Audit Finds Disparity in Access to Recreation

Low-income neighborhoods of Los Angeles have dramatically less access to parks and recreation resources than more affluent communities, and parks throughout the city remain severely under-policed, the city controller’s office found in an audit released Thursday.

In the second of the controller’s three audits of the Recreation and Parks Department, the agency was faulted for not asking the public what services it wants and for not adequately evaluating programs.

“This audit found a department which at the top has been detached from the day-to-day activities in our parks and recreation centers,” said Controller Laura Chick.

In a letter to the mayor and City Council, she urged the agency to conduct an assessment to determine how to better serve the public.

“In 2006, we cannot and should not be running any city department, much less one that is so essential to our residents’ quality of life, by groping in the dark,” Chick wrote.

Jon Mukri, general manager of the city parks agency, agreed that a needs assessment should be done to update one conducted in 1999, but said his office is already taking steps to address issues of access to park services and policing.

“We are in the process of adding parkland on the basis of demographics and need,” Mukri said, citing three new parks being built in poor neighborhoods.

Because the directors of individual recreation centers are given wide leeway, Chick said there is no consistency in what programs are offered.

The audit found that some centers were focusing on youth team sports, while others stressed classes or cultural programs.

Chick added that some of the city’s parks districts receive more services and personnel. One district with upscale areas west of downtown has 8% of the park acreage but 17% of parks maintenance personnel, auditors found.

Some recreation centers were in constant use for city-supervised programs, while others went largely unused.

“Lower-income neighborhoods, including those predominantly populated by Latinos, African Americans and Asian Pacific Islander communities, have dramatically less access to park resources than more affluent areas,” Chick concluded.

Mukri said a needs-assessment study would help identify what programs the department should add.

Chick also raised questions about park safety.

“LAPD drop-in centers, designated for the highest-risk parks, were designed to address these concerns, but they remain scarcely staffed,” she wrote, noting that there are 26 park rangers for 390 parks occupying 15,700 acres.

During fieldwork at 22 of the drop-in centers, auditors never encountered a Los Angeles Police Department officer, the audit said.

However, Mukri noted that the recently approved creation of a new public safety office, which will combine park rangers with security officers from the General Services Department, will create a force of 62 officers capable of better serving city facilities.

The last needs assessment that surveyed L.A. residents found 51% were reluctant to visit city parks because of safety concerns.

But Mukri said a study by Rand Corp. last year found that 29% of inner-city youth and 20% of suburban children thought their parks were unsafe.