On Tuesday, January 29th, the Parks & Recreation Master Plan Committee voted to approve the much-anticipated draft Parks & Recreation Master Plan (pending final revision of typos and errors.) The Master Plan makes recommendations on how the town should prioritize development of parks and recreation land, facilities and programs in the coming years.
The draft plan was not shared with anyone beyond the committee members at the meeting, and I can’t yet find it online. BUT, you can check out video from the meeting here.
The committee voted 5-1 to approve the plan and send it along to the Parks & Recreation Commission for their review and deliberation.
Note, the report reviewed Jan. 29th pertains only to land, parks and programs that are under the current jurisdiction of the Parks & Recreation Commission. What started as a combined effort by the Dedham Parks and Recreation Commission and the Open Space and Recreation Committee to develop a "Parks and Recreation and Open Space Master Plan and Open Space and Recreation Plan Update" split into two separate efforts and two reports through the course of the committee’s work. The “Open Space & Recreation Plan" is still in draft form and has not been presented at a public meeting yet.
I’ve followed this process closely over the past two and a half years because I know how important it is for Dedham’s future. It will require strong leadership, community engagement and creative problem solving to integrate recommendations from the Parks & Recreation plan, the Open Space plan, the Schools Master Plan (gearing up) and the townwide Master Plan (kicking off now) to prioritize and phase the town’s investments to ensure we’re meeting the needs of the community and we don’t leave anyone behind.
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