Parks & Recreation

2024 Budget

$44,719,257

151.5 FTE

Department Overview:

Boulder Parks and Recreation (BPR) promotes the health and well-being of the entire Boulder community by collaboratively providing high-quality parks, facilities, and programs. This mission will be accomplished through sustainable practices, partnerships, continuous improvement and a focus on the common good, service excellence and with health at the core of all we do.

BPR staff manage over 1,800 acres of urban parkland. They also oversee three recreation centers, five pools, the Boulder Reservoir, Flatirons Golf Course, and the Pearl Street Mall. A sampling of programming includes aquatics, art, sports, therapeutic recreation, wellness, camps, and youth outreach.

The adopted 2022 BPR Plan guides operations for the next 5-7 years. 2024 will focus on implementing key initiatives and goals identified within the 2022 BPR Plan and in alignment with citywide goals outlined in the Sustainability, Resilience and Equity (SER) Framework. The 2024 budget focuses money where it will have the most impact. It supports program growth for recreation in growing areas, addresses cost escalation and provides funding for prioritized maintenance projects and equipment replacement across the system to support ‘Taking Care of What We Have’. The budget creates more clear connections to citywide goals to achieve a Healthy and Socially Thriving Community - with a focus on advancing equity by responding to input from Community Connectors-in-Residence and utilizing the Racial Equity Instrument to understand who benefits and who is impacted by funding and policy decisions. BPR's budget supports:

Access to safe and welcoming parks and facilities.
Promotes access for historically excluded community members.
Higher investment in taking care of parks and facilities so that they last longer and can support more play.

Department Programs:

Capital and Operating Budget (FY2022-24)

Expenditure by Program

Program Overview

The department programs include seven service areas organized to achieve the department’s mission of promoting health and well-being most effectively. These service areas are described within each program.

Administration (Responsibly Governed)

Administration for the department includes the department leadership, department-wide finance, marketing, communications, information technology, staff training and development, business planning and process improvement analysis. These teams work closely with city Finance, Human Resources and IT staff to support operations.

Community Building & Partnership

The Community Building & Partnership team provides camps, EXPAND, Youth Services Initiative (YSI) and other recreation programming for people with disabilities and low-income families and volunteer efforts. This includes: targeted outreach to increase awareness of public recreation programming for those from underrepresented communities as well as individuals with disabilities and coordinating system-wide volunteer efforts; and partnerships to build alternate funding to achieve community goals.

Planning & Ecological Services

The Planning program area manages capital project planning, design and construction, and twelve historic and cultural resources. This team leads asset management and park renovation projects, and community engagement related to planning efforts. The Natural Resources team manages urban forestry, natural lands and leads the Urban Park Ranger Program.

Recreation & Park Operations

The Operations team performs the day-to-day management of facilities and public spaces. Within the program, there are three service areas which includes Urban Parks, Recreation and Regional Facilities. Urban Parks is responsible for the operations and maintenance of urban park land (including 55 developed parks). Recreation focuses on the operations of recreation centers and outdoor pools along with sports operations, health and wellness, aquatics and general recreation programming. Regional Facilities operates and programs the Boulder Reservoir, Flatirons Golf Course and Valmont City Park.