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Green open spaces and natural areas are essential to enhancing the beauty and wellbeing of our people and communities; taking stock of our efforts informs how we move forward building a greener city with a commitment to education, partnership and collaboration

Today, the Chicago Park District announces the release of its first ever sustainability report, “Parks Are Making Chicago a Greener City”. The report highlights the important role parks play in advancing the environmental health of the city and the District’s efforts to responsibly manage and preserve vital natural resources for the current and future generations.

The sustainability report is guided by the District’s 2025-20230 Strategic Plan, a blueprint for the future of parks. The plan was developed through a robust public engagement process that identified the needs and concerns of park stakeholders, reaffirmed the importance of sustainability, and challenges the District to evaluate its existing greening efforts and to do more to reduce its environmental footprint.  As articulated in the Strategic Plan, “The Chicago Park District’s mission is to give people of all ages, identities, and abilities access to quality recreation, wellness opportunities, and sustainable green spaces in every neighborhood.”

“The Parks Are Making Chicago A Greener City! We are excited to develop and share the District’s first sustainability report, which underscores the great work we are doing to support sustainable practices in every neighborhood” said Chicago Park District General Superintendent and CEO Rosa Escareño. “We are extremely proud of the work we’ve accomplished and continue to perform, like establishing and caring for natural areas, supporting biodiversity, protecting our robust tree canopy and creating opportunities for residents to actively immerse themselves in nature. As the guardians of Chicago parks, we carry the privilege and great responsibility of making thoughtful decisions that leave our parks, communities and city in better shape and greener than we inherited them.”

Among the Park District’s accomplishments that continue to move the needle on sustainability and are highlighted in the report include:  

Operating and Building Responsibly 

The Chicago Park District manages more than 600 parks and more than 250 fieldhouses throughout the city, making new capital investments annually with sustainability top of mind.  

• Each year, the District purchases energy credits equaling 100% of its electricity consumption to support sustainable energy sources.  
• Ongoing efforts to convert park light fixtures to energy-efficient LED bulbs to reduce energy consumption. To date, the District has converted 41% of its light fixtures district-wide along with indoor fixtures at over 100 park fieldhouses.  
• Installing user-activated drinking fountains and spray features throughout our parks, replacing older features that ran continuously to reduce water consumption.
• Collects stormwater in rain barrels to maintain some park gardens, reducing the District’s water consumption.  
• Reuse wood from removed storm-damaged and diseased trees for mulch, lumber and nature play space components.
• Reducing waste by banning Styrofoam at park concessions and permitted events and minimizing paper use by digitizing internal business operations.  
• Use of alternative biodiesel blends, made from used restaurant oil, to fuel trucks and maintenance equipment including lakefront mowers, tractors and beach groomers. In addition, several District refuse trucks now run on 100% biodiesel, which is carbon neutral and reduces the amount of particulate air pollution that is harmful for people with respiratory health issues.
   

Caring for Nature in the City 

Among the largest park systems in the county and the city’s leading greening agency, the Park District is responsible for nearly 9,000 acres of parkland including almost 2,000 acres of nature areas representing diverse habitats, 26 miles of lakefront, 16 lagoons and a District-wide our robust tree canopy in addition to thousands of flowers, shrubs and native plantings. 

• As the city has little to no remnants of native habitat, the Chicago Park District has actively established natural areas, namely prairies, savannas, woodlands, wetlands, and dunes, by planting a wide variety of native plants, shrubs, and trees while simultaneously controlling the weeds and invasive species that have crept in over time. The maintenance of natural areas is an ongoing task in an urban environment, where the pressures include exacerbated climate change impacts, air pollution, surrounding hard infrastructure, and human use. In such a context, Chicago Park District believes the presence of nature is powerful, for it can provide much needed respite for both wildlife and people.
• In 2018, the Park District removed the city’s last remaining dam at the confluence of the North Shore Channel and the North Branch of the Chicago River, restoring habitat connectivity for fish and other wildlife.  
• As a result of the installation of water control structures on the southeast side, the Park District staff can lower and raise the water levels at these sites, which have long lost their ability to function as natural hemi-marshes after years of industrial dumping and surrounding development.  
• Among the District’s most impactful investments is the transformation of unutilized brownfields into vibrant greenspaces; most notably La Villita Park, which is now a thriving 21-acre, community gathering space in South Lawndale and Park 596, the 17-acre campus that houses the District’s administrative office and park fieldhouse in Brighton Park.  

