March 2016 - Parks & Recreation - 34

People for Parks
An Early Innovator
By Sonia Myrick

hen Mary Scheurer started working for the Portland Parks, Recreation and Cemeteries Department in 1978, there were five city
parks. Today, there are 15 park and recreation facilities, including the 8-mile, paved Portland Riverwalk trail that encircles the
city - an achievement of which Scheurer is most proud. A Portland native, she
grew up on a dairy farm and has only moved a half mile down the road from
her family home. Her love for her city is evident in the legacy she leaves behind,
having just retired after 37 years in the field. Not only was she instrumental in
growing Portland's park and recreation department, but also in mentoring many
current officials who got their start there. Fittingly, she received the Portland Area
Chamber of Commerce Citizen of the Year Award on February 8, 2016.
Changes
During the course of her career,
Scheurer has seen a number of
changes. When she first started in
the recreations department, she was
essentially a one-woman show -
programmer, secretary, director -
plus she was in charge of parks and
cemeteries where she did oversee
some employees. Imagine having to
create the scheduling for 80 softball

with our participants. "
Not all changes have been for the
better, however, as Scheurer points
to a marked decrease in the number
of house-league teams and a waning
interest in team sports in general. " I
worked in a city of about 4,000, but
we served a school district of about
12,000. We used to have really good
in-house youth girls softball and basketball leagues with enough teams to

Under [Scheurer's] leadership, Portland Parks
and Recreation was able to acquire 41 acres of
abandoned railroad grade in December 1987.
teams using a typewriter! For some,
this may be difficult to envision since
this technology was eclipsed by the
personal computer in the 1980s. Ever
the innovator, Scheurer welcomed
the advent of the personal computer and copier, which helped make
her job more manageable, and took
to social media, which she says, " is
a much easier way to make contact
32 Parks & Recreation

have between four and six teams in
each league. Recently, everyone has
gone to the travel program. Many of
the kids don't have the money or parents don't have the time to do travel,
but, as a result, we don't have enough
kids to have the local leagues. In addition, the top people who would have
been our coaches in those leagues
also went to the travel leagues. I feel

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some kids are getting left out.
" Another change is that more and
more people are interested in individual activities like walking and biking
and maybe less so in the team concepts because of how hectic our lives
are now. This has changed a lot from
the old days when a lot of people
were on teams - softball, basketball,
baseball, etc. "
A Visionary
On the site of a former sawmill,
where others saw a vacant lot covered with trees and debris, Scheurer
envisioned a park with playground
equipment and a pavilion, part of the
early stages of a walkable community. Under her leadership, Portland
Parks and Recreation was able to acquire 41 acres of abandoned railroad
grade in December 1987. " In 1990,
I completed a Michigan Department

March 2016 - Parks & Recreation

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