff prepared a request for proposal (RFP) offering Helmerich Park for longterm lease in hopes of attracting new businesses that would lease the property and thereby increase sales tax revenue. The RFP provided that it was from both the TPFA and the City. Ultimately, the RFP was unsuccessful.

In 2014, a private developer became interested in a small portion of the property — specifically Tract A, which runs along the east bank of the Arkansas River — for commercial development. The City’s economic development director, through private negotiations, initially thought he was successful in negotiating a long-term lease for Tract A with the private developer. However, the long-term lease ultimately culminated into a contract for the purchase and sale of Tract A to the private developer for the construction of a commercial shopping center.

After lengthy negotiations, the TPFA and the private developer agreed on a purchase and sale contract (Contract) for Tract A on August 11, 2015. The TPFA approved the Contract during one of its scheduled meetings. The remaining 58.5 acres of Helmerich Park was to continue to be held in trust by the TPFA for the public’s use as a city park.

Challenge to Sale Contract On August 11, 2015, Plaintiff Craig Immel sought to prevent the sale of Tract A by seeking an injunction and a temporary restraining order against the TPFA. On January 7, 2016, Immel filed an

Amended Petition to include the City of Tulsa as a defendant and added four other individual Tulsa taxpayers as plaintiffs.

On March 1, 2017, the Tulsa City Council passed two resolutions concerning Tract A. The first resolution provided that the City would abandon Tract A and support its sale if the TPFA and the developer would revise its contract to include terms requested by the City. The second resolution provided up to $570,000 of the City’s tax funds to be paid to the private developer for infrastructure improvements to Tract A in connection with the construction of the shopping center if the contract was revised. The TPFA and the developer revised the Purchase and Sale Contract (Amended Contract), which the City approved on March 3, 2017.

The City’s economic development director decided to try and sell or lease some of the City’s unused or underutilized property in an attempt to, hopefully, increase sales tax revenue and generate revenue.

In response to the two resolutions passed by the City Council and the City’s approval of the Amended Contract for the sale of Tract A, Taxpayers petitioned the trial court for a declaratory judgment on the following points: (1) [T]he TPFA and the City cannot sell Tract A to a private developer for commercial use because the park land is held in a public trust, expressly as a park for the people; (2) tax funds would be

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misappropriated if the sale of the restricted park land occurred; and (3) the sales price was so low and other considerations so minimal, that it would result in an unconstitutional gift by the TPFA and the City to the private developer.

Taxpayers also alleged actual abandonment of Tract A of the park had not occurred and that the $570,000 to be paid to the private developer would be an illegal expenditure.

All parties moved for summary judgment in the trial court in January 2018. In April 2018, the trial court granted the TPFA and the City’s joint motion for summary judgment as to all issues without stating the grounds to support its decision and denied the Taxpayers’ motion for summary judgment. Taxpayers appealed the trial court’s order granting summary judgment in favor of the TPFA and the City. The state supreme court granted appeal.

Summary judgment would only be appropriate when there is no genuine controversy as to any material fact, and the moving party (in this case, TPFA and the City) was entitled to judgment as a matter of law.

Summary judgment would only be appropriate when there is no genuine controversy as to any material fact, and the moving party (in this case, TPFA and the City) was entitled to judgment as a matter of law.

Taxpayer Standing On appeal, the state supreme court 30 Parks & Recreation

first considered whether the Taxpayers had “standing as citizens and taxpayers to bring this action in equity to challenge the prospective unauthorized expenditure of funds.” As noted by the court: Standing refers to a person’s legal right to seek relief in a judicial forum. Moreover, to establish standing a person must possess “a legally protected interest.” Under Oklahoma law, the state supreme court recognized the right of a taxpayer to “challenge illegal taxation or expenditure of public funds.” In this case, TPFA and the City claimed the sale of real property did not constitute the expenditure of public funds.

The state supreme court, however, found a taxpayer also would have standing to challenge “the prospective unauthorized expenditure of public funds or a prospective unauthorized act related to public funds,” which would include the sale of real property. In addition, the court found the Taxpayers had standing based on their claim, alleging “the $570,000 in City funds to be paid to the private developer would be an illegal expenditure.”

Sale of Public Trust Land On appeal, the Taxpayers claimed “TPFA and the City cannot sell Tract A of the Park to the private developer because the land is held in a public trust for the use and benefit of its citizens as a public park.” As noted by the state supreme court, “the common law public trust doctrine is well established in Oklahoma” and subject to the following “general rule”: [M]unicipal property held in a governmental capacity, which is for public use, cannot be sold

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without special legislative authority unless the public use has been abandoned or the property has become unsuited for continued use.

Accordingly, since this particular parcel of parkland was “held in a public trust for the use and benefit of its citizens,” the City and the TPFA could not sell the parkland absent a finding “the [parkland] has been lawfully abandoned and/ or unfit for its particular purpose.”

Further, the court recognized the following general legal principle that a municipal corporation holds property in two distinct capacities: There is a clear distinction, recognized by practically all authorities, between property purchased and held by municipal corporations for the use of the corporation as an entity, and that purchased and held by such corporation for the public use and benefit of its citizens.

For property acquired for strictly corporate uses and purposes, the court acknowledged “the power of the corporation to dispose of it is unquestioned.” On the other hand, the court found the municipal power to dispose of property dedicated to public use is limited to circumstances in which “the public use has been abandoned, or the property has become unsuitable or inadequate for the purpose to which it was dedicated.”

In this particular instance, TPFA and the City had argued the City’s charter, the City’s amended charter and other statutory provisions provided “general power to sell Tract A of Helmerich Park.” The state supreme court rejected this argument: First, the park land is held by the TPFA, a public trust, for the

use and benefit of the citizens as a public park. Second, because the park land is held in a governmental capacity for use by the public, it cannot be sold without special legislative authority. It is undisputed there is no special legislative authorization empowering the TPFA and the City to sell Tract A of the Park to a private developer for commercial use.

In so doing, the court also rejected the claim that Tract A could be sold to the private developer for commercial use because TPFA, not the City, held legal title to the tract. Despite having transferred legal title to a public trust, the court found the “City still had an equitable interest in the land”: As the City’s sole beneficiary, the TPFA holds Tract A in trust for the public specifically for use as a city park and this is true despite the fact that legal title to the park land was deeded from the City to the TPFA. Additionally, a municipal public trust cannot do something its beneficiaries cannot do, except as authorized by statute.

