Mark your calendars: Registration for January-March programs is coming soon! Oak Park resident registration opens Saturday, Dec 6 at 8:30A. Non-resident registration opens Saturday, Dec 13 at 8:30A.

Organizational Excellence

The Park District strives to be a model government organization both in the Oak Park community as well as in the field of parks and recreation. The following charts measure the current quality of the Park District’s efforts regarding risk management, environmental sustainability, operations, and in accomplishing goals and completing plan objectives. In order for staff to be able to effectively serve our external customers, it’s important that staff are supporting each other internally to the highest level possible.

Staff Ideas Implemented

Launch Pad is the Park District’s innovation platform where employees can share and discuss new ideas. This image shows the amount of innovative ideas, projects or initiatives the Park District has planned from this platform. Click on the image for more details.

FAQs

Staff, Board, Customers, Community

Prior to 2020, the District used nonresident fees to fund innovation. Those funds were repurposed in 2020 to start the Childcare Discount Model financial assistance program, and combined with the pandemic in 2020 the District saw a sharp decline in innovation engagement. Staff are happy to report that engagement over the last two years is up and exceeding 2019 levels.

The turn around is attributed to the District’s Innovation Committee as well as dedicated funding for the BIG idea program.

To strive for operational excellence to encourage organizational excellence.

Environmental Report Card Score

Volunteer hours include the total number of volunteer hours reported by Park District supervisors at facilities, special events, citizen committees, and other efforts as well as the amount it would cost the Park District if those volunteers had to be replaced by staff working at minimum wage.

FAQs

Environmental Sustainability Advisory Committee, Community, Staff

In 2025, the Park District received a 94% score, up from 90% in 2023.

Overall, the Park District of Oak Park scores highly in its environmental stewardship efforts. We are earmarked as an agency that is an environmental leader in the field. Staff continuously look for ways to improve our impact on the environment with everything that we do.

To strategically align organizational efforts for more sustainability, encouraging organizational excellence.

Accreditations & Awards

The Park District works to be a leader among park and recreation agencies throughout the country. By voluntarily submitting itself to the above accreditation and awards processes, the community and staff can be assured that the Park District meets or exceeds current industry standards and has processes in place to best serve the Oak Park community.

Alliance for Innovation Robert J. Havlick Award for Innovation in Local Government for our submission, “Launch Pad: Getting Good Ideas Off the Ground.