December 2012 - Parks & Recreation - 20

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LEARNING

Test Your Park &
Recreation
Knowledge
The following question is a
sample Certiﬁed Park and
Recreation Professional
(CPRP) examination
question.
Which of the following is the best
way to communicate work rules
and policies?
A. Discuss them at in-service training sessions
B. Distribute the policy manual to each new employee
C. Hold essential employee hearings
D. Post them in prominent locations
The Certiﬁed Park and Recreation Professional (CPRP) is the
national standard for all
park and recreation professionals
who want to be at the forefront
of their profession.
For more information on the
CPRP Certiﬁcation program,
please visit www.nrpa.org/cprp.

Answer: A. Discuss them at in-service
training sessions.
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Parks & Recreation

2,000 professional and citizen-advocate members and is a major provider
of education related to parks and recreation, therapeutic recreation, and other
related areas, as well as training for professionals, paraprofessionals, and citizen advocates. In celebration of its 75th
birthday, TRAPS is publishing a book
slated for late this year that commemorates the history of the organization.
■ ANNAPOLIS, MARYLAND, officials
are considering a plan to remove trash
cans from city parks, a strategy they
say would save money and could keep
public spaces cleaner. Without trash
cans, officials said, visitors would take
refuse with them or learn to not produce it in the ﬁrst place. Other parks
across the country have adopted such
" trash-free " policies, including all Maryland state parks and scores of national
parks, which urge visitors to " leave no
trace. " In Annapolis, the idea comes
amid broader changes that, for the ﬁrst
time, shifted city trash service into private hands to cut costs. Annapolis initially announced it would take away
every trash can in every park this fall-
then quietly rolled back the plan when
residents lodged more than 400 complaints in the ﬁrst month.
■ 2012 MARKS THE 75TH ANNIVERSARY of Tennessee state parks, and the
year-long celebration is going out with
a bang. In October, Tennessee Gov. Bill
Haslam and U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander
joined members of the General Assembly and elected officials from Unicoi
County to celebrate the future conveyance of more than 2,000 acres in the
Rocky Fork tract near Johnson City as
Tennessee's 55th state park. Preliminarily, plans for the " park in progress "
include an access road, ranger station,
primitive campground, picnic area, and
trails, state officials said. Rocky Fork
protects more than 16 miles of blueribbon trout streams and is a popular

| DECEMBER 2012 | WWW.NRPA.ORG

hunting area for black bear, turkey, deer,
and grouse. The area also is home to
both state and federally endangered
species, including the peregrine falcon.
■ CITY OFFICIALS IN WASHINGTON,
D.C., have announced a plan to renovate 32 city playgrounds by next September using $30 million that includes
unspent funds from other capital projects, a major upgrade for a renovation
schedule that would have otherwise
seen only eight new playgrounds in
that time. Parks and Recreation spokesman John Stokes said Mayor Vincent
Gray pushed to use the surplus borrowed funds-some of it left over from
delayed or under-budget projects-to
accelerate the renovation schedule after parks officials undertook a triage of
playground facilities.
■ IN AN ATTEMPT to lessen the destructive impact of gray squirrels on
campus at Clemson University, researchers have begun lacing sunﬂower
seeds with contraceptives in order to
quell the ever-increasing rodent population. Over the past decade, squirrels have been responsible for more
than $1 million in damages to trees on
Clemson's campus. Researchers have
spent the past year studying campus
squirrel behavior and drawing blood to
determine hormonal ﬂuctuations, and
they recently introduced the pink-dyed
seeds at 16 campus feeders that only
squirrels can access. If the experiment
succeeds without signiﬁcant ill effects
to the wider ecosystem, the contraceptive plan could become more widely
available to other schools, park agencies, and public places in coming years.
■ THE AMERICAN CHEMISTRY COUNCIL presented its 2012 Innovation in
Plastics Recycling Award in November to Marietta, Georgia-based Safeplay Systems-manufacturer of EcoPlay
Playgrounds. ACC cited EcoPlay for its
manufacturing process, which uses

December 2012 - Parks & Recreation

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