Met Council approves new parks plan

Despite criticism from some suburban park leaders, the Metropolitan Council has approved its long-term plan for regional parks.

The plan, approved Wednesday, will guide the Met Council's vision for regional parks in the seven-county metro area for the next 30 years. It's part of Thrive MSP 2040, the Met Council's long-term planning program, which also includes directives for housing, transportation and water resources.

"It's already an amazing … world-class system," said Jan Youngquist, Met Council parks planning analyst. "We're trying to build upon that."

A key new part of the plan: Make regional parks more equitable — nine out of 10 visitors are white residents — such as by building awareness through a new Met Council-funded ambassador program and requiring a certain percentage of each park agency's share of its Parks and Trails Legacy funds to be used to "connect people to the outdoors."

But some suburban regional park agencies say they are already addressing the equity issue and think the new plan gives the Met Council too much control over how public park agencies — which own and operate the regional parks — spend their funds.

"There has been no real meaningful dialogue with the Met Council. It's a case of 'Here's what you have to do, and if you don't like it, tough,' " Scott County administrator Gary Shelton told the Star Tribune in October.

Three Rivers Park District, the state's largest park system, declined to comment on the plan Thursday, and other counties' park directors didn't return messages.

After getting more than 450 comments from residents, community organizations and local government representatives, the draft plan was tweaked before being adopted Wednesday. Now, the Met Council will spend the rest of the year working with regional park agencies to implement it.

"We want to get input from them as well as other stakeholders on how we implement it," Youngquist said.

The metro area's regional park system is a network of more than 50 recreational spaces that includes Theodore Wirth Park in Minneapolis, Bunker Hills Regional Park in Coon Rapids and Lebanon Hills Regional Park in Eagan and Apple Valley.

The new plan, the Met Council says, addresses goals to make park resources available to a more racially diverse and aging population as the Twin Cities' demographics change.

"It's not an end point," Youngquist said of the plan. "It's a beginning point to set the stage for conversation."