Milwaukee County maintains more than 15,000 acres of parkland, from nature preserves and secluded riverside and beachfront trails to soccer fields, golf courses, and water parks.
All of that land takes a lot of money to maintain.
In a recent report, the Wisconsin Policy Forum suggests county leaders might benefit from partnering with municipalities and other local governments and taxing districts, to help preserve such infrastructure.
Deferred maintenance
Although the bulk of the attention in recent years has been focused on how to save the aging Mitchell Park Domes, a recent study estimates that the county is facing roughly $496 million in deferred maintenance and capital project needs at its more than 142 parks – a figure that doesn’t include the up to $91 million it could cost to fix, replace, or re-imagine the Domes.
Improving paved infrastructure such as park roads, parking lots, and paths makes up about half of the $496 million price tag at about $245 million, the report finds. Other costs include $146.1 million to maintain and repair park amenities such as playing fields, basketball and tennis courts, playgrounds, and pools. Another $65 million is needed to address maintenance needs in park buildings.
But not all parks need as much investment as others. Reviewing needs across all of the county’s parks, the Policy Forum classified 21 park sites as having the highest need based on a combination of their physical condition and equity score. Most of the highest need parks, including Kohl and Joseph Lichter parks near Brown Deer, were found on the north side of Milwaukee, others like the Frederick Law Olmsted-designed Washington Park, were sprinkled across other parts of the city and county. The policy forum also identified 20 higher-need parks, which are found in Milwaukee and the southern and western suburbs of the county.
Partnerships may help
While municipalities have their own financial challenges, the Policy Forum suggests they have an interest in strong area parks and also have access to financial tools that the county does not, such as development impact fees and tax incremental financing (TIF), the report notes.
County parks have already been strengthened by a number of such partnerships in recent decades, including those with the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District (MMSD), but expanding on existing partnerships and creating new ones might involve formal processes and steps to maximize mutual benefits, the report states.
“For example, Milwaukee County may need to give greater say about parks uses to municipalities, whose local financing tools in turn could be used to help improve parks infrastructure,” it states.
In addition to infrastructure needs, which the county can pay for with borrowing, the parks system’s operating budget also faces challenges, the report found. With state tax caps limiting how much local governments can pay for operations, the parks department has become more reliant on generating revenue from admissions and concessions fees, the report states.
A bright spot in the park system’s financial picture, the report states, is the county’s new additional 0.4% percent sales tax, which is helping to fund a $3 million increase in the county parks operating budget this year. The American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) also funded $17.4 million in parks capital projects.
Shifting to natural areas
One potential strategy for reducing operating costs that county officials have suggested would be to convert some existing parkland to natural areas that could be managed less intensively, potentially in collaboration with MMSD in cases where the district has flood management objectives within parks. This would be accompanied by a shift in the county’s focus from promoting active recreation to ensuring opportunities for passive recreation, the report states. Parks department staff could continue to work with municipalities and school districts in the county to ensure that recreation and programming continued within those parks where strong demand exists.
MMSD has jurisdiction over rivers and tributaries running through more than 40 county parks and parkways. This overlap, coupled with similarities in environmental missions, provides opportunities for collaboration, according to the report.
In Pulaski Park and Jackson Park, for example, MMSD replaced county parks assets that were disturbed during waterway projects. The Policy Forum’s analysis suggests similar opportunities exist in other county parks, such as Wilson and McCarty.
Existing municipal partnerships
Some municipalities have already partnered with the county parks department, including Oak Creek, Milwaukee, and Greenfield. One partnership, in Kulwicki Park in Greenfield, allows the city to expand recreational opportunities for its citizens in return for maintaining certain parks infrastructure and amenities, the report states. A more recent pending agreement between the county and city of Milwaukee would use city tax incremental financing (TIF) funds to help finance a series of improvements to Red Arrow Park downtown.
With additional structure and effort, such partnerships could be expanded to more parks and municipalities, the report states. While these individual agreements will likely remain modest in size, by streamlining the process for arriving at them, the county could still potentially negotiate more of them to help alleviate its overall maintenance and capital needs, the report states.
