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Community United: Don't Mess with Our Parks
 from www.OurLA.org
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  Community United: Don't Mess with Our Parks
from www.OurLA.org

 Friday, 09 October 2009

By Kristin Sabo

For more than two hours Wednesday night, more than 50 parks advocates from all over the City met with Councilmember Tom LaBonge to discuss the future of the Park Rangers.

Curiously, no matter what part of town they were from or which regional park they visited the most, their message was identical:  Keep Park Rangers the tactical generalists that they are now, and keep Chief Ranger Albert Torres on the job.


On Monday, the Department of Recreation and Parks sent out a department memo making sweeping changes to the Park Ranger division. Citing budget problems and a need for efficiency, the memo outlined major changes, including splitting the unified division into four specializations with different leadership, a major reduction in services provided, a change in working hours, and the surprising removal of Chief Torres, whose popularity clearly brought the diverse parks community together this evening.

Park Rangers provide a wide variety of services in the City's larger regional parks. These include law enforcement, search and rescue, firefighting, educational, community policing, and resource and wildlife protection. The wide range of services evolved out  of the moment-to-moment need in Los Angeles parks over a time span of more than four decades.

It's not clear what effect if any this united crowd will have on the Department's decision with respect to the Park Ranger program, but LaBonge said emphatically that he will be taking the  concerns and comments back to the General Manager of Recreation and Parks, Jon Kirk Mukri, for his response.

Regional Parks in Los Angeles:  O'Melveny Park (Granada Hills), Hansen Dam Recreational Area (Sylmar), Sepulveda Basin (Lake Balboa), Debs Park (Arroyo Seco),  Elysian Park, Harbor Regional (Wilmington), Venice Beach, Angels Gate/Cabrillo Beach (San Pedro), Verdugo Mountains Park (La Tuna Canyon), Runyon Canyon (Hollywood), Augustus Hawkins Park, and Griffith Park.
 


http://ourla.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=693&Itemid=3233

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LaBonge Steps into Uproar over LA Park Rangers Shakeup

Written by Ron Kaye

Wednesday, 07 October 2009

Community reaction to Recreation and Parks GM Jon Kirk Mukri's shakeup of operations of LA's Park Ranger operations prompted Council Tom LaBonge to intervene Wednesday and cal a "last-minute meeting ... to gather input and reactions to the pending changes."

The community meeting will be held Thursday starting at 6 p.m. at the Citibank Building, 2nd Floor - 1965 N. Hillhurst Blvd., Los Feliz.

The shakeup was announced Monday in a memo to staff entitled "REASSIGNMENTS AND WORK SCHEDULE CHANGES."

Effctive Oct. 25, the 9/80 and 4/10 compressed week work schedules will be eliminated and all Park Ranger personnel will work a normal 5 day, 40-hour week.

In addition, Mukri reorganized the division into four units:  Interpretive/Nature Education, Mounted, Park Patrol and Observatory Security.

What set off many community activists was the reassignment of Chief Ranger Albert Torres to the city's emergency preparedness operation downtown. Torres, a Ranger for 30 years, has earned high praise from staff, volunteers and others in the community.

Mukri also named Anne Waisgerber to be the lead staff member of the Park Patrol Unit and  Sharie Abajain to be in charge of the Interpretive/Nature Education and Mounted Patrol units.

The changes were being made to make the Park Ranges "more productive, efficient, effective, and accountable," Mukri said, and are needed "to better utilize limited resources and meet operational needs." 

At least some of the changes are needed because of the severe impact of budget cuts on his department. Mukri had told the City Council during budget hearings that he was planning to reorganize the department to preserve park services as well as possible in the face of reduced funding.

http://ourla.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=681&Itemid=3233

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