park and recreation month July is Park and Recreation Month and a time to celebrate and appreciate all the programs offered and maintained by the employees at your local parks

July is Park and Recreation Month and a great time to salute the people who work hard at your local, state and national parks all year long to create appealing spaces and programs for the public.

According to a recent study by the National Recreation and Parks Association, park workers cover a lot of ground. Literally.

The number of programs offered by local parks and their responsibilities might surprise the average citizen. It should certainly impress them.

The study reports on data obtained from 1,069 park and recreation agencies across the US from 2015 to 2017.

Survey reveals typical workload of parks and rec departments

Here is an overview of what parks and recreation department activities:

  • 84% of parks and recreation departments offer summer camps

  • 79% offer programs for seniors

  • 63% offer programs for teens

  • 62% offer programs for people with disabilities

  • 55% offer after-school care

  • 92% manage playgrounds

  • 83% manage basketball courts

  • 77% manage tennis courts

  • 75% manage baseball fields for youth teams

  • 66% manage baseball fields for adult leagues

  • 63% manage rectangular fields for soccer, flag-football, etc.

  • 55% manage dog parks

  • 52% manage outdoor swimming pools

  • 57% manage recreation centers

  • 55% manage gymnasiums

  • 54% manage community centers

  • 41% manage senior centers

  • 86% offer team sports

  • 84% offer themed special events

  • 81% offer social recreation events

  • 78% offer health and wellness education and fitness classes

  • The typical parks department will engage citizens 200,000 times per year (an engagement means any use of facilities such as visiting a park, playing in a softball game, attending a concent, etc.)

  • In large cities with a population of 250,000 or more, those engagements amount to 2.3 million times per year

  • In big metropolises such as New York City, park personnel interact with 4.8 million people every year

park and recreation month

Personnel and budgets to make it all happen

That's a lot of acreage, programs, special events and facilities to cover.

How do parks and recreation department do it?

  • a typical parks and rec department has 7.9 full-time employees per 10,000 residents

  • the average staff is about 36 full-time employees

  • the typical parks department has an annual expenditure of $3.3 million. That's a large annual budget to manage.

  • more than 2,500 parks departments have a median budget of $7 million. That's a huge annual budget to manage.

  • 43% of that budget on average goes to managing and maintaining parks

  • 40% typically goes to recreation programs

Bottom line: when residents go to their parks to watch fireworks on the Fourth of July, play a softball game, paint in a senior center, swim in the municipal pool or enjoy a meal on a picnic table, there are parks and recreation personnel involved.

Every day of the year. Year after year. Morning to night.

That's an enormous amount of grass that has to be mowed, facilities to be cleaned and maintained, pools to be vacuumed, and park benches to fix or replace.

This Park and Recreation Month, when you visit your local park, take a moment to appreciate all the effort that goes into keeping all these fields, centers, gyms, pools, special events and facilities running. That's during the heat of summer and the cold days of winter.

As you can see, park employees are some very busy folks. And they do all of this for you.

Note: If you want a FREE poster to commemorate Park and Recreation Month, click here.

park and recreation month poster Free Park and Recreation month poster from NRPA

Source: 2018 NRPA Agency Performance Review Key Findings