November 2019 - Parks & Recreation - 48

NRPA UPDATE
CAPRA: A Tangible Guidepost
for the City of Fort Collins
By Wade Troxell and Darin Atteberry

he city of Fort Collins, Colorado, is fortunate to have residents who
recognize and respect the positive impact that park and recreation
opportunities bring to our community. From expertly planned and
well-maintained parks and trails, to affordable and diverse recreation classes and programs, we are surrounded by concrete evidence that park and
recreation services are worth investing in.

A Strategic View
The CAPRA accreditation road
map is thorough, time-intensive
and rigorous, but the benefits are
many. The process allowed our
Parks, Recreation and PPD departments to take a strategic look
at all areas of our operations and
benchmark against best practices
from across the country. When
the city of Fort Collins received
the Malcolm Baldrige National
Quality Award in 2017, it was
the result of many years of diligent work evaluating and improving our operations. CAPRA

The city of Fort Collins celebrates the Fourth
of July with a parade.

Parks & Recreation

| N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 9 | W W W. PA R K S A N D R E C R E AT I O N . O R G

PHOTOGRAPHS COURTESY OF THE CITY OF FORT COLLINS

When the directors of our
Parks, Recreation and Park Planning and Development (PPD)
teams began the accreditation
process from NRPA's Commission for Accreditation of
Park and Recreation Agencies
(CAPRA), we were confident it
would be a valuable process. Under the thoughtful guidance from
leadership and remarkable contributions of the staff involved,
CAPRA revealed to us areas
where we could continue to improve, while also shining a light
on all that was going well.

was a natural next step, guiding
us to drill down and examine our
park and recreation services with
similar rigor and to identify ways
we can improve these important
community services. CAPRA encouraged us to determine how,
why and where we could make
adjustments that would open
doors of possibility in all our program areas.
Some of the immediate benefits we've seen from the CAPRA
process are improved systems for
our teams. These include more robust and reliable risk assessments,
improved connectivity among the
three departments responsible for
parks and recreation, stronger connections with our frontline staff,
who invested in the process, and a
more solid vision for where we can
go in the future.
Another great opportunity on
the CAPRA journey came directly to our mid-level employees involved in the evaluations. Because
of the team-driven approach used
throughout the accreditation period, staff were empowered to think
critically and strategically about
their program areas and evaluate
where changes could be made
from the ground up. This close
work, together, elevated their understanding and ownership of
the interconnected nature of our
Parks, Recreation and PPD departments. Staff now have a deeper appreciation for their colleagues
and a more complete picture of
how the work of these respective

November 2019 - Parks & Recreation

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