As cited by the court, state law provided that “a municipal public trust can be created for the furtherance and accomplishment of any authorized and proper public function or purpose of the municipality.” Moreover, the court noted the powers of a public trust “may not exceed those authorized and proper public functions of its municipal beneficiary.” The court, therefore, acknowledged “a municipal public trust cannot convey real property if its municipality cannot.”

In this particular instance, the state supreme court found “the legislature has not authorized municipalities to sell land held in trust

The court found the municipal power to dispose of property dedicated to public use is limited to circumstances in which “the public use has been abandoned, or the property has become unsuitable or inadequate for the purpose to which it was dedicated.”

for the people, except under specific statutory procedures, which are not applicable to the sale of Tract A of Helmerich Park.” As a result, the court held TPFA, as a municipal agency, is “equally bound by the public trust doctrine with respect to property held in trust for the people, just as the municipality itself would be.” Further, the court found the City of Tulsa Charter, as amended, did not include a grant of power to “alienate parks” or sell park property. Similarly, the court found “no specific statutory provision authorizing the City (or the TPFA acting on its behalf) to convey or otherwise dispose of the [parkland] held in such a capacity.”

Moreover, the court found “the [parklands] in this case, where Helmerich Park, including Tract A, has continually been in use as a city park since 1991 and continues to this day to be in use as a city park.” As the result, the state supreme court found the trial court had erred in granting summary judgment to the City and TPFA on

the proposed sale of parkland.

TPFA and the City had argued this interpretation of the public trust doctrine would “mean that Tract A of the Park or the entire Park can never be sold.” The state supreme court rejected this argument. According to the court, in order to sell Tract A of the park, “the burden is on the TPFA and the City to prove that Tract A of the Park has been lawfully abandoned and/or is no longer fit for its intended use as a public park.”

In so doing, the state supreme court reiterated that applicable rule of law: “municipal property held in a governmental capacity that is for public use cannot be sold without special legislative authority unless the public use has been abandoned or the property has become unsuited for continued use.” In the absence of special legislative authority, the issue before the state supreme court was, therefore, whether there was evidence that “Tract A of the Park has been lawfully abandoned by the TPFA and the City.”

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Abandonment Resolutions As cited by the state supreme court, under Oklahoma law, “to constitute abandonment in respect to property, there must be a concurrence of the intention to abandon and an actual relinquishment of the property so that it may be appropriated by the next comer”: In determining whether one has abandoned his property, the intention to abandon is the first and paramount object for inquiry. There can be no abandonment without the intention to abandon.

Because abandonment rests upon the intention to relinquish the premises, it is a question of fact for the jury.

In this particular case, the court found there was “conflicting evidence in the record concerning whether Tract A of the Park has been lawfully abandoned by the TPFA and/or the City.”

The court further acknowledged: “The TPFA and the City unquestionably have the burden of establishing abandonment.” In this particular case, the court found there was “conflicting evidence in the record concerning whether Tract A of the Park has been lawfully abandoned by the TPFA and/or the City.”

To establish abandonment, the TPFA and the City had pointed to the two Resolutions passed by the City Council as evidence of the City’s intent to abandon Tract A. In claiming Tract A had been abandoned, the TPFA and 32 Parks & Recreation

the City also maintained it was “impractical and unreasonable to erect a fence around the 8.8 acres of [parkland] for purposes of establishing actual relinquishment of the property.”

At the same time the resolutions were passed, the Taxpayers had argued “the land was not actually relinquished” because “Tract A and the entirety of Helmerich Park was still in use and open to the public as a city park.” Moreover, the Taxpayers contended “the TPFA and the City conceded Tract A had not been abandoned when they acknowledged Tract A was still in use as a public park in their joint motion for summary judgment.”

As characterized by the state supreme court: “The two Resolutions passed by the City Council may be affirmative official acts by the City Council indicating the City’s intention to abandon Tract A.” On the other hand, the court acknowledged that these two resolutions “may also be viewed as an attempt by the City to validate its authority, in conjunction with the TPFA, to sell Tract A to the private developer in the first place”: The City Council passed the two Resolutions approximately one year and seven months after the original Purchase and Sale Contract was approved by the TPFA in August 2015. Whether the TPFA and the City had the intent to abandon Tract A and whether there was an actual relinquishment of the property are questions for the trier of fact [i.e., a judge or jury that determines questions of fact in a trial].

In light of such “conflicting evidence in the record concerning

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whether Tract A of the Park has been lawfully abandoned by the TPFA and/or the City,” the state supreme court reversed the summary judgment in favor of TPFA and the City and remanded this case to the trial court “for a determination on the merits as to whether Tract A has been lawfully abandoned.”

Public Purpose On appeal, the state supreme court further noted “disputed material facts concerning whether the ‘public purpose’ requirement was met.” As cited by the court, the Oklahoma Constitution “restricts the use of public funds to expenditures for a public purpose” to prevent “the investment of public funds in private enterprises.” That being said, the court acknowledged the term “public purpose” should not be construed “in a narrow or restrictive sense.”

As defined by the court: “A public purpose affects the inhabitants of the state or taxing district as a community.”

Within the context of a legal “public purpose,” TPFA and the City had argued “Tract A of the Park can be sold to promote economic development.” Under the state constitution, the state supreme court acknowledged that “economic development is a legitimate public purpose for which public funds may be expended.” Further, the court noted an “economic development plan did not lose its public purpose merely because it involved a private actor.”

That being said, the court held “this power is restrictive” in structuring plans for economic development. Specifically, the court found

a city “must obtain adequate consideration and accountability from a private actor in exchange for the expenditure of public funds.”

In this case, Taxpayers had claimed: “Tract A is being sold for about 20 [percent] of its market value and that the private developer will be given more than a halfmillion dollars in tax funds for infrastructure development in violation of the public purpose requirement.”

Moreover, “once the contract is entered into and the commercial shopping center is built,” Taxpayers argued “the TPFA and the City of Tulsa will not maintain control over Tract A and its operation,” including “no control over the future disposition of the property.”

In response, the TPFA and the City claimed increased sales taxes and employment would satisfy the public purpose requirement.

In the opinion of the state supreme court, there were “clear material facts in dispute concerning whether the expenditure of the public funds in this case would meet the public purpose requirement.” As a result, the court reversed the summary judgment of the trial court in favor of TPFA and the City and remanded (i.e., sent back) this case for further proceedings to resolve these disputed facts and determine “the constitutionality of the sale of Tract A to the private developer and whether those facts support the public purpose requirement” under the Oklahoma Constitution.