 
Promoting Environmental Stewardship Through Education and Experiences 

Ensuring the current and future environmental strength of our parks and city is a collective effort. The District is committed to increasing engagement, whether it’s welcoming and collaborating with residents, corporate groups, researchers and cultivating the future generation of stewards through volunteerism and play. 

• In 2024, more than 83,000 individuals participated in park environmental education programs and events.  
• More than 3,500 volunteers completed 20,000 hours of stewardship work in parks in 2024. Each year, thousands of volunteers give their time and energy to help care for our parks, gardens and natural areas.
• The Park District has prioritized connecting people with nature. Investments in eco-recreation parks like Big Marsh on the city’s far South Side and Steelworkers Park in the South Chicago community. Both these spaces encourage active recreation and play amidst nature.  
• The District has constructed 16 nature play spaces in parks across the city. These areas feature natural elements like mud kitchens, reclaimed wood and other natural elements that encourage environmental awareness and appreciation.  
• In 2024, the Park District launched the Plants and Pollinators Program, which brought  
• elementary school students and their teachers from nearby public schools to Big Marsh Park for a series of field trips and workshops focused on the life cycle of native plants and the intersection with various pollinating insects.
• In efforts to expand its educational outreach, the Park District’s environmental education staff travels across the city to deliver environmental programs and educational experiences to neighborhood parks across the city. Activities include paddling, fishing, camping, stargazing, and guided nature walks.  

 
Partnering to Increase Our Impact 

As the city’s motto “Urbs in Horto” indicates, Chicago truly is a City in a Garden. While we take great pride in the work we do to care for our green spaces, we cannot do it alone. The Park District’s success in building a sustainable park system would not be possible without the robust partnerships with sister city agencies, research institutions and community-based groups, working to advance sustainability and resilience across the city. 

• The Park District’s workforce is vital to ensuring our greenspaces continue to thrive amidst global warming and Chicago parks’ diverse and extensive landscapes are living laboratories that professional researchers and citizens alike are eager to investigate. In 2024, there were 107 active research projects in parks. Research findings help make new discoveries in optimizing sustainability efforts and improves day-to-day park operations.
• The District maintains strong working relationships with partnering organizations equally committed to sustainability, like the Chicago Wilderness Alliance and the Morton Arboretum, to strengthen and further its efforts. The Park District is currently working with colleagues from Adler Planetarium, the Field Museum, Shedd Aquarium, and others to expand native habitat on the Museum Campus.
• The Park District’s use of diesel fuel alternatives and work towards long-term environmental resiliency is part of the city’s broader sustainability efforts. Chicago’s 2022 Climate Action Plan is set to reduce the city’s carbon emissions by 62% by 2040.
• The Park District also helps implement the City’s Sustainable Development Policy, which guides sustainable construction practices as well as the River Ecology and Governance Task and Our Roots Chicago’s Tree Ambassador Program which focus on the preservation of natural assets. 
   

Looking ahead, the Park District will develop a Sustainability Plan that identifies areas where we can continue to improve our operations, articulates our goals, and sets metrics to measure our progress. This plan will help guide future investments of time and resources as we continue in our work to make Chicago a greener city. 

View the Sustainability Report and learn more.

Met and exceeded goals by investing in workforce, prioritizing youth, delivering on critical services and programs; maximizing event experiences and launching essential capital and sustainable projects across the District
 
CHICAGO – As 2024 comes to an end, the Chicago Park District celebrates its progress to build a stronger, more resilient and equitable District by investing in its workforce, elevating Chicago’s youth, and supporting families and communities over the past year. These efforts resulted in improved equitable service and programs delivery, increased recreation and fun experiences for Chicagoans and visitors, and a continued commitment to build inclusive sustainable park projects in every community. The Park District also ended the year with a balanced budget without imposing new taxes. To enjoy a brief video of the Park District’s year end highlights, please click here.

