In 2019, the Vashon Park District will set out to complete the first of a number of deferred maintenance projects as outlined in an extensive strategic plan meant to guide the preservation and enhancement of park assets, facilities and services.

For over a year, members of the park district board drafted the plan, which is set to encompass the lion’s share of their maintenance and programming goals through 2024. The latest iteration was adopted at the Nov. 13 board meeting.

“We are really focused on doing deferred maintenance, so it’s not very sexy, but we’re fixing things that should have been fixed a long time ago,” said board Chair Doug Ostrom.

Commissioners have assigned themselves as leads on an itemized schedule of projects listed by priority and availability of funds, ranging from general modifications of the Point Robinson lighthouse in 2019 for an amount of $5,000, to enterprises such as a $1 million renovation of the community pool, anticipated to begin in 2022. Funding will be provided both from the park district and outside sources. Other deferred maintenance work in the plan includes remediation of invasive plants, providing access to restrooms at various park properties, completing a myriad of restoration work at Ober Park, major playing field drainage projects and the purchase of new vehicles, mowers, and trailers.

The district will seek grants to fund many of its aspirations, but they will not be enough to cover a significant portion of the plan’s estimated $1.5 million minimum capital project expense through 2024. According to Executive Director Elaine Ott-Rocheford, the district plans to pay for the capital projects using levy dollars, which it receives annually from the county. She added that the strategic plan is dependent on what the district asks for in the next levy cycle.

Commissioners recently voted to change the district’s financial management policy in order to fulfill their objectives. Under the old policy, the district was restricted from using a major portion of its funds from levy dollars for operating and maintenance expenses. The board instead had to prioritize the funding of reserves in the budget over the flexibility of using the districts’ resources for fulfilling urgent needs. That stipulation was changed after a vote, permitting the district to better allocate levy dollars for its purposes once the budget reserves for programming and deferred maintenance are fully funded. For 2019, the district’s budget allocates $145,000 for capital projects, per the plan.

Ostrom said that going forward, a collaboration with the community will be essential for the plan and the district’s future.

“The strategic plan is more or less a consensus document,” said Ostrom. “We understand that as we go forward, things are going to change, and people are going to come along with ideas. As chairman, that’s one of my roles sometimes, to mediate those conflicting objectives.”

The strategic plan, said Ostrom, was informed primarily by the 2016 community survey. Islanders, he noted, were clear that they were opposed to ideas which may overextend the district, ranking infrastructure projects such as repairs to the community pool highest. Proposals for new district-led construction projects such as an island dog park or climbing wall at Burton Adventure Recreation Center received the least support.

“One way to think about it is, we tend to put out fires that occur,” he said, referencing the myriad of repair needs that often come with aging facilities. “The strategic plan gives us the ability to step away from that sort of problem-solving.”

Board member Karen Gardner, for her part, said that difficult choices would have to be made in order for the district to meet the high expectations it set for itself in the plan. One of her responsibilities is to identify district-owned properties that may be considered surplus and more fit for management from another agency, or even for private sale after public review.

“One of the things that we decided last year was that we can’t be all things,” she said. “We decided that the Land Trust should really be saving land, and not the park district.”

The park district owns 525 acres of land on Vashon-Maury Island, of which more than 200 acres are undeveloped or cannot be built on. “It’s sort of an emotional thing because people gave away these pieces of land,” she said.

Above all, according to Gardner, developing robust programming in concert with the completion of deferred maintenance work will be paramount. She said using Ober Park, for example, for tailored programming, would help to meet a primary concern of the community reflected in the survey. Respondents were interested in low-cost activities that could involve a number of partnerships with other island organizations to support additional recreation opportunities for less represented populations.

“One of the things we want to do — part of recreation programming for senior citizens — is ‘the playground for all’ [concept] — that’s a major focus,” she said, naming fellow commissioner Abby Antonelis as helping her facilitate a broader dialogue with the island’s senior population. Together, they fielded suggestions that the district explore the possibility of hosting diverse concerts in the park, classes, lectures, district-sponsored activities at Vashon Center for the Arts, short guided walks on park trails and special events for elders at the community pool.

Echoing Gardner, Ott-Rocheford added that engagement is one of the greatest values of the district’s strategic plan.

“Being responsive to community desires; that a big one,” she said, explaining how the plan will ultimately strengthen the district’s integrity, its relationship with islanders, its viability and offerings. “Your decision making, your financial planning, what it is you set out to accomplish in the short term; it’s a roadmap, and I believe it’s critical for proper management to have a strategic plan.”

Ott-Rocheford said a plan devised in 2001 and later updated in 2008, called the Park, Recreation, and Open Space Comprehensive Plan, focused on the district’s outlook at large as opposed to completing deferred maintenance needs. The Strategic Plan is the first of its kind in the district’s history.

As part of its pledge for excellence in drafting the strategic plan, Ott-Rocheford said the park district is pursuing accreditation from the National Park and Recreation Association’s Commission for Accreditation of Park and Recreation Agencies (CAPRA) by 2022. CAPRA accreditation, described in the plan as the “gold medal standard for excellence in operations and services” for park and recreation services nationwide, requires that the district’s strategic plan demonstrate how it will meet its goals in the near-term. Ott-Rocheford said the district’s staff and commissioners worked to develop the plan in accordance with CAPRA guidelines.

“In my opinion, it’s the right way to do it. If you’re going to do it, you want to do it right,” she said. “There’s a reason why its standard. It’s good management.”

Ott-Rocheford added that the district is halfway through the process of writing a Recreation Program Plan, which will take an inventory of recreation opportunities currently available on the island. The park district will use it to devise how the district can involve itself and expand programming for all.

Ott-Rocheford said the strategic plan was something that staff and commissioners had invested a tremendous amount of effort into.

“We worked really hard on this to make sure it was done right and that it was complete. It’s quite an accomplishment and one I think we’re really proud of,” she said.

The strategic plan is now available to view online at vashonparks.org.