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Conclusion Having found “Tract A is [parkland] held in a public trust expressly for the use and benefits of its citizens as a city park,” the state supreme court held “Tract A of the Park can only be sold by the TPFA and the City to a private developer for commercial use if Tract A has been lawfully abandoned and/or is no longer fit for its intended purpose as a public park.” On remand, the state supreme court directed the trial court to resolve whether: (1) Tract A of the Park was lawfully abandoned by the TPFA and the City; and (2) the public expenditure of funds to be paid to the private developer meets the public purpose requirement under the Oklahoma Constitution.

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James C. Kozlowski, J.D., Ph.D., is an Attorney and Associate Professor in the School of Sport, Recreation and Tourism Management at George Mason University (jkozlows@gmu. edu). Law review articles archive (1982 to present): mason.gmu.edu/~jkozlows.

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More Than Access:

Designing Inclusive Parks Arch Street Park in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, goes beyond ADA standards to provide a truly inclusive play experience

By Logan Garrett

PHOTOS BY AJ WALTZ

O

ver the course of the past decade, park and recreation professionals have been creating playgrounds that go beyond basic Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requirements. In years past, playgrounds were expected to meet basic standards regarding ramps and surfacing, but communities around the country have begun to build play environments that are truly inclusive for people of all ages and abilities. This recent increased focus on creating inclusive play spaces underscores the difference between inclusion and accessibility.

The 2010 ADA Standards for Accessible Design (tinyurl.com/3xys4j3s) stipulates that playground equipment and facilities constructed or altered on or before March 15, 2012, must be accessible and offer a range of play experiences to children of varying abilities. As important as this development was for providing access for differently-abled individuals, it does not require a playground to provide equipment that is truly inclusive. A 2014 survey (tinyurl.com/ 5urhpsbp) conducted by a playground manufacturer found that more than half (57 percent) of the people

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Accessible playgrounds allow people with disabilities to visit the play area, whereas fully inclusive playgrounds provide the opportunity for everyone to actually use and interact with the playground equipment.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF AJ WALTZ

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questioned mistakenly believed that playgrounds are required to have elements designed for children with Down syndrome, sensory disorders, and visual and hearing impairment.

Accessible playgrounds allow people with disabilities to visit the play area, whereas fully inclusive playgrounds provide the opportunity for everyone to actually use and interact with the playground equipment. In other words, inclusive play is not solely about physically accessing an environment, but also intensely focused on what happens once an individual gets there.

“A playful environment is an environment where people collaborate. It’s an environment where people get along and become more welcoming,” comments Tom Norquist, PlayCore senior vice

The City of Lawrenceburg (Indiana) recently reopened Arch Street Park, and the new park features a number of inclusive play elements.

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president of innovation and business development. “It’s necessary to provide play spaces where people of all abilities can play together, because play, on a fundamental level, eradicates social barriers that might have been there previously.”

More and more, people are realizing the disparity in access and inclusion. According to a poll conducted by NRPA (tinyurl.com/ wtmashc9), close to 9 in 10 Americans say communities should offer all-inclusive play options at playgrounds across the country. Park and recreation departments have recognized this need and are building inclusive play spaces for the communities they serve.

Communities Embrace Inclusive Play An excellent example of a city going above and beyond ADA standards of accessibility is Lawrenceburg, Indiana. The City of Lawrenceburg recently reopened Arch Street Park, and the new park features a number of inclusive play elements that are accessible to people in mobility devices, including swings, seesaws and ziplines. A colossal amount of collaboration was required to complete this project, with city officials and community organizers partnering with the playground manufacturer GameTime to provide the inclusive play equipment. Additionally, landscape architects and sales representatives from Sinclair Recreation oversaw the installation of the playground.

Beginning in 2020, the Lawrenceburg community set out to revamp

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Arch Street Park. This led to forming the Arch Street Park Playground Committee, which consists of area residents, young students and community members. Led by Lawrenceburg Mayor Kelly Mollaun, members of the committee included Sallee Johns, Joe Vogelgesang, Erin, Nicole and Taylor Ratliff, Grace Brown, A.J. Waltz, Connie Knue, Tina Zint, Bonnie Vise, Guinevere Emery and Mario Todd. “[The] project took a lot of time, with great input from our playground committee, to finalize a design that could be utilized by different age groups for ultimate fun and healthy experiences,” says Mayor Mollaun.

This dedicated group set forth to review existing playground infrastructure conditions, address recreation issues in the area and improve accessibility for their outdoor play environments. Their main goal was to create a playground design featuring inclusive, fun and exceptional play experiences to add to the city’s award-winning parks. After a year of planning, design and installation, the universally designed Arch Street Park reopened in June 2021.

“Inclusion was always a priority for us,” says Emery, communications director for the City of Lawrenceburg.

“We’ve always been a community dedicated to supporting exceptional recreation environments, and part of that is providing inclusive play spaces for people in the region.”

The playground was made possible and partially funded by a GameTime Playground Grant Funding Award of $190,403, with the City of Lawrenceburg committing an additional $550,026 toward the Arch Street Park Inclusive Playground project.

“On behalf of everyone at GameTime, congratulations on your new playground,” says GameTime Presi-

Playgrounds like Arch Street Park highlight the many aspects of inclusion and equity.

dent Spencer Cheak. “Your commitment to inclusive play and outdoor recreation for people of all ages and abilities is a model for communities around the country. Everyone involved in making this possible is a true community champion, and we are honored to partner with you to make play possible for everyone.”

According to Emery, multiple members of the Arch Street Park Playground Committee have connections to individuals with disabilities, and this perspective has had a dramatic impact on their desire to create an inclusive playground. In order to comprehensively address the developmental needs of children, the city relied on best practice research conducted by PlayCore, particularly their seven principles of inclusive playground design.

This research specifies principles that ultimately create an inclusive and embracing play experience by intentionally providing opportunities for physical, cognitive, communicative, social/emotional and sensory development.

“It was great to develop options for their park based on feedback from the community. We worked with people and kids of all ages and abilities to create the playground that is going to be perfect for this community and it’s been such a blessing to be a part of a project that is going to affect so many people,” says Jeff Branham, a regional sales associate with Sinclair Recreation.

Due to their commitment to evidence-based research on inclusion and social equity, the Arch Street Park received a PlayCore National Demonstration Site (NDS) recognition for Inclusive Play. PlayCore’s NDS network includes playgrounds that thoughtfully support playful pathways, nature play, adult fitness,

youth physical activity, and inclusion in outdoor play and recreation settings.