 “As we planned for 2024, the priority was to deliver on services and programs that our residents rely on. Residents depend on parks for sports, recreation, wellness, respite and families need after-school programs and summer camp. Our seniors are more active and require greater service and our young people want more year-round experiences – this is why we set a path to plan for the future and invested in our workforce who are essential to our delivery of service, said Chicago Park District General Superintendent and CEO Rosa Escareño. “I am proud of our accomplishments during 2024. As a service-driven agency, it was imperative to support our workforce and to build our employee pipeline into the future, and we are doing that by prioritizing our youth hiring and building a stronger more equitable district.”   
 
In moving towards a stronger and resilient park system, the District focused on improving service delivery equitably. Starting in 2024, the Chicago Park District placed its focus on planning for the future of parks. Initiating a process to do away with its outdated strategic plan after nearly 12 years and began a robust community process to garner community input to set a path towards progress.  
 
“Building a more resilient and equitable district starts with planning for the future. In 2024, we initiated the process for the District’s new Strategic Plan which reflects the ideas, wishes, concerns and aspirations from our valued stakeholders. The plan completed and launched in November of 2024 serves as a compass for the programmatic and capital investments, operations and policies we are planning for in the coming year, announced in our 2025 Budget,” said Escareño.

The District commenced the year by facilitating the new 2025-2030 strategic plan that lays the groundwork for the organization’s future, and strengthens parks as essential cornerstones for wellness, enrichment and quality of life for all residents.  Guided by the goal of developing a plan to address the diverse needs and interests in all communities, the District engaged in a robust ten-month engagement process including hundreds of hours of meetings (in person and virtual), forums, focus groups and surveys. Reaching residents, seniors and teens, as well as community stakeholders and park employees.   The valuable feedback gathered through this robust process, resulted in the District’s new Strategic Plan with a refreshed vision, mission, values, and goals which was launched in November of 2024 and will be activated in 2025. More details about the new plan can be found on the website here.  
 
In 2024, the Chicago Park District was also ranked #10 out of the 100 largest cities by the Trust for Public Land who evaluates the categories of acreage, investment, amenities, access and equity in our nation’s parks. Chicago is the only city with a population over one million in the top 10 ranking, scoring a 98/100 for resident access to parks and open spaces and a 90/100 for equitable distribution of parks between neighborhoods by race and income.
 
“Parks remain vital for residents and families and it’s important to make the necessary investments that maintain services and program levels to support strong healthy lifestyles for the thousands of park users who rely on them,” said Rosa  Escareño.   In 2024 we are pleased to report that our programs experienced a 6% increase serving nearly 345,000 individuals registered. This is how parks are making a positive and lasting impact on those we serve”
 

Programs: In 2024, the Park District offered over 28,000 individual program opportunities and saw nearly 345,000 registrations, a 6% increase from 2023. Our services across the system especially during the summer and after-school hours which families rely on resulted in stronger recreation, arts, and cultural programs and services across the system.

1. This summer, the Park District celebrated another successful summer, opening all beaches and 77 indoor and outdoor pools for the second consecutive summer, ensuring Chicago residents have access to their neighborhood pool at least six days a week.  
2. Enrollment numbers for Chicago Park District Day Camps, one of the most sought out summer experiences, reached 30,000 registrations, including 20,000 traditional day camp participants – a 9% increase from 2023.  Parks served more than 34,000 participants in Special Olympics across all games.
3. Senior programs saw over 32,000 registrations this year, up 7% from last year.
4. The District’s Learn to Swim programs saw over 11,000 registrations gymnastics also had a strong year with 22,000 participants, up 5% from 2023 and Special Recreation experienced 27,000 program registrations, up 15% from 2023.
5. Enrollment in teen-focused programing reached over 21,000; a 6% increase from 2023.  
6. As one of the largest providers of arts and culture programming, the Night Out in the Parks celebrated its 12th year producing hundreds of free cultural events across all 77 Chicago Community Areas. This year, Night Out events saw an estimated reach of 347,000. In addition, registrations for arts and culture programs including music, theater, dance, storytelling and more, exceeded 25,500, up 13% from last year.  
7. Launched the Parks Health and Wellness program with three essential pillars guiding our efforts and resources towards promoting community health, supporting active living, and healthy food environments.
8. Raised more than $320,000 through our Financial Assistance Fund from individual, corporate and foundation donors providing financial assistance to approximately 4,570 youth in our out-of-school time programs.

