ASTORIA PARKS & RECREATION Comprehensive Master Plan 2016 - 2026 Adopted July 18, 2016 by Ordinance 16-04 Acknowledgments Parks & Recreation Staff City Council Angela Cosby.......... Director Arline LaMear.......... Mayor Jonah Dart-Mclean... Maintenance Supervisor Zetty Nemlowill....... Ward 1 Randy Bohrer........... Grounds Coordinator Drew Herzig............ Ward 2 Mark Montgomery... Facilities Coordinator Cindy Price............. Ward 3 Terra Patterson........ Recreation Coordinator Russ Warr................ Ward 4 Erin Reding............. Recreation Coordinator Parks Advisory Board City Staff Norma Hernandez... Chair Brett Estes............... City Manager Tammy Loughran..... Vice Chair Kevin Cronin........... Community Josey Ballenger Development Director Aaron Crockett Rosemary Johnson... Special Projects Planner Andrew Fick John Goodenberger Historic Buildings Eric Halverson Consultant Jim Holen Howard Rub Citizen Advisory Committee Jessica Schleif Michelle Bisek......... Astoria Parks, Recreation, and Community Foundation Community Members Melissa Gardner...... Clatsop Community Kenny Hageman...... Lower Columbia Youth College Drafting and Baseball Historic Preservation Jim Holen................. Parks Advisory Board Program Craig Hoppes.......... Astoria School District Workshop attendees, survey respondents, Zetty Nemlowill....... Astoria City Council focus group participants, and volunteers. Jan Nybakke............ Volunteer Kassia Nye............... MOMS Club RARE AmeriCorps Ed Overbay............. Former Parks Advisory Ian Sisson................ Planner, Project Manager Board Member Megan Smith........... Program Director Brooke Stanley......... North Coast Watershed Association Titus Tomlinson....... Program Coordinator Dulcye Taylor.......... Astoria Downtown Historic District Association Scott Tucker............. National Parks Service Patrick Wingard...... Oregon Department of University of Oregon Land Conservation and Resource Assistance for Rural Environments Development (RARE) AmeriCorps Program Executive Summary The 2016 Astoria Parks and Recreation Comprehensive Master Plan is the first known parks and recreation plan for the City of Astoria. The process involved substantial community input to evaluate current facilities and services, and create a vision and strategy for the future of the Astoria Parks and Recreation Department. This document is intended to be used and updated regularly, and to serve as the foundational guide for decision-making bodies, including Department staff, the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board, and Astoria City Council. The Plan’s first three sections give an overview of the planning process, profile of the community, and state of the Department. Section 1 describes the planning process, methods used, objectives, sources of input, and related planning documents. Section 2 provides an overview of the City of Astoria’s population and economic demographics and trends, public health issues, zoning relative to parkland, and transportation network relative to parkland, to provide context for the Plan. Section 3, State of the Department, outlines the Astoria Parks and Recreation Department’s organization, staffing, and budget relative to its inventory of programs and services, parkland, trails, indoor facilities, and other properties it manages. The Plan’s next two sections evaluate the Astoria Parks and Recreation Department’s level of service and identify its needs. Section 4 measures Astoria’s facilities and services against recommendations established by the State of Oregon such as parkland per capita, and provides information regarding recreation programs typically offered by municipal parks and recreation departments. Section 5 extends the comparison analysis to more specific planning issues in peer communities, as well as state and nation-wide. Community input from over 1,200 users of Astoria Parks and Recreation’s facilities and services is also summarized in Section 5. The final sections of the Astoria Parks and Recreation Comprehensive Master Plan outline recommended actions and a strategy for funding and implementation of the plan. Section 6 describes recommendations for maintenance, planning, communications and marketing, partnerships, operations, and capital projects. Each recommendation includes background and reference information that ties back to previous sections. Section 7, the Implementation Strategy, organizes the recommendations into a matrix that includes estimated costs, target completion dates, and responsible parties. Key findings: • Astorians rate parks and recreation facilities as extremely important to their quality of life. • Despite