What Are Your Park and Rec Pet Peeves? — Episode 029

On today’s episode, we’re talking about pet peeves. We know how
much passion you have for your communities and careers as park
and recreation professionals, but we also know that there’s
always that one thing that continues to irk you. On our 25th
episode, we asked you to let us know some of the things that you
deal with in your career in parks and recreation that really
annoy you, and you answered the call.


We met up with a few of our listeners at the 2018 NRPA Annual
Conference in Indianapolis to hear a little more about their park
and recreation pet peeves, and while some of them are things you
would probably assume park and rec professionals have to deal
with, you might also learn a thing or two (we did)!


Here’s a sneak peak at the pet peeves in this episode (listen to
the show for more):


Samantha Marsden, Central Park Conservancy
(1:08) — “Being in New York City, one of my pet peeves
is when people — they do it in parks, too, of course — is when
they spit on the sidewalk. Any type of bodily fluid, I can’t
stand it. It makes me want to gag, or puke, or something.”


Brittanie Propes, Excelsior Springs Parks and Recreation
(2:43) — “We bring our families out [to our public parks
and trails] for a fresh air experience, and you really ruin it
for us when you smoke.”


Nancy Desmond, Cleveland Metroparks (3:13) —
“There’s toxins in those cigarette butts, and it’s just not good
for the health and wellness of the park visitors or the nature
that it affects.”


Trillby Berry-Tayman, Washington Township Park
(3:37) — “When the community asks for a program, I find
a sponsor to cover the costs, and then my community doesn’t show
up.”


Mark Foote, City of Chandler Parks and Recreation
(5:23) — “Trying to take square millennials and fit them
into our round holes. I think as recreation professionals, a lot
of times we have this old-school way of thinking of taking these
new kids and fitting them into our systems. We have to adapt to
who these kids are.”