The vast amount of inclusive playgrounds included in the NDS network exemplifies the surge in inclusive playground installations during recent years.

Building Inclusion When discussing inclusion, the vast majority of people will immediately think of providing access to those with physical disabilities, but playgrounds like Arch Street Park challenge that notion and highlight the many aspects of inclusion and equity. In addition to physical disabilities, inclusive play spaces should also address the needs of individuals with cognitive, communicative, social/ emotional and sensory disabilities.

This can be accomplished in a variety of ways — namely with the addition of play elements like sensory panels, which stimulate senses such as touch, movement, smell, taste, sight, hearing and balance. Similarly, human-powered electronic devices provide sensory experiences in which users engage in some sort of physical activity to “power-up” the action. This may include turning a handle, repeatedly pressing a foot pedal or rotating a wheel. These innovative products feature sensoryrich experiences, like lights and music, storytelling, or social games.

In addition to inclusion for people of all abilities, playgrounds like Arch Street Park are built for people of all ages. Multigenerational play is incredibly beneficial for numerous reasons for both adults and children. Studies show

that children who play with adults demonstrate greater creativity and higher levels of language and problem-solving skills. Recent studies (tinyurl.com/3wkvkvrw) also indicate adults who engage in play with children experience drastic psychological and health benefits, including improved mood, greater cognitive skills, enhanced relationships and reduced stress.

Playgrounds play an important role in children’s development and quality of life, and everyone deserves the opportunity to partake in play. Communities around the world are joining the City of Lawrenceburg in providing thoroughly inclusive play spaces for people of all abilities, ages and backgrounds.

In hopes of addressing the needs of the 7.3 million school-aged children with disabilities (tinyurl.com/ sws5cwrk), park and recreation professionals are constructing inclusive play environments that go well beyond basic ADA compliance.

Logan Garrett is Media Relations Coordinator for Mace+Carmichael (logan@macecarmichael.com).

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An All-Inclusive Trail

By Julia Garstecki

— Gretel Ehrlich, an American travel writer, poet and essayist

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I

n 2015, Letchworth State Park in Castile, New York, was voted the Best State Park in the United States by USA Today (tinyurl.com/n63z8khj).

Now, it is also known for having the most inclusive trail in the country. The Autism Nature Trail (ANT) is the first of its kind, designed specifically to meet the needs of those with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

This benefits not only those with autism, but also those with other cognitive or physical impairments. And while it was designed thoughtfully for those with special needs, all visitors to the park will marvel at it as well.

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PHOTO COURTESY OF JULIA GARSTECKI

“Everything in nature invites us constantly to be what we are.”

The Autism Nature Trail at Letchworth State Park makes nature accessible for all

The Autism Nature Trail is the first of its kind, designed specifically to meet the needs of those with autism spectrum disorder.

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AUTISM TRAIL

As the mother of a teenager on the spectrum, this trail is a sign of hope that the world will become more inclusive for people with disabilities that may not be easy to see nor understand. Trail Founder and Co-Chair Loren Penman understands. “We aren’t just making a public place accessible, we are making an accessible place public,” she says. This small yet significant idea is what makes this private trail in a public space so unique. From conception, the trail has consistently been a celebration of inclusivity, collaboration and learning from others.

verbal, curious and peaceful when in nature. However, the presence of parking lots, power lines, and/ or vending machines can all break nature’s spell. It’s the complete immersion of nature that helps. This is what the founders and developers of the ANT understood when creating and designing the trail.

Partnering to Make the Trail a Reality In 2014, Penman and her neighbor spoke about the new Humphrey Nature Center at Letchworth State Park. During the discussion, the neighbor thought her grandson, who is on the autism spectrum, would love it. However, she was concerned that his sensitivities and behaviors might make a visit to the

PHOTO COURTESY OF JOHN KUCKO

Eight sensory stations along the trail help develop auditory, visual, tactile and balance processing.

Why an Autism Trail?

Mountains of research prove the benefits of nature in our lives.

Exposure to nature improves cognitive development, increases concentration and improves working memory. Studies using scientific parameters prove the benefits of “nature therapy” for those with ASD (tinyurl. com/2rns92hf).

Incorporating interactions with nature into daily lives of those on the spectrum can lead to better sleep, higher tolerances of sensory stimulation and elevated moods.

Family members of those on the spectrum don’t need scientific research to convince us — we see it firsthand. Many parents report that their children become more

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nature center challenging. Penman shared this conversation with her friend Susan Herrnstein, who also has a grandson with autism. Both grandsons shared a similar autism experience, and both were soothed when visiting Letchworth State Park. The women were struck with a thought — how could they encourage those with autism and their families to come to Letchworth State Park? What could a fully inclusive, autism-friendly nature experience at a park look like?

Park managers and elected officials get great ideas for parks all the time. However, Art Briley, regional director of New York State Parks – Genesee Region, and Doug Kelly, park manager for Letchworth State Park, point out that there are only so many resources to support these ideas. “We love getting great ideas, but there is the question of cost, maintenance and programming,” Briley says.

Penman and Herrnstein continued talking, and brought a third friend, Gail Serventi, into the conversation. The three women discussed how a fundraiser for the Humphrey Nature Center at Letchworth State Park had been mostly private. Could private fundraising be how the ANT could become a reality?

Penman, Herrnstein and Serventi quickly became known as the ANT aunts, and the success of the trail is attributed to their tenacity and enthusiasm. A large part of their success was asking for help where and when it was needed.

“It truly was a grassroots organization, because the more we talked about it with people we thought

PHOTO COURTESY OF JOHN KUCKO

Leading expert Dr. Temple Grandin advised incorporating interesting things to see, but ensuring there are “no surprises” and building in places to decompress.

could help us, the more partners we found,” says Penman. “We all kept asking, ‘What if ?’”

One such partner was leading expert Dr. Temple Grandin (temple grandin.com), who advised hiring staff with expertise in both autism and outdoor environments; incorporating interesting things to see, but ensuring there are “no surprises”; and building in places to decompress in case overstimulation occurs.

In addition, the aunts contacted the Open Space Institute (OSI) (openspaceinstitute.org), an organization that works to protect and preserve the natural habitats and wildlife, which became the 501(c) (3) sponsor. Now, tax deductible donations could be gathered.

By August 2016, a concrete vision and pathway forward was determined, and New York State Parks gave the go ahead to the aunts, provided they understood no funding would come from New York State for this project — the agency would

only provide the land.