a cost recovery rate of nearly double the national average, and a top-quartile standing for revenue generated per capita, the Department struggles to achieve the most basic level of maintenance and safety for its facilities, and personnel to support its programs. • Major 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. • Astoria’s parks system includes nearly double the amount of parkland per capita than peer communities nation-wide, yet operates with 25% fewer full time employees and spends 23% less per acre of parkland. • The community prioritizes proper maintenance levels of the Department’s existing facilities over new development. • The highest priority recommendations of this plan, as identified by the Master Plan Citizen Advisory Committee, Parks Advisory Board, and the community, include: increasing staff capacity to meet level of service expectations, increasing revenues to meet level of service expectations, developing a system-wide maintenance plan, developing and connecting the trail system, and improving communications and marketing. • Many recommendations outlined in the plan will not be possible to implement without additional staff capacity and reliable funding sources. The Astoria Parks and Recreation Department looks forward to improving Astoria’s parks and recreation system through the recommendations of this plan, and would like to thank the community it serves for an incredible level of engagement throughout the process, the Citizen Advisory Committee for its thoughtful guidance and attention to detail, the Parks Advisory Board for their support and input, and RARE participant Ian Sisson for facilitating the planning process and producing this document. Table of Contents 1. Introduction 1.1 Summary 2 1.2 Purpose 2 1.3 Sources of Input 3 1.4 Related Plans 4 2. Community Profile 2.1 Population, Growth Rate, and Projections 8 2.2 Economic Indicators 8 2.3 Race, Origin, and Language 9 2.4 Public Health and Related Factors 9 Map: City of Astoria Zoning 10 Map: Astoria’s Transportation Network 12 3. State of the Department 3.1 Organization, Staffing, and Funding 16 3.2 Programs and Services Inventory 20 3.3 Parkland Managed by Astoria Parks and Recreation 24 3.4 Additional Land Managed by Astoria Parks and Recreation 25 3.5 Indoor Facilities Managed by Astoria Parks and Recreation 25 3.6 Trails Managed by Astoria Parks and Recreation 25 Map: City of Astoria Parks, Trails, and Facilities 26 4. Level of Service 4.1 Introduction 30 4.2 Parkland: Level of Service 34 4.3 Trails: Level of Service 35 4.4 Park Amenities: Level of Service 35 4.5 Additional Facilities Within 5 Miles of Astoria 35 4.6 Recreation Level of Service 36 5. Needs Assessment 5.1 Community Input 40 5.2 National, State, and Local Trends 44 5.3 Peer Community Analysis 48 6. Recommendations 6.1 Introduction 54 6.2 Maintenance 54 6.3 Planning 55 6.4 Communications and Marketing 57 6.5 Partnerships 58 6.6 Operations 59 6.7 Capital Projects 60 7. Implementation and Funding Strategy 7.1 Introduction 65 Table: Implementation and Funding Strategy 66 Appendix: A.1 Inventory and Existing Conditions Report: Parks, Facilities, and Trails A.2 Community Input Results A.3 Historical Report: Parks, Facilities, and Trails Adopted July 18, 2016 by Ordinance 16-04 1. Introduction 1.1 Summary 1.2 Purpose 1.3 Sources of Input 1.4 Related Plans 1 1.1 Summary 1.2 Purpose The creation of a City of Astoria Parks & The Plan establishes a short and long-term Recreation Comprehensive Master Plan (the vision, and priorities for the Department “Plan”) was adopted as a City Council Goal by assessing the need for improvements, for the 2015-16 fiscal year. changes, and future development. The scope The need for a system-wide parks and of the Plan includes all parks, trails, facilities recreation master plan was identified as a and programs managed by the Astoria priority by the City Council and Parks & Parks and Recreation Department, as well as Recreation Department (the “Department”) maintenance and operations. staff. The Department has not had a master The use of, and regular updates to this Parks plan in place that provides guidance and and Recreation Comprehensive Master Plan policy direction in the past. will allow the Department and City to make The Plan assesses the current inventory decisions based on a clear, community-shared and conditions of parkland and facilities, vision for the Department, ensuring facilities measures the level of service provided by and services meet the needs and interests of the Department, identifies community needs, the community throughout time and changes and establishes a set of recommendations on in leadership. This plan will also