Carrie Blackmore Smith

csmith@enquirer.com

Fifty-five million dollars. It's the figure advocates for the failed Cincinnati Parks levy referred to repeatedly as the price to eliminate decades of deferred maintenance in the park system. The levy supporters blamed the backlog for park and trail closures, general crumbling infrastructure and other safety hazards.

Yet it took city officials nearly three months to produce a detailed accounting of the physical state of Cincinnati's parks.

The listing, updated for The Enquirer after it filed open record requests and at the behest of a city councilman, still lacks the up-to-date detail of the conditions of park assets.

Sadly, as a result of the loss of state funding, our parks face a $55 million deferred maintenance backlog. Issue 22 will solve this problem by requiring the Park Board to use at least 50 percent of all money raised by the charter amendment for maintenance. - Cincinnati Mayor John Cranley in an Oct. 24 column published on Cincinnati.com

Meanwhile, how park leaders would spend an additional $4 million a year that they have asked for remains a work in progress at best and murky at worst. The murkiness is due in part to the role that City Council and politics play in approving the capital improvement budget and how the list often changes.

Some park assets in the worst shape won't get immediate attention, park leaders say, because the additional $4 million won't cover them. They don't see saving money over a series of years for a project as an option, either.

Big repairs must wait until a corporate partner comes along, officials say.

City Council appears poised to provide the additional $4 million, even as the parks' operating costs have increased almost 22 percent since 2007 because it absorbed Sawyer Point and Yeatman's Cove from the Recreation Commission, opened the massive Smale Riverfront Park and renovated others, including Washington Park. But that may change now that the city is facing a $13.8 million deficit.

Some opponents of the parks levy weren't happy upon hearing about the projects the department would get to first in 2017.

Tim Mara, a local lawyer who was a levy critic, said the parks department's response doesn't correlate with the urgency of the maintenance problem expressed during the levy campaign.

"I think they grossly exaggerated this $55 million price tag," Mara said.

The struggle for answers and a response

The Enquirer first asked for the parks' list of deferred maintenance at an editorial board meeting with park officials and Mayor John Cranley on Sept. 25.

The request was reasserted several times leading up to Election Day.

Parks leaders continually pointed to a document that outlined park assets and rough costs to replace and maintain the system, such as "The Park Board has a total of 21 pavilions and lodges and most of those structures were built between 1940 and 1960 ... . An on-going program of renovations and enhancements cost $200,000 annually."

The document, titled "Cincinnati Park Board Budget and Levy Considerations," noted three individual building needs, but lacked other specifics.

The levy came and went, failing by a 2-to-1 margin.

Opponents, including some City Council members, believed the levy failed for a lack of transparency and community input. Other voters simply thought the parks didn't need more money.

Parks leaders regrouped, with Director Willie Carden saying if the maintenance problem wasn't addressed, the backlog of needed repairs could climb to $70 million by 2025.

Parks found itself budgeted for a little less than $1.47 million for capital improvements – including any new infrastructure, repairs and salaries for park maintenance employees in the coming budget cycle. After $1.2 million to pay park employees’ salaries, that leaves just $268,800 for physical improvements to the park system, Carden said.

In response, the Park Board increased its maintenance request to City Council by almost 275 percent to $5.5 million.

"There is a list of capital projects that grows and grows, with the passing of each year," Park Board Chairman Otto Budig told council members on Dec. 7. Deferred maintenance is now the parks' top priority, park leaders said.

The lion's share of the $5.5 million – $4 million – would help the department chip away at deferred problems, Carden said. The remaining $1.5 million would secure an additional $1.8 million grant from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, due to expire in August, to build a marina at Smale Park.

Still, the parks had not produced a detailed list of the deferred maintenance to council.

"We have the capability to, and we will be very happy to provide members of City Council with every single one of these capital projects, their approximate cost and how, year after year after year, we have put capital projects aside because the money simply isn't there," Budig said at the Dec. 7 meeting.

However, Parks Director Carden told an Enquirer reporter in a Dec. 2 email, that "we are trying to get our arms around this park system.... The numbers are just estimates and fluid."

City Councilman Chris Seelbach demanded more detail.

"It matters that if there’s a line item that says 'shelters,' that we know exactly what repairs are needed and exactly where," Seelbach said after the Dec. 7 meeting.

Carden told the councilman he'd have a list ready by the first week of January, Seelbach said.

Park leaders shared details about deferred maintenance with The Enquirer in late December.

"What people have been asking about got us to go back and update this information," said Steve Schuckman, superintendent for planning and design and also the park's maintenance chief, who is a trained planner and architect.

Parks use formula to estimate proper spending on assets

The backlog of work is particularly daunting, park leaders said, because Cincinnati's park system is so big.

Comprising nearly 10 percent of the city, parks take up more acreage here than most of America's largest cities, according to the Trust for Public Land.

Cincinnati is also ranked among the highest for parks spending per capita, according to the nonprofit, which puts out an annual parks report card.

