The Fremont City Council received an update of the Parks and Recreation Master Plan at their regularly scheduled Council meeting on September 7. The presentation encompassed progress on the project, picking up where the previous update left off, including benchmarking against peer cities, prioritizing investments for City facilities and programs, assessing City programs, and mapping to better provide equitable levels of service.
The peer city benchmarking measures Fremont among other similar-sized California general law cities and two award-winning cities on a variety of metrics, including park acreage, annual operating expense per resident, capital investment, program participation, and indoor recreation facilities. The investment prioritization summarizes the results of the statistically valid survey in terms of how residents think investments should be made to the City’s parks and recreation facilities and programs. The Program Assessment looks at recreation program and event lifecycle stages, cost recovery, marketing, and which programs comprise the “core” program areas in order to determine the best path for future programming. The Levels of Service and Equity Mapping takes inventories of the parks and their amenities and maps them throughout the city based on a ratio of park/amenity to population to reveal areas of service and gaps in service.
The combined data will inform and guide the Parks and Recreation Master Plan on how to meet the demands for future recreational, programming, environmental, and maintenance needs, as well as to establish priorities and funding strategies for facility improvements, future park and trail development, and land acquisition.
For more information, view the September 7 Council meeting webcast or September 7 Council Agenda (Item 7A) staff report.
You can also watch the February 16, 2021 City Council Special Meeting Work Session, which covered a summary of the project, including community outreach efforts and the preliminary results of the statically valid Parks and Recreation Needs Assessment survey.
For more information on the Parks and Recreation Master Plan or to provide your input, please visit InventFremontParks.com. Thank you for contributing to the future of parks and recreation in Fremont!