The aunts began a soft fundraiser with a goal of raising $2 million.

If they could raise this amount, it would prove to all involved that there was a need for such a trail.

By December 2019, the $2 million was raised, and on December 12, 2019, New York State Parks officially greenlit the project.

Natural Heritage Trust (NHT) (naturalheritagetrust.org), with its mission to receive and administer gifts, grants and contributions to further public programs for parks in the state of New York, became the fiscal sponsor for the ANT. Now that the project could be made public, more ideas for fundraisers were generated. Of course, the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic threatened to slow the project down, but in the spirit of inclusivity and accommodation, it didn’t. A virtual auction was designed, and many of the auction items reflected sensory-friendly

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AUTISM TRAIL

ments of schools and businesses, isn’t the number one mission to improve the quality of life? If it is, we should all move forward on the same path. This project engaged local partners on a path to have a global impact.”

The School Board of Perry Central Schools unanimously agreed to create an ANT coordinator position. Now, Perry Central Schools coordinates the ANT website, and will help set up and coordinate visitors, promote events on social media, meet with the park about maintenance, and help facilitate community service opportunities for the trail.

Jen Hackett, executive director and founder of Camp Puzzle Peace (tinyurl.com/ydwp5xce), will develop programming events at the trail and provide materials. In addition, the organization will provide trail guides, and when making reservations, families can let the trail guides know exactly what modifi-

PHOTO COURTESY OF JOHN KUCKO

items and experiences that paralleled the design of the trail. Examples included online autism consultations with experts in the field and consultations of sensory-friendly playground equipment. Because it was held online, word of the ANT spread around the globe. To date, $3.2 million has been raised.

As fundraising efforts continued, the aunts encouraged partners to join them by inviting community members to meetings to learn about the project. Daryl McLaughlin, superintendent of Perry Central School District in nearby Perry, New York, remembers meeting the aunts. “They were a force. They were amazing, and had the ‘wow’ factor,” he says. It only took that one meeting for McLaughlin to be convinced his school district needed to be a part of this one-of-a-kind project. “I was thinking of the ultimate long game, both educational and economic,” says McLaughlin.

“When you consider mission state-

cations may be needed. Camp Puzzle Peace also will help create videos and social stories that outline what the trail looks like, and who will be there. These accommodations can greatly help visitors on the autism spectrum.

Briley insists these carefully planned considerations are what made it possible to move forward with the trail. The aunts were not only thinking of what the trail would and could look like, but they also were considering how the trail would be maintained and utilized. “Otherwise,” Briley states, “we’re just building a nice trail in a nice park.”

The Groundbreaking With $3 million of the funding committed, a COVID-style groundbreaking was held on February 19, 2021.

Activities along the trail are fun for all visitors, not just those on the spectrum. The one-mile trail begins and ends in the same location, providing predictability. Videos and pictures can be viewed ahead of time, and well-marked, yet understated, signs clearly mark different aspects of the trail. This is a critical component for many on the spectrum because the unknown can cause great anxiety.

Eight sensory stations help develop auditory, visual, tactile and balance processing. One example is a music station, where visitors can play with instruments made from nature. Musicians can control the sounds they create and the volume at which the sounds are made.

At another station, a meadow run and climb allows running, jumping, climbing and balancing, which helps improve awareness of one’s The one-mile trail begins and ends in the same location, at the Trailhead Pavilion, providing predictability.

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body in space.

Doug Kelly, park manager of Letchworth State Park, says, “This project is unique in that we were given the blueprints but had weekly meetings to discuss improvements and changes. Everybody was invested in the mission of the project. People could come to us with ideas, and then our engineers could find a way to make it happen or explain why it couldn’t. As families with autism have learned about the project, they have offered information and suggestions that can be incorporated into the trail as well.”

Another aspect designed for those on the spectrum are reflection points and “alone zones,” where people can go to reflect, calm down, if necessary, and relax in a quiet environment. One element of these zones is cuddle swings, which are great for sensory integration therapy. Swinging back and forth can stimulate the vestibular system and improve proprioception.

What’s more, the potential for global impact should not be diminished. McLaughlin is excited to see how the thoughtfulness of the design promotes change outside of the park. He wonders: If other businesses took part in training those with various cognitive challenges, how could businesses become more inclusive? For example, the hand dryers at the Humphry Nature Center are loud. Could quieter hand dryers exist? Could area restaurants begin to change for a more sensory-friendly experience, such as providing menus with picture cues for those with communication challenges?

PHOTO COURTESY OF JOHN KUCKO

The trail features reflection points and “alone zones,” where people can go to reflect, calm down, if necessary, and relax in a quiet environment.

While interviewing the many partners involved in bringing the trail to life, one theme was clear: Everyone was inspired, motivated and wanted to be a part of it.

What’s more, each person claims it was someone else who made the ANT happen. The aunts attribute the success to the partners they found. Others state it was the aunts’ excitement and drive that made it happen. Erik Kulleseid, commissioner at New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, agrees. “The trail happens to be in a park, but autism is not the specialty of the those that work at the park,” he says. “This had to be done through the volunteers. The Autism Nature

Trail is proof that a community of people can come together when they are inspired. My hope is that it is a successful template, a model used to inspire larger and smaller parks.”

According to Penman, “In a time of division, the Autism Nature Trail was a unifying project.”

This mother, who happened upon the trail just before construction began, could not be more excited, or more hopeful, that the world is headed in the right direction. Autism awareness is not just a phrase, it is something concrete — and thanks to the Autism Nature Trail, it is happening!

Julia Garstecki is a Freelance Writer based in Buffalo, New York (julia@juliagarstecki.com).

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The New Parks Movement:

Resilient Park Access

The Tacoma (Washington) park and recreation department was a grantee of NRPA’s 10 Minute Walk grant program, in partnership with The Trust for Public Land and the Urban Land Institute, to ensure that everyone has close-to-home access to a highquality park and recreation space.

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How communities are using parks and recreation to foster health and resiliency

By Jared Mummert

I

t was an overcast Pacific Northwest day in December 2019 when Metro Parks Tacoma (Washington) Management Fellow Jackson Skinner led a group of about 35 park and recreation professionals and planners around Tacoma’s park system. From the picturesque waterfront at Point Defiance Park — complete with a zoo, aquarium, miles of trails and views of the Puget Sound as well as, on a clear day, the breathtaking 14,410-foot Mount Rainier and Cascade Mountains — to the recently constructed and meaningful Eastside Community Center, park and recreation professionals witnessed the beauty, complexity and diversity of the Metro Parks Tacoma system.

