3rd Annual Nassau County Parks Report Card 10/20/07

Its that time of year again. Our grade is derived from personal observation and from comments received from PARCnassau organizations and their members. 2007 was no improvement over recent past years. The grade awarded is a C. It would have been worse except for 2 factors. The first is we had a rainy spring and July, so the parklands looked green and lush. Secondly, the few remaining workers did their best with minimal equipment and supplies to keep the grass mowed and the bushes trimmed. Under the leadership of the First Deputy Commissioner Murphy they kept the park system alive, barely.

We are not going to list each deficiency as they are too numerous to mention. What we would suggest is that you examine your county park of choice and see the advanced rust on the support steel of the buildings, the filthy restrooms, decrepit grandstands, overgrown areas that virtually hide benches with poison ivy and tick infested weeds. Signs hanging from a thread, ponds (recently cleaned) again overgrown with invasive plants, broken and below grade footpaths that flood in the slightest rain, are only some of the problems un-addressed because parks no longer has its own Technical Services (Maintenance Department). There is NO SECURITY in the parks, leaving them open to vandalism, underage drinking, drug use and other illegal activities.

Most serious, is the Administration's attitude toward our county park system. They allow the annual employees to shrink well below any capacity to maintain and repair these facilities. Meanwhile they have 14 Commissioners and Deputy Commissioners (or equivalents) falling all over each other in Eisenhower. Instead of infusing our tax monies collected for the park budget in parks, they "steal" those funds and use them elsewhere. This year they actually eliminated the park budget line from our future tax bills insuring their financial chicanery would not be visible.

The administration is actively pursuing the transfer of county parks to the three towns to reduce future labor costs but not our taxes. We've railed about this before noting the average county resident's loss of control and reduced admittance rights to these facilities and the increased costs to the town residents concerned. These transfers are a "Lose-Lose" for all of us except the politicians.Each of your members should be calling his or her state legislator to demand they deny Nassau County permission to take parklands we've paid to acquire, develop and maintain from us. It is our understanding that the only park facilities the county executive is interested in keeping are Bethpage Restoration Village, Eisenhower Park, Mitchel Field and Nickerson Beach. All the rest are up for grabs.

Until they are disposed of, the administration intends to bleed every penny out of the system. The mandatory golf cart fiasco at the Eisenhower Red Course recently is a prime example. Over 7 active parks now have private day camps located in them, crowding out residents and their families from pools, playgrounds, picnic areas, athletic fields, etc. Incidentally, these camps make millions over the summer, pay minor leasing fees and NO SCHOOL OR TOWN TAXES to the host communities despite being in direct competition with neighborhood day camps that do. (County Assessor Levinson, please note).

Election Day fast approaches and while the county executive is not running this year, the county legislators are. Our suggestions would be to determine which legislators solicited your opinion on the issues of parks, taxes, illegal apartments, illegal immigrants and quality of life issues. They all pontificate on these issues when given an opportunity but seldom ask or care how you feel. If your legislator actually seeks your position and reflects it in his or her voting, then vote he or she back in. If not, throw the rascals out!

One of the main reasons we live in Nassau County is to enjoy the park system. It provides recreation and open space for all of us to enjoy especially the elderly on fixed incomes, young families with limited budgets and the under-employed. The loss of our county parklands would be a catastrophe. The first step is to hold our county government responsible in protecting all our parks. Please find out how your legislator voted on park transfers and budgets and respond accordingly on Election Day.