Please select your top priorities that contribute to your ideal high quality of life when dealing with parks and open spaces.

Develop a racial and social equity plan and refine the Energized Public Spaces (EPS) Plan to ensure the quantity and quality of park facilities and programming are available to all residents on an equitable basis.  

Pursue co-location, adaptive reuse, joint programming, and shared use of land, buildings, and facilities to achieve this objective. 

-Identify gaps in facilities and services suited to specific age groups, such as seniors, teenagers, and younger adults of working age.
-Ensure that residents in urban, suburban, and rural areas all have access to a wide variety of parks and programs. 
-Assess and systematically address cultural, physical, and economic barriers to park visitation and participation in recreational activities. 

-Prioritize a state of good repair and the physical condition of existing parks and facilities.
-Stay abreast of trends in park amenities, management tools, and programs.
-Encourage experimentation and innovation and remain open to new ideas. 

-Add and enhance park sites and facilities in densely populated centers of activity.
-Integrate privately owned public spaces with the park and recreation system to supplement publicly owned and managed gathering spaces and athletic facilities.
-Ensure communities have access to a range of park types through a combination of public and privately owned facilities. 

Design parks, facilities, and amenities, and program activities to support physical activity, encourage social connections and steward environmental resources.

-Develop a comprehensive lighting policy for the park system.
-Assess needs for lighting to support athletic field needs, trail usage, and evening activities in park buildings or for special evening events.
 

Consider accessibility for walkers, cyclists, and transit users when making decisions about where to acquire land for parks and where to locate new amenities in existing parks. 

-Offer programming designed to increase visitation to urban parks and extend the time spent in these parks to make them centers of activity. 
-Ensure accurate operations and maintenance cost estimates for parks in densely populated and high-use areas.
-Modify operations and maintenance practices for smaller, more intensely used urban parks, including maintenance yard and equipment storage models, equipment types, and staffing approaches. 

-Update and implement the Countywide Park Trails Plan with an emphasis on connecting trails to neighborhoods through connector trails, trailheads, and extending existing trails.
-Explore opportunities to support physical activity using pump tracks and mountain biking skills areas.
-Ensure major hard surface trails have adequate width and amenities to accommodate different users by providing additional travel and passing room for safer trail sharing.
-Explore creative and effective ways to educate users about trail etiquette.
-Increase awareness of existing trails and develop programs to allow all residents to feel welcome using the trail network.

-Include active recreation as an integral element in park planning and design.
-Encourage active recreation as a key component of privately owned public spaces in all parts of the county.
-Consider the multiple purposes that parks play and integrate opportunities for physical activity into parks where that was not the initial driving force.

-Conduct a needs assessment to understand how best to serve the distinct physical activity needs of seniors, teens and younger adults of working age.
-Ensure recreational opportunities are equitably distributed in the county.
-Provide recreational opportunities for non-elite athletes.
-Use strategic marketing plans to promote programs, trails and parks targeting multiple demographics, increasing community engagement and advocacy for the park system.

-Focus on small, compact-sized, multi-purpose sports facilities to be able to provide more recreation opportunities with faster implementation.
-Explore opportunities to build recreational amenities, such as athletic fields, above structured parking and on roofs of county buildings, and underneath infrastructure.

-Work with public agencies to create "Safe Routes to Parks" and to other public spaces by filling gaps in sidewalks, trails, and transit services that connect public spaces to neighborhoods, schools, and other county facilities.
-Integrate park trails and paths into transportation planning and better use them to connect residents to jobs, centers of activity, and other parks and trails. 
 

-Where practical, add lights to currently unlit fields and study parking capacity to increase playing hours and access to fields without the need to build new facilities.
-Continuously re-evaluate the inventory of athletic fields and build new fields and develop partnerships to meet community needs.
-Assess the need for and provide opportunities for sports such as lacrosse, cricket, field hockey, and ultimate frisbee.
-Focus on providing new athletic fields along accessible transportation corridors and in transit-accessible areas.

No description is necessary.

Explore opportunities to develop standards for casual use spaces. Locate or connect parks where social gathering is encouraged. 

No description is necessary. 

Increase access to fresh, healthy foods, and promote social engagement. 

Implement recommendations of the 2021 Safety-in-Parks Committee.

Use surveys, focus groups and other research techniques to understand park visitors' safety concerns to identify how to improve safety. 

Explore expanding the offerings or permitting of concessions and food trucks in public spaces, design and build new permanent restrooms and retrofit existing restrooms to accommodate year-round use, expand wi-fi to provide public internet access in urban parks, and explore legislative changes to allow parks to issue permits for the sale and consumption of alcoholic beverages in designated parks. 

-Use parks and interpretive programming to tell the story of Montgomery County's history, culture, and natural resources, focusing on historically marginalized groups, including Black, Hispanic, Native-American, and LGBTQ communities.

-Preserve and support unique gathering places and sites that enhance neighborhood character and reflect the local culture.

-Incorporate public art and public performances to celebrate local history and culture and create meaningful connections between people and places. 

Encourage activation of public spaces and other publicly and privately owned property through temporary activities, special events, seasonal markets and pop-up events. 

-Develop, adjust, and pursue a priority list of natural resource-based land acquisition targets that protect sensitive watersheds, preserve unique and rare habitats, complete critical wildlife corridor connections, and connect communities to natural areas.

-Continue to allow and develop natural surface trails in conservation-oriented parks and encourage transit access to all parks where feasible.

-Assess the department’s analytical tools and standards and practice for resource monitoring and management to ensure that they reflect a state-of-the-practice understanding of the most effective and efficient means of achieving stewardship goals. 
-Ensure environmental and sustainability services improve public health, allow for opportunities for nature interpretation and education, and correct environmental injustices within equity and/or densely populated areas.
-Develop coordinated strategies with other agencies, neighboring jurisdictions, and relevant stakeholders to target meaningful stormwater treatment opportunities before stormwater reaches parkland. Identify and eliminate point source (piped) stormwater discharge into stream channels on parkland through state-of-the-art stormwater management, outfall enhancements, stream restoration, and other mitigating techniques.

-Create a resiliency plan to improve the ability of park and recreation facilities and natural resources to withstand the effects of climate change. This plan should align with the County Climate Action Plan and Parks Sustainability Plan.

-Articulate a clear theory about the desired ends for natural stewardship activities.
-Establish program priorities and identify clear steps and program activities, within existing financial resources, to achieve the stated objectives.
-Establish metrics tied to outcomes and measure projects accordingly.