Park Maintenance Evaluations
About the evaluation program
The Controller's Office (CON) and the Recreation and Park Department (RPD) work together to evaluate the City’s park maintenance. CON and RPD developed objective maintenance standards to create the evaluations. Each quarter, CON and RPD staff conduct more than 200 park evaluations across the City. On an annual basis, CON analyzes the results of these evaluations. CON reports the results to the public through this website and an annual report. RPD uses the results to make strategic decisions for its park programs.
Parks have different sets of features. Features include:
- Athletic Fields
- Buildings and General Amenities
- Children’s Play Areas
- Dog Play Areas
- Greenspace
- Hardscape
- Lawns
- Ornamental Beds
- Outdoor Courts
- Restrooms
- Table Seating Areas
- Trees
For each feature, there is a set of standards that drive the evaluation. For example, athletic fields' turf should be less than 4.5 inches tall. If the evaluator finds that the turf is too tall, the field fails that standard. Standards are averaged into elements, which then are averaged into feature scores. Aggregate feature scores give the park maintenance score for each park.
We average quarterly park scores to create the annual score. We group annual scores across the city or by various categories for more analysis.
For more information on the park maintenance scoring process, review this explainer document.
Limits
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we do not have annual data for FY 21.
New and improved parks
To learn more about parks being improved, visit RPD's website.
To see the newest parks added in FY 24, visit RPD's website.