2023: Our parks on the rise
In May, more than 100 people joined us at the home of our board co-chair Michele Hanss and her husband Bob, as we launched Mass Parks for All (MPA), our rebranded charitable corporation. In doing so, MPA joined Mass Conservation Voters (MCV), our advocacy arm, as part of the only statewide NGO solely focused on supporting our state parks, forests, beaches, trails, pools, fields, and other assets managed by the state Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR).
We were honored that DCR Commissioner Brian Arrigo, who had just been hired, agreed to be our keynote speaker. Since then, we have been nothing but impressed with where he is taking the agency. He has stepped up DCR’s social media presence, and is seemingly everywhere, as he visits facilities and meets with stakeholders from around the state.
Department of Conservation and Recreation Commissioner Brian Arrigo speaks at MPA’s launch event in May 2023.
As a former mayor, Arrigo is well acquainted with the varied duties he has as commissioner. DCR shares many similarities with cities. In addition to caring for our parks, DCR oversees parkways and attendant streetlights, plows snow, removes trash, ensures public safety, and takes on myriad other tasks mayors know how to do.
The MPA launch was three years in the making, an outgrowth of our 2014 rebranding as MCV, which we did because we saw the need for a statewide park-focused organization. Fortunately, David Solomon and Herb Nolan, of the Lawrence & Lillian Solomon Foundation, saw the need for an organization like MPA, and graciously agreed to grant us our first institutional funding.
We are currently seeking our match for part two of this grant, raising $25,000 to receive an additional $25,000, which we must do by Jan. 31st.
Key park legislation leaders lauded
On that beautiful May evening, we also honored state Sen. Jamie Eldridge and state Rep. Ruth Balser for their leadership in their respective chambers in passing the Public Lands Preservation Act, as well as the late Phil Saunders, who toiled in the trenches to get the bill passed for some two decades, only to pass away four months before final passage. However, his daughter, Clean Water Action State Co-Director Elizabeth Saunders, picked up the mantle and helped get this important bill over the finish line.
Signed into law in December 2022, PLPA codified the “no net loss” policy governing the process for repurposing public park land for other use. The law mandates a public process, the identification of nearby compensatory land of equal size and ecological value, an alternatives analysis to make sure no other viable options exist, and a two-thirds vote of the state Legislature for final approval. Prior to passage, the process to repurpose park land was a state policy that could be circumvented, often resulting in the permanent loss of public land. This is particularly problematic in densely populated areas, especially in environmental justice neighborhoods, where parkland is scarce.
Historic New England Summit
In November, I attended Historic New England’s annual Summit, a two-day affair at The Vet in Providence, RI, where I participated in a panel discussion on the importance of public open space. We are grateful to Historic New England President and CEO Vin Cipolla for inviting us to bring our parks for all message to a wider audience.
My co-panelists were landscape architect Louis Fusco, and former Cape Cod National Seashore Superintendent Maria Burks, who facilitated the discussion. We talked about the inherent value public open space brings to our physical and mental well-being and how good park policy and design can inspire people to get more involved in protecting our valuable open spaces. We look forward to a continuing relationship with Haverhill-based Historic New England.
Organized advocates are stronger advocates
Moving on to policy and project work, MPA began the process to help park friends groups and other stakeholders become better advocates for our shared resources by banding together. This began in October of 2022 with a park summit attended by more than 20 organizations. Together, we crafted an open letter to the incoming Healey-Driscoll Administration, the state Legislature, other park stakeholders, and the media.
The summit built upon the Legislature’s request that park advocates, to the extent possible, get on the same page when we approach state government on behalf of our beloved parks. Also a factor was 2021’s report from the Legislative Special Commission on DCR, which noted at the time that Massachusetts was spending less money per capita on public open space than any other state in the nation. More than 50 organizations signed the letter, and the attendant media attention helped us make the case that parks are not just nice to have assets, but need to have assets.
Now we are trying to replicate that success around the state on a regional basis, starting with Greater Boston. We are about to hire a Regional Coordinator to help with the task of unifying friends groups and other stakeholders to be more united and thus more effective park advocates. The plan is to take this model to the other four DCR regions around the state.
Park stewardship moves forward on multiple fronts
This year also saw the DCR Stewardship Council continue to move along the continuum started when Chairman Jack Buckley took the helm and put the Council on a more proactive stance. A case in point, Buckley, who retired from a long career with the state Division of Fisheries & Wildlife, thought it would be good idea to get involved in the budget process before the governor’s budget comes out instead of simply reacting to whatever number emerges in what is commonly called House.1. As a result, the Council now makes a DCR budget recommendation to the Executive Office of Administration and Finance as its analysts assemble the budget. Buckley also held, for the second time, a well-attended public hearing on the coming fiscal year’s budget that informed the Council’s ask for DCR funding, as well as a public meeting soliciting input for the council’s updated Strategic Oversight Plan.
The agency itself is moving forward with its effort to be more transparent in its day-to-day activities, a key recommendation from the Special Legislative Commission and the Stewardship Council, with the development of a capital spending dashboard that will detail capital projects around the state on a clickable map. We wrote about this last month, and welcome DCR’s efforts.
Last but certainly not least, the Healey-Driscoll Administration and the state Legislature gave DCR the largest operational budget increase ever when the governor signed the FY2024 budget. DCR received $20.6 million for the Parks and Recreation Operations account (2810-0100), more than twice the increase the agency received for FY2023. An Administration decision to move about $14 million in existing salaries that had been paid for out of capital accounts over to the operations account served to temper that increase. But it also allowed DCR to recover from a generally frowned upon, but at the time necessary, practice DCR adopted following the Great Recession, when the agency lost a third of its budget and 300 positions. DCR had to protect mission critical positions, and paying for them out of capital funds was the only path forward at the time. The FY2024 budget cycle was the first time in more than a decade that DCR could make that move and not cripple the operations account. As candidates, Gov. Healey and Lt. Gov. Driscoll told park advocates they would have DCR’s back, and they did.
In memoriam
Finally, this year marked the passing of our great friend and advisor, Fran Gershwin. Fran was a supporter and advisor of Mass Conservation Voters and a behind-the-scenes force in creating Mass Parks for All. She advised, prodded, questioned, and cajoled us to define and shape our purpose. She served on our Advisory Council, and her debilitating stroke in 2022 and death in 2023 were a terrible blow to all of us.
A lawyer by trade, her passion was restoring an ignored part of the Emerald Necklace – the Muddy River. For more than twenty years, Fran worked to secure the funding and oversee its restoration as Chair of the Muddy River Maintenance and Management Oversight Committee (MMOC).
Frederick Law Olmsted, the creator of the Emerald Necklace, designed and built this series of connected parks for the enjoyment of all, and that, beneath its beauty, serves as flood protection for the people living in the Fenway neighborhood of Boston and bordering Brookline. Fran worked to restore and maintain the Olmsted legacy, and this parkland is a model for other Bay State communities as we struggle with the severe impacts of climate change.
The Muddy River Restoration is a historic achievement. But more important is the conservation ethic behind it, which Fran personified, and which she urged during the creation of Mass Parks for All - a quiet persistence that our existing parklands require public oversight and must be staffed, maintained, safe, and free for everyone to enjoy. Ultimately, continuing her legacy is our mission at Mass Parks for All, and our solemn promise to Fran.
Doug Pizzi is executive director of Mass Parks for All