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1 0 - M I N UT E WA L K

The Tacoma park and recreation department, along with the visiting park and recreation professionals, were grantees of NRPA’s 10 Minute Walk grant program, in partnership with The Trust for Public Land and the Urban Land Institute, to ensure that everyone has close-to-home access to a high-quality park and recreation space. Over three years, 32 communities across the United States — from sunny Miami, Florida, to snowy Anchorage, Alaska, and from Winooski, Vermont, with a population of 7,000, to Los Angeles County, with a population of more than 10 million — received $40,000 for a park-planning grant to create equitable park systems.

Reimagining the Basics Park and recreation professionals have taken the basics of park planning — master planning, land acquisition, geographic information system (GIS) mapping and more — and adapted them to meet the moment.

Some communities, like Camden, New Jersey, had a high percentage of community members living within a 10-minute walk of a park, but many of those spaces were not high quality. Others, like Chattanooga, Tennessee, had a low percentage of access to parks within a 10-minute walk, but the spaces they had were of a higher quality. To address these nuances, each community took an approach that was best for them. El Cajon, California, created El Cajon 2030, the city’s first-ever park master plan, to bring parks and open spaces to a community that is fully built out. In Lewisville, Texas, the park and recreation agency worked to establish a land dedication ordinance for development that more equitably funds park development in a rapidly growing city. Raleigh, North Carolina, used GIS data and community input to develop a park quality assessment tool to determine priorities for its master plan update.

Equity and community

engagement were central to grantees’ park access work. In Anchorage, park and recreation professionals centered immigrant, refugee and Indigenous voices in their engagement process to learn how they could increase access and create culturally relevant and welcoming spaces (tinyurl.com/t4e8j22h). The project team held listening sessions at the Alaska Native Heritage Center to hear the concerns of new Alaskans and Alaska Natives. Through these sessions, the project team learned of barriers, such as the need for seasonappropriate gear and fears of wildlife encounters. Participants expressed the desire for culturally relevant art, more signage, edible and native landscaping, and culturally relevant markets. Further south in arid Southern California, park and recreation professionals in Norwalk, California, went into their master plan process with a vision and expectations of the project. As the team engaged the community, they

Park and recreation professionals have taken the basics of park planning and adapted them to meet the moment.

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Equity and community engagement were central to grantees’ park access work.

learned of deep-rooted barriers to access that were not only physical barriers, but also were grounded in a mistrust of government. This development led the agency to cultivate new partnerships with community-based organizations to build trust and deliver on promises for the community.

In 2018, Denver completed its Neighborhood Equity Index and found that the city’s most vulnerable neighborhoods — which have high numbers of people of color and high-poverty rates — lack access to high-quality parks or, in some cases, any park. To address this injustice, Denver voters passed a 0.25 percent sales tax that provides a dedicated funding stream for park and recreation professionals to improve park quality and acquire land for new parks in park-poor areas. Through this grant, Denver’s park and recreation professionals held public meetings, hired additional staff dedicated to managing parkland acquisition and built out a framework to develop their land acquisition plan. In June 2021, the city completed Denver Parks and Recreation’s Strategic Acquisition Plan to close its 10-minute walk gap. Access to high-quality parks and recreation improves mental and physical health, environmental resilience, safety and social cohesion. Ensuring everyone has access to parks and recreation is part of the answer to addressing the harm and disinvestment done to Black, Indigenous and Latino communities.

Access to Parks and Recreation Is Restorative Justice In Tacoma, the Eastside Community Center represents why access

to parks and recreation is a form of justice. The East Side community of Tacoma had long faced disinvestment. The neighborhood was redlined (tinyurl.com/37tutf33) in the 1930s by the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation because it was a low-income, immigrant community. In the following decades, the neighborhood would see a school, pool and library built and later closed. The community lacked safe gathering spaces. It took a tragic event and a motivated, tenacious mother to change that.

As park and recreation professionals toured the community center in 2019, they heard the powerful story of the impetus for the community center from Shalisa Hayes, mother of Billy Ray Shirley III. In 2011, Shirley, who was 17 years old, went to a party to give someone a ride home when a fight broke out.

He and a friend collected another friend and were leaving when someone came up from behind and shot Shirley in the back, killing him. According to Hayes, Shirley

often would talk about the need for a safe space for kids on the East Side. At her son’s funeral, Hayes announced that she would pursue getting a community center built in their neighborhood. Friends, family and neighbors joined the effort and convinced their elected officials to make Shirley’s dream a reality.

It was a difficult and tumultuous effort. Hayes and community members advocated for years and spent countless hours debating what the space would include, balancing their desired amenities, like a pool, with what they thought would be realistic and affordable.

The determination and courage of a mother shone through when Hayes, in need of additional funding, went to a summit in Tacoma that Governor Jay Inslee was attending and found her moment when he and his staff were getting on an elevator. She gave the governor her elevator pitch and got $2.5 million in his next budget. In 2018, the 55,000-square-foot, $32 million community center opened,

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PHOTO COURTESY OF CAMDEN COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIP, INC.

1 0 - M I N UT E WA L K

Some communities, like Camden, New Jersey, had a high percentage of community members living within a 10-minute walk of a park, but many of those spaces were not high quality.

complete with a climbing wall, zipline, gym, music recording studio, kitchen, café, classrooms and a 318,000-gallon swimming pool — a reflection of the vision of the community.

In hearing this story (tinyurl. com/36a87397), one is inspired yet disheartened. It should not have taken the loss of an innocent, young life to galvanize the resources for a community gathering space, but it did.

Shirley’s story — Hayes’ story — is powerful and was made possible by a visionary son and a passionate and determined mother, but the story of disinvestment in lowincome communities of color; the story of senseless gun violence; the story of a lack of access to safe, culturally-relevant, welcoming park and recreation spaces is not unique to Tacoma. These stories can be told of communities across the United States.

48 Parks & Recreation

A New Phase in the Parks Movement Over the past 150 years, parks and recreation has responded to the needs of communities (tinyurl. com/3zdeej9y) — from the Olmsted parks, built to combat pollution and disease in cities, to parks functioning as service centers for immigrants, to the many roles of parks and recreation centers today. Park and recreation professionals provide meal sites during the summer and after school. They offer places for older adult and youth physical activity programs. They provide spaces for learning, connection to nature and environmental resilience; spaces for healing and memorials; spaces for joy and celebration.

Parks and recreation is essential to the fabric of every community.