“Our commitment to build a safe, respectful and stronger workforce is paying off with stronger workforce committed to serving Chicagoans who rely on park services and programs. In 2024, we increase our workforce wages and benefits and continued to invest in youth jobs and stipend-based opportunities building a strong jobs pipeline by eliminating barriers and training our youth to be the future of Parks, touted Escareño”
 
Workforce and Youth: The Chicago Park District employs nearly 3,000 year-round full-time and part-time workers and during the summer it doubles up hiring nearly 3,000 seasonal summer workers to deliver summer programs and services.
 

1. The District worked with our SEIU partners supporting $28 million in improved benefits and wages over a five- year period benefiting our workers. This unprecedented package included wages increases, bonuses and benefits prioritize employee well-being, workforce retention.
2. This year, we had the largest number of vacancies filled, bringing our vacancies to an all-time low at 9.8% this was due to both internal promotions and new hires.
3. Worked hard on outreach and engagement including our successful “Your Perfect Summer Job” hiring campaign, the District employed more than 3,000 seasonal hires, among them lifeguards, recreation leaders and junior laborers. Of these, over 2,500 of them were teens and young adults, ages 16 to 24. 
4. This year, the Park District received a total of 2,175 lifeguard applications, exceeding last year's numbers.
5. Nearly 200 participants registered for the newly created stipend-based Lifeguard Explorers Training Program (LETP), which replaced lifeguard recruitment pipelines disrupted by the pandemic. Close to 50 percent of LETP participants passed the lifeguard test and were eligible for a lifeguard seasonal job this summer.
6. Supported 1,000 Recreation Leaders in training with stipend-based summer opportunities, to build our pipeline for those ages 13-15. 
7. By eliminating barriers to employment and supporting entry level workers, on average we have transitioned 199 seasonal workers to year-round, over the past two years we’ve hired 400 seasonal employees onto our workforce pipeline.

Rosa Escareño added that, “We are thrilled that in 2024 Parks’ strong recreational experiences and positive park activations not only brought fun and entertainment to families and communities across the city, but these also contributed to the economic vitality of Chicago. 
 
Events/Experience: The park District had a strong year for events and experiences. In 2024, the Chicago Park District issued more than 2,000 special event permits with roughly 13 of those events bringing in more than 10,000 in daily attendance which generates critical revenue for the District to support parks and programs citywide.
 

1. Celebrating its 100th anniversary, Soldier Field hosted numerous exciting events, including eight concerts by major musical acts such as the Rolling Stones, Metallica, George Strait and Pink as well as four international soccer events, Chicago Bears football games and Chicago Fire soccer matches, Altogether, Soldier Field welcomed more than a million visitors to the stadium in 2024.
2. In 2024 we signed a five-year contract with Sueños Music Festival. The 2024 event brought in more than 60,000 in daily attendance and generated $2 million for the District and $243.7 million in local economic impact.
3. Lollapalooza celebrated its 20th year in Grant Park with a record-setting 115,000 in daily attendance and generating $9.8 million to the District and $440.9 million in local economic impact.
4. We continued to prioritize community engagement in our permit process, building on the prior years’ initiatives, by instituting a set aside of 10% of the net permit revenue of certain large events to fund capital improvements at the local host park.
5. Contracts were finalized for Soldier Field food service management and golf course management, both of which include significant capital funding to enhance these offerings for years to come.

“We are proud of the $100 million dollars in park investments in neighborhoods across the city this year, and half a billion over the next 5 years. We are investing equitably with half of our investments going into communities that need it most, said Superintendent Escareño.  “We know that all projects, large or small, have a profound impact on our parks and enhance our residents’ lives, activate beautiful spaces and improve service delivery for neighborhoods and families.”
 
