SEATTLE PARKS FOUNDATION Connections FALL 2014 South Park Residents Step Up for a Healthier Future Earlier this summer, three generations of a South Park family took an evening stroll around the neighborhood they’ve called home for 20 years. It was the first time that grandmother, mother, and daughter had ever explored the area. “I’ve driven down here, but I’ve never actually walked down here,” said Jennifer Marroquin, 27, as she walked along 8th Avenue South. Daughter Khalia half-ran, half-skipped several yards in front of her. “Even on a nice day, I don’t really go out,” Marroquin explained. On this evening, it was hot enough to melt a Full Tilt ice-cream bar within min- utes of it being unwrapped. Said her mother Lupe Toca, walking alongside her: “My priority is having a place where I can take my grandkids.” What Toca wishes for is an outdoor space that is attractive to children and, above all, safe. What brought them out on this June evening was a neighborhood walking tour and gathering at Paulina Lopez and her son Nicolas Duwamish Waterway Park to celebrate the completion of the South Park Green Space Vision enjoy their time at the Duwamish River Festival. Plan, a citizen-led effort to revitalize the neighborhood, including the heavily polluted western shore of the Duwamish River. To be sure, the neighborhood has a community center and five parks, including a skate park. It’s also home to Marra Farm, one of two public working farms in Seattle (the other is Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands). But the entire community, including riverfront sites so pol- luted they were declared federal Superfund sites, suffers from serious environmental problems. A 2013 Duwamish Valley Cumulative Health Impacts Analysis found that the riverside com- munities of South Park and nearby Georgetown are exposed to more air pollution and contami- nated waste than wealthier neighborhoods to the north. South Park has less tree canopy and less open green space per resident than the city average, and life expectancy is also lower—13 years lower than in Laurelhurst, for example. continued next pages South Park Residents Step Up for a Healthier Future (from front page) “We need healthy spaces,” says Paulina Lopez, a South Park resident who works for the Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition/Technical Advisory Group. Lopez was one of 20 people who contributed to the Health Impacts Analysis, which was conducted by researchers at the University of Washington, Just Health Action and the Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition/ Technical Advisory Group. The analysis included an assessment of opportunities for South Park after the federal govern- ment decides how it will clean up the Superfund site. Residents have also been brainstorming, coming up with their own ideas for how to improve their surroundings. Lopez was one of dozens of residents, neighborhood activists, and com- munity supporters who gathered at Duwamish Waterway Park to cel- ebrate the completion of the South Park Green Space Vision Plan. There was food: chicken and cheese tamales. There were crafts: plastic leis and pipe cleaners. But above all, there was a desire to take ownership of the neighborhood and see the possibilities. Lopez sees huge potential for the park. “This is a beautiful space where we can gather,” she says, “but it can be improved to better meet our needs.” Lopez moved to the neighborhood from Miami 10 years ago, attracted by South Park’s large Latino population and wanting a place to raise a family with her husband. She was born and raised in Ecuador, where she studied human rights issues and worked with indigenous people. She assumed that coming to the United States would take her away from her line of work. “When you’re in Ecuador, you don’t think about the disparities that are here,” she said of the United States. But then reality hit: “Oh my gosh, there’s a lot to do.” Lopez regards herself as more of an advocate than an activist. She served as a Spanish-language interpreter for her neighbors after a fatal shooting in the neighborhood and then pushed the city to improve public safety. Years later, she advocated for the reopening of the South Park Bridge. To ensure that local residents could stay informed about the cleanup of A boy plays at Riverside Drive the Duwamish River, she pushed to have the Environmental Protection Agency hold a public Park, one of the only access meeting in Spanish—its first ever in the United States. points to the Duwamish River. Photo: Charlie Montes To collect input from locals about what an ideal South Park would look like, Lopez avoided surveys. “People are really tired of surveys!” she says. She suggested mapping exercises, asking people to point out the places they enjoyed as well as those they wanted to see improved. “People got excited,” she says. “We learned how people wanted more parks and more trees. The youth said there weren’t a whole lot of things to do. People liked Duwamish Waterway Park, but they wanted more play equipment, like a rope-climbing thing.” Many neighbors—particularly Vietnamese residents who frequent Marra Farm—called