Lacking access to parks and recreation is an injustice. To achieve just and fair park access for all people, agencies must acknowledge, harness and celebrate the unique power and resilience that dwell within communities while working to remove the barriers that perpetuate the inequities that exist between them.

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In July 2021, NRPA announced the selection of a new cohort of grantees for the Resilient Park Access grant, taking the work of the 10 Minute Walk to the next level.

These six communities are receiving more than $2.5 million total to take a community-driven, equityfocused, systems-level approach to addressing systemic racism and inequities in park access, environmental resilience and community health. Grantees are using a myriad of strategies, such as promoting community engagement, supporting workforce development, creating culturally relevant spaces for healing, and enshrining community power in plans and policies, to shift power structures in their systems and institutions from a traditional top-down approach to a grassroots, community-driven approach. “We are thrilled to be working in partnership with these park and recreation professional leaders to advance communitycentered local solutions,” says Rachel Banner, director of park access at NRPA. “While this work will take intentionality and time, we are excited to be able to lift up their journey along the way so that park and recreation professionals can work together to create stronger, healthier and more resilient communities through parks.”

This moment in our history requires us to live up to the highest ideals of our profession in creating a multiracial, multicultural democratic society that supports community power in creating equitable park access and quality for all. Communities across the United States are picking up this gauntlet.

How are you and your agency answering the call?

Jared Mummert is Park Access Program Manager at NRPA (jmummert@nrpa.org).

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OPERATIONS ADA Construction: Best Practices and Lessons Learned

By Gary Logue

H

aving worked as the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) coordinator for the Fairfax County Park Authority (FCPA) for the past 19 years, I can attest that one of our biggest challenges in both the indoor and outdoor environments has been the ability to ensure 100 percent compliance with ADA standards. With more than 400 facilities, 24,000 acres of parkland and 1,145,670 customers at last count, here’s what I have found to be best practices.

Standards vs. Guidelines There’s always that project manager who thinks, for example, “We don’t have to follow the trail accessibility guidelines because they are not required.” While there’s an inkling of truth to that statement, remember all guidelines eventually become standards after adoption.

Not only does this mindset save you money in the long run versus having to come back and retrofit for compliance down the road, but also by following the guidelines you are meeting the spirit of the law by ensuring persons with disabilities can participate in your programs and services. In addition, why risk the negative publicity? Use the latest guidelines to level the playing field, which is your ultimate goal!

Planning Identifying all of the applicable ADA standards and guidelines in a renovation or new construction is paramount to getting it right the first time. Dedicate a page or two of your plans to those ADA components and detail those standards to help ensure your contractor and project manager are clear on those expectations.

When making renovations, at 50 Parks & Recreation

a minimum and unless all your ADA obligations are satisfied, you should spend 20 percent of your project budget on accessibility needs. Starting outside in, think logically and prioritize: • Is the accessible parking compliant?

• Is the route to the facility accessible?

• Is the restroom inside compliant?

• Are there both a high and low water fountain?

• Would we be better served by an automatic door opener in the lobby or one for accessing the restroom?

Quality Assurance Both during construction and after, someone should be checking the work for quality assurance. Below are some suggestions for producing a successful project outcome.

• Checklists are excellent tools for guidance and documentation and can be found at the New England ADA Center website (tinyurl.com/53t5xn38).

• For accessible routes, it is critical to communicate with your contractor to ensure your base coat (prior to your concrete/ asphalt finish) will meet expectations for a slope with an absolute maximum base grade of 4.5

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percent and cross slope of 1.5 percent. The standard for assessing accessible routes is to break the route into four-foot sections (if using a four-foot level), then cut the route in half lengthwise and measure each section into a consistent number of rectangular sections, determining both slope and cross slope. Total your readings and then figure the average by dividing the number of readings documented.

• For accessible parking, ensuring a 2 percent slope in all directions is critical for achieving usability. If your parking space is in a gravel parking lot, ensure there is periodic maintenance performed to sweep the gravel off the space. The standard for measuring accessible parking spaces is to break the space into nine squares, again measuring both slope and cross slope for each. To determine compliance, total your slope readings and then divide by 9 to get your overall slope score.

• Ensure your maintenance staff are checking the opening force of your interior doors monthly. Five pounds of pressure or less is critical for ensuring seamless usability.

• Use your resources! The MidAtlantic ADA Information Center has been an invaluable resource over the years (adainfo.org).

The experience here at FCPA has been overwhelmingly positive thanks to staff support and a healthy allocation of resources. While 100 percent compliance is still a ways down the road, we have built a solid foundation for the future.

Gary Logue is ADA Coordinator for Fairfax County Park Authority (gary.logue@fairfaxcounty.gov).

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American Sports Builders Association............................................51 BCI Burke Playgrounds................................................................ 51, C4 Bright Idea Shops, LLC.........................................................................51 Broyhill Company..................................................................................51 Columbia Cascade................................................................................25 Discount Playground Supply.............................................................23 DOGIPOT................................................................................................52 Doty & Sons...........................................................................................52 Easi-Set Buildings.................................................................................53 Ex-Cell Kaiser.........................................................................................52 Greenfields Outdoor Fitness................................................................ 5 Gyms for Dogs......................................................................................53 Kay Park Recreation.............................................................................53 Landscape Structures Inc..................................................................... 3 Most Dependable Fountains............................................................... 7 National Construction Rentals..........................................................54 Nice Rink.................................................................................................54 Percussion Play..................................................................................7, 54 Pilot Rock/RJ Thomas Mfg. Co.........................................................21 Polly Products........................................................................................54 Shade Systems..................................................................................... C2 Spectrum Aquatics...............................................................................55 (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 ©2021 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.

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Publication Title: National Recreation and Park Assoc/Parks & Recreation Publication Number: 422240 Filing Date: September 2021 Issue Frequency: Monthly Number of Issues Published Annually: 12 Annual Subscription Price: $30.00 for members; $36.00 for nonmembers Complete Mailing Address of Known Office of Publication (not printer): National Recreation

and Park Association, 22377 Belmont Ridge Road, Ashburn, VA 20148-4501

Complete Mailing Address of Headquarters or General Business Offices for Publisher (not printer):

National Recreation and Park Association, 22377 Belmont Ridge Road, Ashburn, VA 20148-4501 Full Name and Complete Mailing Address of Publisher, Editor, and Managing Editor: > PUBLISHER—Gina Cohen, National Recreation and Park Association,

22377 Belmont Ridge Road, Ashburn, VA 20148-4501 > EDITOR—Vitisia Paynich, National Recreation and Park Association, 22377 Belmont Ridge Road, Ashburn, VA 20148-4501 Owner: National Recreation and Park Association 22377 Belmont Ridge Road, Ashburn, VA 20148-4501 Known Bondholders, Mortgagees, and Other Security Holders: None Tax Status: The purpose, function, and nonprofit status of this organization and the exempt status for federal income tax purposes has not changed during the preceding 12 months.

