I'm all for the involvement of private citizens in the stewardship of neighborhood parks. A park with an active "friends" group is a park that is safer and cleaner than a park in which neighbors do not take an active stewardship role. A fantastic local example is the Foss Park Neighborhood Association (FPNA), which has been actively working with both City and State representatives to improve (dog-friendly) Saxton J. Foss Park on Broadway and McGrath Highway. FPNA was featured last month in an article in the Somerville Journal, "Foss Park gaining popularity."
[T]he group has drawn the support of State Rep. Carl Sciortino, D-Somerville, and of the staff of State Sen. Charlie Shannon, D-Winchester, who died in April, in getting the DCR to finally face Foss Park problems. More recently, State Sen. Jarrett Barrios, D-Cambridge, has also joined forces with the neighbors. . . .
The neighborhood association met last week with Patrick Flynn, director of Urban Parks and Recreation for the DCR, to share 24 issues they would like the state to address. . . .
Bill Roche, the Ward 1 alderman, said the neighborhood association is doing great work and should expect to see a safer, more beautiful space over time.
Another option for Friends groups frustrated by a lack of public resources and governmental support is to assume responsibility for neighborhood parks. The Boston Globe ran an article on June 17, "Neighbors go green, raising cash for parks," about parks friends groups in Boston, among them the Friends of Hayes Park:
Joe Park and his wife formed the Friends of Hayes Park, whose members devote 1,400 hours a year to mowing lawns, tending roses, and maintaining playground equipment by agreement with the city. . . .
[T]he Friends of Hayes Park raise $15,000 to $25,000 annually through fund-raisers and donations. They squirrel away whatever they can for an endowment fund.
"The theory was that one day, I would be able to retire from this fund-raising business and that the interest that we generated from these fund-raisers would in essence pay for the maintenance of the park," he said. "Well, that hasn't happened yet. What we're finding is obviously, as we get older, more things can go wrong, [or] just have to be maintained."
Both the Foss Park Neighborhood Association in Somerville and the Friends of Hayes Park in Boston are demonstrating great civic responsibility, but, as every good civics student knows, responsibilities do not guarantee rights. There is a reason that the government is responsible for the open spaces which are the citizens' right. Even communities that do not have private resources to retain a gardener for their neighborhood parks have a right to safe and well-maintained open spaces. I am deeply concerned about the attitude of Boston Mayor Thomas Menino that neighborhood organizations should take an increasing role in maintaining parks. It is reckless for the government to delegate back to the public the very responsibilities for which governments were created in the first place.
Foss Park gaining popularity
By Erin Dower / Journal Staff
Thursday, June 2, 2005
When Peter Ungar moved to his home across from Foss Park in 2000, he avoided walking through the park even during the day, he said.
"There was just a feeling about it," he said. "I couldn't even put my finger on what was happening there. You wouldn't want to."
Foss Park has been the site of many crimes over the years, including the rape of two deaf girls in 2002 and other alleged MS-13 gang activity.
Now, the park is beginning to thrive, he said. It is host to games and activities all the time because the park has three baseball fields, two soccer fields, two playgrounds, a pool and tennis and basketball courts.
However, Ungar still won't walk through the park at night, he said.
Ungar, who lives on Fellsway West, is the chairman of the Foss Park Neighborhood Association. The group has about 12 members who are working with officials to spruce up the state-owned park and hold those who use it to a high standard.
"We can easily say that thousands of people use Foss Park," Ungar said. "What we're trying to do is to get people's pride and respect for the park, to kind of raise the bar there."
At 14.6 acres, the park is the largest open space in the city. It is owned by the state Department of Conservation and Recreation, which has slacked on trash pickup, mowing and other duties for years, some neighbors say.
The neighborhood association has the motto of "Crime prevention through park restoration" and believe Foss Park can become safer and look as "pristine" as other state-owned urban parks, such as Pope John Paul Park in Dorchester, Ungar said.
Ungar said the group has drawn the support of State Rep. Carl Sciortino, D-Somerville, and of the staff of State Sen. Charlie Shannon, D-Winchester, who died in April, in getting the DCR to finally face Foss Park problems. More recently, State Sen. Jarrett Barrios, D-Cambridge, has also joined forces with the neighbors, Ungar said.
Sean Fitzgerald, Shannon's chief of staff, said legislative aide Adam Knight has particularly taken on the Foss Park issues. The late state senator's team has no legislative voting power but will continue to work on constituent concerns, Fitgerald said.
Shannon "wanted to advance that cause," Fitzgerald said of Foss Park. "I know he would want us to continue working on it."
The neighborhood association met last week with Patrick Flynn, director of Urban Parks and Recreation for the DCR, to share 24 issues they would like the state to address. The group is calling for the state to post signs banning littering, household waste dumping and leaving dog messes, and to keep better trash pickup and landscaping schedules.
The neighbors are also asking the state to step up law enforcement against graffiti and gang activity. Flynn seemed very receptive, Ungar said.
Bill Roche, the Ward 1 alderman, said the neighborhood association is doing great work and should expect to see a safer, more beautiful space over time.
