Advocates of greenspace equity work to make parks and gardens accessible in underserved, park-poor communities.
Although Los Angeles is renowned for its beautiful beaches, mountains and amazing weather year-round, one thing the city is not known for is for it's equal access to lush, open and green spaces. The truth is that most low-income communities in Los Angeles, getting to a safe, quality park is not easy.
Compared with the rest of the nation, Los Angeles and its neighboring cities have a lot of catching up to do. Parkland makes up only 10 percent of the city, while other major cities like New York boast double that. At $82 per resident, Los Angeles ranked 45th in a 2015 survey of park expenditures in the nation's top 100 cities. In many of the region's poorest communities, disproportionately low rates of park space exist alongside disproportionately high rates of chronic conditions such as diabetes and obesity.
Parks are the heart of a healthy community and part of the complex fabric critical to creating healthy, economically viable, thriving communities. While other infrastructure needs tend to dominate the headlines - broken water pipes, pothole repairs, schools, sidewalks - community health, social justice, business and environment advocates are raising awareness about the need for park funding. But in order to build more green space, Los Angeles needs another kind of green: park funding.
Here in Los Angeles, for example, county parks lost hundreds of millions in revenues. Without that money, youth programs, maintenance and construction of new parks are at risk. A coalition of organizations that includes From Lot to Spot, the Los Angeles Neighborhood Land Trust, Trust for Public Land and Parks Now is working to restore those funds and make the case that investment in our parks is an investment in the future health and safety of our communities.
For the past eight years, From Lot To Spot (FLTS) has been fighting for greenspace equity and ensuring these spaces will have lasting impacts by putting the transformative power of green space in pockets of the region that don't have enough park space to play. Currently, FLTS is planting 100 trees in Lennox, a low-income park-poor community underneath the LAX flight path, to absorb carbon emissions and clean the air that residents breathe and ensuring that the community has the same tree canopy other areas of the County have. With creative partnerships FLTS has also built parks in previously underused lots in Hawthorne, Lawndale, Los Angeles and Lynwood, park-poor communities where many residents don't have a community park that they could easily walk to from their home.
FLTS has counted on the support of local governments and grants, but future investments need to be supported with a dedicated source of funding that will make it easier to give all Angelenos access to the quality parks that they want and deserve.
By building parks and gardens with community members, residents become more invested in the future of their parks.
Fixing pFof how we pay for park space. In Los Angeles, park funds are generated where construction takes place, creating an imbalance of resources for low-income communities that don't receive a lot of private investment. State parks are going through a transformation process focused on bringing in diverse users, but that will require thinking about how to build more park space in urban communities that need them the most.
An adequate level of resources is necessary for the maintenance of existing parks and construction of new spaces. Some of those resources will have to come from voters, as support from federal and state government has dwindled. It's an investment worth making, but voters need to feel like they are getting a fair share in the deal. That will require building parks in communities that need more green spaces, keeping parks safe, and using parks as tools to revitalize neighborhoods.
It is likely that in 2016, voters will have the opportunity to approve a dedicated funding stream to build new parks in Los Angeles County, support youth and senior programs, and help maintain and enhance the existing park resources that we enjoy today. FLTS is working with many partners so that voters understand that parks are good for the health of our families and environment, the vibrancy of our communities and the economic vitality of the region.
People need to feel that nature is theirs to enjoy and protect. Previous state park bonds passed with overwhelming support from communities of color, and in order to continue engaging the future face of California in protecting our natural resources, resources need to be fairly distributed so that all Californians can enjoy the outdoors. It's time to create that same and necessary support here in LA County.
Every time we help convert an empty lot into a vibrant park or community garden, we are planting the seed of conservation among the residents who now have a safe place to enjoy nature. Every resident should be able to easily walk to a neighborhood park. Every child should be able to enjoy local programs and recreational activities. Every family should be able to get away from the bustle of city life and have a safe place to meet their neighbors and enjoy the refreshing respite that parks provide. In order to achieve this vision, we need to make sure we are properly investing in local parks. It's an investment worth making and one we can no longer ignore.
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
Advocates of greenspace equity work to make parks and gardens accessible in underserved, park-poor communities. 
