Last month in this space I exhorted park and recreation administrators to view themselves as integral players in the betterment of the health and well being of their communities. Rather than assessing their value in a checklist fashion of services provided and acres of land managed, a fundamental shift of perspective is needed. Agencies can achieve more by recognizing and communicating how well their efforts mesh with their communities. Our cover story this month offers a number of examples of how municipalities small and large successfully leveraged their conservation efforts into positions of community leadership.

As Nette Compton, NYC Parks director of green infrastructure told Parks & Recreation, two key lessons emerged from their efforts to implement a green infrastructure:
“Anything new, people are going to be skeptical of, even if the old system of the combined sewer isn’t working very well,” Compton says. “They’re very hesitant to buy into anything new wholesale and so I think the power of demonstration projects is huge. I’m seeing city after city not being satisfied with the fact that other cities are doing it and they need to try it themselves and work it out themselves to make people comfortable with it. The demonstration approach really helps get more people on board.
“The multi-agency approach is also incredibly helpful….the fact that it’s citywide and it’s incorporating all these different agencies gets everyone at the table together working together, working out kinks of how this works to accomplish green infrastructure,” she adds. “You build allies and you learn what people’s concerns are and figure out how to address them. As you’re moving forward past the demonstration phase, it’s something that everyone can get behind.”

Such thinking—reaching out to fellow agencies and private partners—has become the wave of the future. As our cover story demonstrates, it works in conservation, and we believe it will work just as ably in many other areas, from public health to public safety.

This is not to say that pursuing every avenue of opportunity will be easy. In a second feature this month we explore one of the hotter buttons in parks and recreation, the outsourcing of park management to private vendors. “Public? Private? Partnership?” doesn’t draw any conclusions other than the usual need for open minds. You’ll find the topic rife with philosophical and practical considerations, and this pertains to just one business model for operating parks. In future issues of Parks & Recreation we will be exploring other funding models as they emerge. As always, we appreciate and value your feedback and suggestions.