"They're keeping pressure on state officials to keep the park clean, keep a police presence down there, keep the grass cut," he said. "Overall, it definitely will improve the quality of life."
Neighbors go green, raising cash for parks
As city's contribution drops, maintenance falls to groups
By Lisa Wangsness, Globe Staff | June 17, 2005
Tom Boyden was dismayed by the scraggly park across the street from his house when he moved to the South End a few years ago. Its wrought iron fence had deteriorated, the weed-ridden groundcover hid "a multitude of sins" -- empty beer bottles, stolen wallets, and credit cards. So Boyden and some neighbors decided to raise $200,000 to fix it up.
"I realized it was something the parks department just didn't have the money to do," he said. "We would have to look within the community, to volunteers, neighborhood associations, and foundations."
Twenty years after the city made a massive investment to clean up its badly neglected parks, an increasing share of the responsibility for maintaining the city's green spaces is shifting from public to private hands, park advocates say. As anemic budgets have depleted the parks department's maintenance staff, Park Partners groups are proliferating around the city, and neighbors are doing everything from weeding to raking to watering to picking up trash to raising thousands of dollars to pay for new plants and equipment.
While most agree the community should help care for the parks, some worry that the city is too willing to rely heavily on private groups to handle routine parks maintenance.
"What you see is this persistent decline, and at the same time, parks are more and more important to people," said Patrice Todisco, executive director of the Esplanade Association and former director of the Boston GreenSpace Alliance. "So that's why you'll see more and more friends groups stepping up to the plate to fill in the gaps. Which isn't necessarily the best solution, because parks are public infrastructure. You don't want to see private dollars replacing public dollars."
Mayor Thomas M. Menino said that with shrinking budgets, the city is left with little choice but to rely on neighborhood organizations. They should take an increasing role in maintaining them, he said.
"With the Park Partners, with the ownership of the community, sometimes those parks are maintained and protected much better than if just the city had the responsibility for them," he said.
City parks were among the beneficiaries of a surging economy during much of the past decade, getting $75 million in improvements, such as new playing fields and playground equipment in the last seven years alone, according to city officials. But since 2002, with hits to Boston's budget, the parks maintenance staff has declined from 173 to 152. A parks budget that had increased by a third between 1999 and 2003, was slashed 9 percent the following year.
When Menino announced this year he would give away $250,000 in money left over from the Democratic National Convention for small grants to parks groups this year, 169 applications requesting $475,000 arrived in a matter of weeks.
"That just reflects the fact that there is such an unmet need for capital repairs," said Betsy Johnson, a board member of the Boston GreenSpace Alliance.
Johnson said that even if public funds are short, Menino should use the power of the bully pulpit to solicit large contributions from big donors.
"When he wanted to make sure he defeated the elected school committee, he had no trouble raising over $100,000. When he wanted to have the DNC here, he had no trouble raising from the private sector the $1 million he's now giving away."
Johnson, Boyden, and other park advocates praised the parks department, and its commissioner, Antonia Pollak, for regularly meeting with park groups, helping them apply for grants and responding to their concerns as quickly as they could.
According to department projections, 75 percent of maintenance requests will be completed on schedule this year, compared with 63 percent two years ago.
Still, some neighbors say they increasingly rely on one another to keep their parks clean.
"I feel like every year we seem to take on a little bit more and a little bit more," said Sherwood Hughes, who heads the Blackstone-Franklin Square Neighborhood Association in the South End.
Joe Park and his wife formed the Friends of Hayes Park, whose members devote 1,400 hours a year to mowing lawns, tending roses, and maintaining playground equipment by agreement with the city.
Park, who is retired, even takes out the trash. He is proud of his work and does it cheerfully, but he also realizes what would happen if the group did not exist.
"The park would go to hell in a hand basket, unless someone else took it over," Park said.
The city used to give the Friends of Hayes Park $400 a year to help maintain the park, he said. That amount was cut in half in the late 1990s. A few years ago, the city's contribution stopped coming altogether.
Meanwhile, the Friends of Hayes Park raise $15,000 to $25,000 annually through fund-raisers and donations. They squirrel away whatever they can for an endowment fund.
"The theory was that one day, I would be able to retire from this fund-raising business and that the interest that we generated from these fund-raisers would in essence pay for the maintenance of the park," he said. "Well, that hasn't happened yet. What we're finding is obviously, as we get older, more things can go wrong, [or] just have to be maintained."
In Franklin Park in Roxbury, the Franklin Park Coalition recruits at least 500 volunteers a year to help with park maintenance, said Christine Poff, its executive director.
But she said that while the city regularly mows the grass and empties the trash cans, the coalition is still struggling to handle the larger task of caring for the forest.
"It can't all be done by volunteers," she said. "We don't have a water truck, and we can't drive one. We can't use heavy power equipment. Last year our teenagers moved piles of woodchips that had been sitting there for years -- it took them three six-hour days, with 10 to 12 kids. With equipment, you could come in and do it in an hour, and that's a huge difference. We've experienced the limits of manual labor."
Lisa Wangsness can be reached at lwangsness at globe.com.
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