Browsing by Subject "Parks and recreation"
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Item Equitable access to green space : management strategies in San Diego California and Austin Texas(2014-12) Steverson, Jennifer; Dooling, SarahThis report is focused on the implementation strategies used by municipal governments to provision communities in San Diego California and Austin Texas with public parks. Green space is an important amenity in urban areas that improves the quality of life for residents. Low income who experience sustained mental fatigue from the stress associated with acquiring basic necessities may experience stress alleviation in vegetated environments. Comprehensive planning documents, city budgets and interviews with parks department employees were used to investigate the methods used to ensure equitable access to public parks in urban areas. Digital cartography was used to measure the proximity to green space at the city and neighborhood scale. Green space was broadly defined to include public parks, conserved lands, community gardens, greenways, and school yards. This is in keeping with the comprehensive plans of both cities.Item The survey as a public input tool in city parks and recreation departments : do representative surveys matter in decision making?(2010-05) Mora, Sabina; Kahn, Terry D.; King, Christopher T.; Spelman, BillAlthough most city departments use citizen surveys to gather information from the public, very few use probability sampling to ensure a representative sample of the population. This report takes a first look at how park and recreation departments use citizen surveys to gather input from the public. The purpose of this report is to explore the extent to which adequate representation of communities is considered in citizen surveys. This report uses two approaches. First, interviews with parks and recreation administrators in 13 U.S. cities are analyzed to compare the use of surveys across departments. Second, responses from two samples of visitors to Barton Springs (a representative stratified sample and a non representative online sample) are analyzed to find differences in responses between the two samples. Qualitative analysis of the interviews found that although citizen surveys are common, few managers conduct citizen surveys using probability samples. In addition, adequate representation of the population is not generally recognized as one of the principal benefits of citizen surveys. Responses to the Barton Springs survey suggest that there are important differences between probability samples and non probability samples. This report supports that sampling techniques and survey methodology have a significant impact the results of citizen surveys.