A final draft master plan for the Astoria Parks and Recreation Department calls for a systemwide maintenance plan, reflecting public disappointment with conditions and upkeep at sites under the department’s care.
“Many comments collected during surveys and public meetings identified maintenance of existing park and facilities as a top priority, and that acceptable maintenance levels should be achieved before planning for any new development,” the master plan reads.
The citizen advisory committee that oversaw the planning process voted Thursday to recommend the final draft to the City Council, which made the creation of a parks’ master plan a goal for the current fiscal year.
“I think we have packaged something that gives us a foundation out which to pull some thinking to some of the major issues that the city faces and that we, as citizens, are constantly going before the government (about) and saying, ‘We’re frustrated by this,’” said Jan Nybakke, a committee volunteer, adding that one of the virtues of the plan is that it contains steps to become “unfrustrated” by addressing parks-related issues.
The document — which is posted on the department website and lays out the department’s vision, objectives and priorities for the next decade — incorporates feedback gathered from several public meetings, stakeholder focus groups and an online survey.
The draft will come before the Parks Advisory Board and the Planning Commission before it reaches the City Council, which will vote next month on whether to incorporate the master plan into the city’s comprehensive plan.
Time and money
The parks department has long argued that it doesn’t have enough revenue and full-time staff members to adequately maintain the roughly 300 acres of land, nine miles of trails and 12 indoor facilities under its management.
“As the parks system has grown, staff positions across all divisions of the department have been reduced or eliminated to compensate for rising operational costs, resulting in fewer employees responsible for a greater amount of work,” the master plan says.
For example, recent visitors to Ocean View Cemetery — an Astoria Parks-run cemetery in Warrenton — were outraged by the unmowed grass and unpulled weeds they discovered there on Mother’s Day. Parks Director Angela Cosby said the department should have spruced up the site but had been focused on site safety throughout the park system rather than aesthetic upkeep.
“That’s, unfortunately, the reality for every one of our sites,” Cosby said.
The result is that employees can only perform bare-minimum services at each site.
“We’re basically able to mow and pick up garbage at all of our sites and not much more,” Cosby said.
Plans within plans
Concerns that Astoria Parks and Recreation resources are spread too thin inform a great deal of the master plan, which says the department must tap more funding sources to hire a sufficient number employees at competitive wages.
One of the key findings from the master planning process is that “(m)ajor cuts to staffing in 2011, combined with a rapidly growing inventory of facilities and programs, high expectations from the community and decreasing general fund tax support, have contributed to a significant maintenance deficit and high staff turnover.”
The department may look to increase revenue by regularly adjusting program and user fees to keep up with changes in operation and maintenance costs, or by creating a parks and recreation taxing district.
Meanwhile, to address basic maintenance issues, the master plan recommends increasing community stewardship of parks by establishing “Friends of the Parks” and “Adopt-A-Park” programs; keeping an online database of maintenance projects that volunteers can complete; ensuring partner organizations using department sites are also sharing maintenance responsibilities; and contracting for services that cannot reasonably be provided by department staff.
Ideally, the department will also have funding to:
- create a capital improvement plan
- develop a separate master plan for the 100-acre Ocean View Cemetery
- set up an annual communications and marketing plan for the department
- install additional lighting and restrooms along the Astoria Riverwalk
- install a permanent restroom at Fred Lindstrom Park
- add, remove, replace or repair playground equipment
- improve signage throughout the park system
Selling parks?
A line on page 55 caught the eye of George “Mick” Hague, a local who attended Thursday’s committee meeting.
Under a section concerning where the department should be putting its energy, one recommended action reads: “Evaluate reconfiguration or sale, of surplus or underutilized facilities or land, to allow more resources to be allocated to the core (services).”
Hague pointed out that residents indicated, by and large, that they would rather see their underused parks become green spaces than sold for residential or commercial purposes if the parks department can’t maintain them.
“There’s nothing that the city or the parks can point to that says the citizenry is in favor of selling,” he said. Cosby said Hague is correct.
Hague added that he fears future city councilors and city staff will use the line as “cover” for selling off parks.
Scott Tucker, a committee member and superintendent of Lewis and Clark National Historical Park, said most of the deeds for city parks preclude selling them. Some deeds, however, may allow for land to be sold, and Cosby said the department is requesting legal guidance to identify them.
Tucker suggested amending the master plan in the future to enumerate the parks that could be put up for sale, the ones without such deed restrictions. But City Councilor Zetty Nemlowill, a committee member, said the master plan need not be so specific.
“In order to improve services, we need to give something up; that’s the bottom line,” Nemlowill said. “It would be great to have more money for parks but, going through two budget committee cycles now, I don’t see where that is ever going to come (from).”
She added that letting the underused parks become green space is a possibility.
Brooke Stanley, a committee member and coordinator at the North Coast Watershed Association, said she supports selling some parks — especially the underused parks that are full of invasive species and don’t provide an ecological benefit — because she would rather the city have fewer sites that are well-maintained than too many sites that aren’t. This is a view shared by many people in the community, Cosby said.
Ian Sisson, the planner and project manager, said the section Hague objected to will be clarified to read that the master plan is not recommending selling or otherwise repurposing the majority of parks but the underused parks in areas with an abundance of parks.
He reminded the group that, if the city considers selling parkland, the decision will be part of a public process.
Originally Published in The Daily Astorian
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Astoria, Oregon 97103
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