Capital Investment: In 2024, the Chicago Park District broke ground on or completed over $100 million dollars in capital projects to create new or preserve existing park assets including:

1. Launched $48.6 million in capital park investments for new community field houses that act as hubs for neighborhoods and offer year-round programming: Cragin Park Fieldhouse in the Belmont Cragin community; Jackie Robinson Fieldhouse in the Washington Heights community; Kells Park for the Humboldt Park community, and Moran Park for the Englewood community 
2. Invested $8.5 million to begin work to update aging electrical systems to ensure electrical infrastructure reliability for decades to come;
3. Broke ground on the Elizabeth Morse Genius Children’s Garden in the Garfield Park Conservatory. The $10 million project will bring new features and an enhanced experience to visiting children and families.
4. Also broke ground on the new signature playground at the Midway Plaisance, the City’s first universally-accessible playground. This 21,000 square foot play space is funded by a $4 million donation from the Obama Foundation.
5. Committed an additional $6 million to accelerate the long term, lead service line replacement program, increasing remediation from 35 to 100 projects each year.  
6. Completed the installation of broad-band Wi-Fi in 60 parks increasing connectivity in parks and neighborhoods in need with deficient connectivity. 
7. Other noteworthy projects in the Park District’s 2024 capital construction season include, but are not limited to, playground renovations, new artificial turf fields, new fieldhouse windows and roof replacements, fencing and lighting. All projects, large and small, positively impact park operations and enhance the delivery of services to neighborhood residents and families.

“We are proud of the impact our park projects make in every community. Only one year after the District relocated its downtown headquarters to the Brighton Park community, this September, the Park District headquarters building, designed by John Ronan was awarded the Design Excellence Award by the American Institute of Architects Chicago Chapter”, said Escareno. “This is one of the many beautiful and impactful capitals projects by the Park District.” Among other awards for the new headquarters building, the Park District also won first place in The Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Award for Architectural Excellence in Community Design, an award recognizing “the essential role that both non-profit and for-profit developers play in building communities in Chicago-area neighborhoods.” 
 
Sustainability: In 2024 the District initiated a review of its current environmental sustainability initiatives in order to catalog these efforts and devise a report to inform future efforts of the district.

1. We continued the expansion of our forestry operation, adding forestry crew members to provide more capacity to maintain the District’s canopy of 250,000 trees and planting 3,000 trees annually.  
2. This year, we received a $1.475 million grant through the Inflation Reduction Act, passed through the Morton Arboretum.  This grant, for the first time, will fund a citywide tree inventory and development of an urban forest management plan.  
3. Parks is collaborating with research institutions to evaluate the ecosystem benefits (e.g. stormwater infiltration, carbon storage) provided by park green spaces. Recently, the collaboration received a $1.76 million dollar grant. 
4. This year the Parks’ River Lab at the Chicago River, which runs river-themed and science education programs and camps started the Thursday Night Paddle Club providing weekly accessible river recreation opportunities.
5. In 2024, the Monty and Rose Wildlife Habitat at Montrose beach was named. Later this summer, there were new hatchings of the Piping Plovers endangered specie demonstrating the strength of this habitat.
6. The Park District continued to utilize energy retrofits to reduce the Park District’s carbon emissions. For example, at La Villita Park in the Little Village Community, we converted the 98 flood lights that illuminate our soccer and baseball fields to LED bulbs, and this cut the energy use per fixture by 900 watts. Each year, the reduction in carbon emissions associated these energy savings is equivalent to that which would be achieved by taking 26 cars off the road.
7. The Park District’s Harvest Garden Program celebrated its 25th year! Due to high demand, the program has expanded from 7 gardens in 1999 to 21 gardens in 2024. Harvest Garden provides summer and fall programming that allows kids the opportunity to grow healthy food from seed and learn the fundamentals of organic vegetable gardening, nutrition, cooking, and stewardship. Knowing that a plant-filled diet can have significant health benefits, the Park District expanded Harvest Garden on the South and West Sides to include Austin, South Shore, and West Englewood communities where food deserts exist.

Most recent news from the Chicago Park District

On August 6, 2021, Governor Pritzker signed into law Public Act 102-0263 (2021 Pension Law).  The 2021 Pension Law contains several components that are expected to put the District’s Retirement Fund on a path to full funding within 35 years of 2023.

Chicago Municipal Analysts Society Site Visit at Soldier Field

Pension litigation update as of March 16 and March 22, 2018, is available on EMMA under "Financial Information & Documents:  Other Financial / Operating Data."