Publication Title: Parks & Recreation Issue Date of Circulation Data Below: September 2021

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a. Total Number of Copies (Net press run) (1) Mailed Outside-County Paid Subscriptions Stated on PS Form 3541 (include paid distribution above nominal rate, advertiser’s proof copies, and exchange copies) b. Paid Circula- (2) Mail In-County Paid Subscriptions Stated on PS Form 3541 (include paid distribution above nominal rate, advertistion (By Mail er’s proof copies, and exchange copies) and (3) Paid Distribution Outside the Mail Including Sales outside Through Dealers and Carriers, Street Vendors, Counter the Mail) Sales, and Other Paid Distribution outside USPS® (4) Paid Distribution by Other Classes of Mail Through the USPS (e.g. First-ClassMail®) c. Total Paid Distribution (Sum of 15b (1), (2), (3), and (4))

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No. Copies of Single Issue Published Nearest to Filing Date

11,808 11,096

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d. Free or (1) Free or Nominal Rate Outside-County Copies Nominal included on PS Form 3541 Rate (2) Free or Nominal Rate In-County Copies Included Distribu- on PS Form 3541 tion (By Mail (3) Free or Nominal Rate In-County Copies mailed at other classes through the USPS Leg. First-Class Mail and Outside Included on PS Form 3541 the (4) Free or Nominal Rate Distribution Outside the Mail Mail) (Carriers or other means) e. Total Free or Nominal Rate Distribution (Sum of 15d (1), (2), (3), and (4)) f. Total Distribution (Sum of 15c and 15e) g. Copies not Distributed (See instructions to Publishers #4 (page #3)) h. Total (Sum of 15f and 15g) i. Percent Paid (15c divided by 15f times 100) 16. Electronic Copy Circulation a. Paid Electronic Copies b. Total Paid Print Copies (Line 15c) + Paid Electronic Copies (Line 16a) c. Total Print Distribution (Line 15f) + Paid Electronic Copies (Lines 16a) d. Percent Paid (Both Print & Electronic Copies) (16b divided by 16c x100)

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12,364 93.70%

50,311 61,786

50,311 61,896

67,111

64,675

99.48%

98.76%

I certify that 50% of all my distributed copies (electronic and print) are paid above nominal price.

17.

Publication of Statement Ownership. If the publication is a general publication, publication

of this statement is required. Will be printed in the October 2021 issue of this publication.

18. Signature and Title of Editor, Publisher, Business Manager, or Owner: Vitisia Paynich, Executive Editor, September 2021 I certify that all information furnished on this form is true and complete. I understand that anyone who furnishes false or misleading information on this form or who omits material or information requested on the form may be subject to criminal sanctions (including fines and imprisonment) and/or civil sanctions (including civil penalties).

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Park Bench

PHOTOS COURTESY OF COSUMNES COMMUNITY SERVICES DISTRICT

•

Whatever Floats Your Pumpkin Boat!

Seven-time Regatta Champion Robert Cook sits in his prepared pumpkin before the 2019 Giant Pumpkin Regatta.

Have you ever seen pumpkins used as canoes? Each October at the Elk Grove (California) Giant Pumpkin Festival, gourds weighing at least 500 pounds are hollowed and carved into boats for the Giant Pumpkin Regatta.

For 27 years, the Cosumnes Community Services District has held the Elk Grove Giant Pumpkin Festival during the first weekend in October. The park and recreation department first created the harvest celebration around an international giant pumpkin contest.

The festival grew larger each year, and so did the pumpkins! The most recent festivals have attracted more than 70,000 visitors and numerous one-ton pumpkins. The heaviest pumpkin weighed a whopping 2,138 pounds!

Back in 2006, festival organizers were looking for ways to bring more pumpkin attractions to the growing event. They learned of a pumpkin regatta held in Nova Scotia, Canada, and decided to recreate the event in Elk Grove since the festival takes place around a small lake.

While the three heftiest pumpkins from Saturday’s Giant Pumpkin Weigh-Off remain on display throughout the weekend, the other giant gourds (weighing between 500 to 1,000 pounds) may be entered into the regatta on Sunday. A few loyal contestants even grow pumpkins specifically for the regatta.

Every minute counts as the junior shipwrights craft their vessels, just hours before the event. Pumpkins are buoyant, but it’s impossible to guess which part of the pumpkin will float above the water. So, with the help of a forklift, skippers place their gourd in the water, mark the water line with a permanent marker and then remove the pumpkin from the water and begin preparing it with reciprocating saws, hand saws and shovels. They’ll climb into the carved pumpkin while it is on land to make sure there’s enough room for their legs and torso.

And they’re off! Competitors must paddle across the lake — about the length of a football field — pick up a flag at the dock, and paddle back. The most important rule is they must start and end the race inside their pumpkin — it is more of a balancing act than a speed race.

The giant pumpkin shells are surprisingly seaworthy but difficult to steer. Some pumpkins veer off course and end up soaking their skipper in the lake’s fountain. Some pumpkins tip over and force their skipper to swim back with the boat in tow. There are no guarantees when you’re relying on a gigantic fruit to transport you across a lake — but it is always entertaining.

Thousands of onlookers gather around the shores of the lake to cheer on the contestants. Will they sink or swim? Everyone is eager to see who will paddle in for bragging rights, cash prizes and the title of Pumpkin Regatta Champion. This 14-year tradition in Elk Grove is a must-see!

Learn more at yourcsd.com/GPF and become a friend of the festival on social media at @ElkGroveGPF. – Jenna Brinkman, Public Affairs Manager, Cosumnes Community Services District

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Step Aside Normal, There’s a New Way to Swing!

Swinging on the Brava™ Universal Swing is a whole new experience for all children. Seamless transfer, motion options and room for multiple users means independence, socialization and a play experience like no other.

Isn’t it time to Join Our Movement?

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PARKS & RECREATION OCTOBER 2021 ◆ WELCOME TO PLAY! ◆ WALKING THE AUTISM NATURE TRAIL ◆ THE NEW PARKS MOVEMENT