Cincinnati's system includes 75 neighborhood and regional parks, 34 nature preserves, five parkways, many city gateways and small green spaces and roughly 80,000 street trees.

Schuckman presented a spreadsheet listing roughly 500 park assets – everything from shelters to swingsets to mulch, including details about their age, size, approximate value and an estimated cost for replacement and annual maintenance. For park buildings, costs are broken down between the structure itself and the utility systems it contains for park buildings.

"It's a formula," Schuckman said, determined based on how long something should last and what sort of long-term and short-term maintenance is appropriate.

After updating the numbers, park officials believe the maintenance backlog has grown to roughly $58 million.

The intent is to invest annually in all infrastructure, according to Schuckman, though there's never enough money to do that.

Carden said his department prioritizes repairs based first on "hazard remediation and safety." An example offered: A broken stairway system in Fairview Park, which is closed.

"Sometimes you tape it off and you look the other way," Schuckman said.

Some buildings are so dilapidated that they might even fall down, he said. Inwood Park's pavilion, built around 1910, may be most at risk, Schuckman said.

But Inwood Pavilion is not on the proposed capital budget project list for 2017 and neither are the Fairview steps.

What the park system plans to do

While safety is the top priority, it's not the only priority in deciding what gets fixed. During the budget process, all Cincinnati departments use a ranking list that the parks uses as well, and tacks on a few more criteria.

"Sure, you take safety hazards first," Schuckman said, "but if you have two facilities in front of you and they both have needs, if one is a rental facility, we hit that first."

Officials also try to divide dollars equally among city neighborhoods, Schuckman said, and pay special attention to the regional parks such as Eden and Ault, which draw the most visitors.

Schuckman works alongside Parks Supervisor of Maintenance Andy Schuermann when creating the proposed budgets and gets approval after a discussion with Carden and other parks leaders. The Park Board has final approval, voting to accept this proposed budget at its December meeting.

The list for 2017, or the fiscal year that begins July 1, includes big-ticket items such as a new $80,000 geothermal and insulation system at Oak Ridge Lodge in Mount Airy Forest, a new $250,000 roof for the Reading Road operations building and a $170,000 "cosmetic uplift" inside the Caldwell Nature Center in Hartwell.

These bigger projects are listed among dozens of smaller ones, including $60,000 to "install railings at steps throughout parks," and money for emergency repairs on roads, parking lots, walls, stairs and park utilities.

Some of the more pressing issues, such as Inwood Pavilion, are just too expensive. Parks must find a partner to share the cost, whether that be an employer, developer, nonprofit or whomever, Schuckman said.

Next year's budget doesn't include any money for the city's 65 miles of trails, which Carden has called "unsafe."

He has ordered a review of the trail system, now underway. If only 10 miles are in good shape for visitors, the rest will be closed, Carden said in a public meeting. Right now the department doesn't employ anyone with trail building or maintenance skills, or with masonry skills, for that matter.

As for the three building needs outlined in the literature circulated during the levy – Inwood, Owls Nest Pavilion in East Walnut Hills and a brick amphitheater off Ezzard Charles and Central Parkway – none is listed for improvements in 2017.

Mara has questions about the priority process. "Has the Park Board followed their own criteria and the proposed capital improvement program budget?" he asked. "That does not seem to be the case. For example, the Oak Ridge Lodge geothermal project would seem to be a low priority given other needs."

Park system still focused on 'responsible growth'

On a tour of Caldwell Nature Center, built in 1970 and on the list to receive $170,000 next year for new flooring, lighting and dividing wall, as well as bathroom and kitchen renovations, Schuckman was asked whether another part of the system had more pressing needs, based on the parks' prioritization system.

He said the list can, and often does, change. For example, if the parks don't get the full $4 million for repairs, the Caldwell project "would probably drop off the page."

"We have to see how much we get and readjust," Schuckman said. "We finalize the budget then, and it's going to be different than the budget we submit to council. So we're constantly asking the questions you're asking."

Councilman Seelbach said he is trying to make sense of the information provided by park leaders, which he sees as a positive step. Now he wants to make sure it matches the department's priorities going forward.

"Getting more feedback is imperative given what we came from in November," Seelbach added, referring to the heated levy campaign, which resulted in Cranley calling for an audit of park finances after The Enquirer reported questionable spending by park leaders, including a $200,000 donation to the levy effort; a donation the Park Board rescinded after The Enquirer reported about it.

"If they want to be taken serious about this, get an advisory committee appointed," Mara said. "Open the doors; let the air in. Make everyone opposed a partner of sorts. Change fundamentally how they do business."

Meanwhile, parks leaders say they'll stay on the path of "responsible growth," despite rising expenses and the maintenance backlog.

New projects include a larger and improved Ziegler Park, which will be renovated in Over-the-Rhine and Pendleton next year.

"There is a part of me that is desperate to just say 'stop' to everything. Just stop,' " Budig said. "We have this increasingly difficult infrastructure to maintain. But if we did that, Washington Park wouldn’t be what it is. Some of the other things we are doing just wouldn’t have come to pass."