Quality is the name of the game for the Plant City Recreation and Parks Department.
The 51-person staff is tasked with overseeing maintenance and operations in Plant City’s 23 parks, eight athletic facilities and more. Though the department doesn’t have anything special planned for July, which is National Parks and Recreation Month, director Jack Holland says he and his staff work hard every month to give Plant City and its visitors resources to take pride in.
“We have a good staff that cares about what they do,” Holland says. “They take pride in their work product. The guys want it to look right. They want it to be a notch above for the public to be able to enjoy it.”
PARKS DIVISION
Plant City’s Parks division uses the majority of the department’s available capital and personnel resources, accounting for roughly 68% ($2,563,185) of the overall budget ($3,790,178) and 42 of the department’s 50 staff members (minus Holland, who oversees both divisions).
The Parks division’s most obvious responsibility is the oversight and maintenance of the city’s parks and related facilities, including the recently-completed 46-acre parcel that is Ellis-Methvin Park. Though the department has not added new equipment or created new jobs to handle Ellis-Methvin and other, smaller additions, thanks in part to effects still felt from the 2008 economic recession, Holland says the crews do what they can to keep everything in good shape.
“It’s been difficult but we’re doing it,” Holland says. “We’re getting it done. Some of our areas don’t get maintained like we’d like to on a weekly basis or 10-day cycle, but we keep them all looking definitely appropriate and try to keep them better as much as we can.”
Holland also says the department is working on one particular parcel, the McIntosh Tract at 775 E. Knights Griffin Road, with the goal of turning it into a “passive park” with a heavy focus on nature trails within five years.
In addition to the four maintenance crews caring for city’s parks and athletic facilities, the division has two that handle other jobs around the city.
One crew is responsible for maintaining landscapes of city properties such as the Bruton Memorial Library, City Hall and the police station. It also trims trees on city properties and ensures roadways and right-of-ways are clear for larger vehicles. The other crew handles the work at the city’s cemeteries.
“We are literally ‘cradle to grave,’” Holland says. “We have youth athletics and sports and everything for the little kids, working all the way up to we handle the cemeteries, as well. Maintenance, interments, opening and closing of grave sites.”
Though the Recreation division keeps the Parks crews busy, Holland says, the teams are generally able to get the jobs done and keep the fields maintained.
RECREATION
The eight members of the Recreation division oversee, among other things, a schedule with events at Plant City parks most weeks each year. In 41 of the 52 weeks of 2016, for example, Plant City facilities hosted at least one athletic event.
Many of those events, plus those of the city’s various youth sports leagues, fall under the umbrella of Danny Smith, the Youth Sports Director and a 20-plus year department veteran. Smith, whom Holland considers an “unsung hero” of the department, is the go-to resource for all of the city’s youth athletics programs and often the city’s liaison with large groups such as the United Youth Football League and the United States Flag and Touch Football League.
Holland says that, with help from the Parks division’s work, the Recreation side is kept busy with help from the Tampa Bay Sports Commission, which connects tournament hosts with facilities around Hillsborough County.
“They push us quite a bit because we’ve got a lot of good facilities,” he says. “Our quality’s there on the playing surfaces. The availability of a lot of fields in one central location … all within just a mile or two of each other is very beneficial.”
Large events such as the UYFL and USFTL tournaments, the National Baseball/Softball Association Spring Training and International Softball Association tournaments bring visitors from around the United States, if not the world. Holland says the economic impact of such events on Plant City businesses, from restaurants to hotels, cannot be understated.
The division also works on events beyond sports. One popular feature is the annual Youth Summer Program, which aims to give Plant City kids a fun, educational experience at both the Planteen and Dr. Martin Luther King recreation centers. The division also works with local groups that host events on city property, from the MLK Festival to Christmas in the Park, and hosts its own events.
The department sponsors the annual Fourth of July celebrations, held at Plant City Stadium. In 2017, Holland says, a capacity crowd of 6,700 attended the event.
“It makes you proud to have an event like that,” Holland says. “You throw a party and wonder if anybody’s going to show, and they definitely showed up.”
Special Recreation events, such as that celebration and the City-Wide Easter Egg Hunt, rely on sponsorships. The majority of the division’s programs cover costs through user fees, relying on zero-based and fee-based budgeting. Tournament rental fees take care of staff overtime (a frequent occurrence with the larger events, Holland says), field marking supplies and lighting.
Though the Recreation and Parks Department has a lot going on, Holland says the staff is always open to suggestions.
“We’re always looking for new ideas,” Holland says. “If people have a new idea of something they want to do, we’d be glad to consider it and see what the cost ratio would be, if we could handle it, what the fees would be. We work new things into the program as much as we can.”