for more walking trails. The June community event highlighted the possibilities for South Park: connected riverfront public spaces, small pocket parks, existing stairways reinvented as pathways with Mount Rainier views. Many of those who attended felt that they were seeing their surroundings in a new way. “This neighborhood feels like it’s on a good upswing,” said Kyla Sweet, a school librarian who moved to South Park two years ago with her husband, Sergio Chavez. “You see older teens just sitting on a corner with nothing for them to do,” said Jennifer Marroquin, who was on the walking tour, taking in her neighborhood in a new way for the first time. Marroquin, who’d like nothing more than to be able to exercise in South Park, would love a track. “I just want some place to run.” THOUGHTS FROM A HEALTH EXPERT Dr. Pooja Tandon is a pediatrician and researcher at Seattle Why is the effort to Children’s Hospital who studies and promotes behaviors, create improved and programs, and policies that increase physical activity in connected parks, children, particularly those in disadvantaged communities. trails, and green We spoke with Dr. Tandon to get her thoughts on the nexus spaces in South Park of health and parks, as well as the work underway to create interesting to you? healthy, connected green spaces in South Park, a neighborhood with more kids per household than any other part of the city. It’s interesting because health What have you learned in your research about how our urban and public safety environments affect children’s health? are at the top of this community’s Our built environment has a huge impact on health, so it’s priority list and Dr. Pooja S. Tandon of Seattle Children’s imperative to think about the importance of physical and have implications for mental health in urban planning. We know from research, for generations of people. This is also an environmental justice example, that people who live near parks get more exercise issue. The idea of “safety” is multi-pronged. For example, and have better health outcomes. There is also research that among other factors, safety in South Park could be about suggests that spending time in nature has benefits for mental polluted air, water, and soil; poor pedestrian and bicycle health and that kids who have ADHD can even focus better facilities and connections; and high levels of truck traffic. after spending time in nature. Improving public spaces is an important piece of the puzzle. However, we must be wary about the unintended possible What partnerships would you like to see in place between the impact of gentrification and think about how that might be health sector, local governments, and neighborhoods to better addressed up front. address health disparities? Finally, because South Park is a well-defined community, there Addressing health disparities needs many stakeholders at is a unique opportunity to possibly measure the impact of the table. By bringing the health sector in early, we can better improved public spaces by doing “before-and-after” studies. understand the health implications of our urban planning Such research could help us learn why some parks and trails decisions. Regulations and policies can be informed by data are better used than others, what is working best and why, and, and respond to the community’s priorities. The work done of course, the effect of improved public spaces on residents’ by the Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition on the Duwamish physical and mental health. Valley Health Impact Assessment was certainly a big step in the right direction. Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands Campaign for Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands Nears Completion Your Chance to Help Fund the Farm Seattle Parks Foundation, in partnership with Seattle Tilth Don’t miss your chance to make history and help complete and the Friends of Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands, is the Campaign for Rainier Beach Urban Farm & Wetlands. raising funds to greatly expand the programming and facilities Your gift of any size is welcome and will ensure that we at the farm. We’re pleased to report that we’ve met 90 percent can realize the long-awaited vision of a multi-faceted urban of our total fundraising goal of $2.4 million and are on farm and education center with a high level of community schedule to break ground in November. participation, including: ■■ Farmland that produces more than 10 tons of organic produce each year, distributed directly to low-income neighborhood residents ■■ A children’s garden, community learning gardens, and indoor/outdoor classroom spaces ■■ Cooking and nutrition classes and community meals ■■ Farm stand that sells produce, eggs, and other food items and serves as a distribution point for the community ■■ Greenhouses for intensive, year-round production of organic fruits and vegetables ■■ Christina, a Seattle Community gathering area Tilth program ■■ assistant, harvests Restored and protected wetlands along Lake Washington tomatoes at the Rainier Beach Urban ■■ Fruit orchard, apiaries, native plant nursery, and Farm & Wetlands.