December 2020 - Parks & Recreation - 21

the plant is available for community use during evenings, weekends
and school vacations, then usage
of the recreational elements could
increase to 61 percent.
Elected officials on both school
boards and city councils are under
pressure from taxpayers to do more
with less. Providing one set of recreational facilities that both school
and community constituencies can
share is, in essence, using the same
tax dollar twice. Joint provision is
likely to result in savings to taxpayers from reduced land acquisition
costs, capital development costs
and operating expenses.
In addition to economic efficiencies, a school's recreation complex
may better serve as a social focus
for the surrounding community.
Intensive programming outside
school hours could help foster a
sense of community in neighborhoods that have no such identity.
In some neighborhoods, school facilities are the largest public space
and they are grossly underused.
Building public facilities into a
school campus alleviates the need
for working parents to arrange
transportation for students to afterschool programs offered by the recreation department.

Figure 2: Potential Use of School Plant
Total School Plant Annual Capacity
24 h per day x 365 days = 8,760 h
Total Annual School Use
9 h per day (8 a.m. to 5 p.m.) x 180 school days = 1,620 h
School use of potential capacity = 18%
Total Annual Community Use
[7 h per day (5 p.m. to 12 a.m.) x 180 school days] +
[24 h x 52 weekends (Saturday 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. and Sunday 12 p.m. to 10 p.m.)]
+16 h per day x 81 school vacation days) = 3, 804 h
Community use of potential capacity = 43%
Total school and community use of potential capacity = 61%
ation amenities. To alleviate these
concerns, facilities designed for
community recreational use could
be grouped at one end of a school
building in a special wing or separate building. Such a functional
arrangement limits access to other
parts of the building.
A primary challenge is aligning
the availability of capital budgets
of both entities at the time needed
to construct facilities. This requires
a planning horizon of perhaps five
years in advance of construction,
so bond referendums by both agencies can be organized.

Vision: The Key Ingredient
Why Isn't Joint Provision
More Widely Used?
Joint provision inherently implies
compromises. For example, inevitably there are occasions when
both parties want to use a facility
at the same time. This may cause
resentment and adversely affect
the morale of both teachers and
recreation personnel. Similarly,
school administrators do not want
the community having access to
the school plant beyond the recre-

A recreation manager experienced
in partnerships with school systems observed: " The difficult part
of getting these partnerships going
is there is a lot of hostility because
everyone is looking out for their
own interests. It is hard to step
back and look at what is best for
the community. And, what is best
for the community, particularly in
these times of very difficult funding, is to combine your efforts and
work together. "

In most communities, schools
and recreation facilities belong to
the same taxpayers. This suggests
no construction of new recreation
facilities by either the school board
or the city should be considered in
isolation. Administrators in both
agencies would prefer to possess
their own facilities, because it gives
them greater flexibility and control.
Sharing creates additional challenges they would rather not have to address. However, it's not their money
- it is the taxpayers' money - and
if administrators and elected officials
genuinely subscribe to the view that
they are " public servants, " then the
taxpayers' interests should prevail.
Joint provision requires leadership with a " can do " attitude, rather than leaders who use the control
arguments to forestall such efforts.
The logical case for joint provision
is overwhelming, but it requires enlightened leadership.
John L. Crompton, Ph.D., is a University Distinguished
Professor, Regents Professor and Presidential Professor for
Teaching Excellence in the Department of Recreation, Park
and Tourism Sciences at Texas A&M University and an
elected Councilmember for the City of College Station
(jcrompton@tamu.edu).

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Parks & Recreation

December 2020 - Parks & Recreation

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