Communities blossom in Nations in Bloom: the Nations in Bloom annual international awards competition is a worldwide celebration of what makes a community livable, sustainable and enjoyable.

Nations in Bloom is the world's leading environment-based awards competition that recognizes the best in environmental management practices, excellence in landscape design, success in heritage management, commitment to empowering local communities and forward planning. Annual awards are granted in five categories of daytime population, ranging from communities of up to 20,000 citizens to those with more than 1,000,000 citizens.

The objectives of Nations in Bloom are to encourage innovation and leadership in communities around the world. The awards recognize those communities that provide vibrant, sustainable and livable communities for residents, who in turn support the efforts to enhance the quality of life and participate in planning for the future.

Communities are judged by five criteria by an international panel of judges:

* Enhancement of the Landscape: How a community enhances its natural and man-made landscapes to create civic pride, facilitate enjoyment of recreation and improve the quality of life within the community.

* Heritage Management: How a community values, preserves and manages its natural resources, cultural heritage and historic sites.

* Environmentally Sensitive Practices: How a community pursues initiatives that result in sustainable management of the environment, including enhancing the quality of air, water and open space as well as reducing the consumption of natural resources.

* Community Involvement: How a community involves all sectors, including individuals, businesses and community organizations in the practical maintenance, management and planning of the local environment.

* Planning for the Future: How a community employs sensitive and creative planning techniques for the creation of sustainable and livable communities.

Nine U.S. communities were named finalists in last year's judging, which took place in late November and early December 2001 in Shenzen, People's Republic of China. Forty-one international jurisdictions in 18 countries were invited to-participate in the finals. Included in the group of finalists were Chicago, Ill., Smyrna, Tenn., Coralville, Iowa, Greenwood Village, Co., Des Moines, Iowa, Rochester, N.Y., Baltimore, Md., Los Angeles, Calif., and Miami-Dade County; Fla.. Three U.S. entries received overall awards in their respective population brackets, and a fourth received a special award for excellence in Heritage Management.

A behind-the-scenes look at the four award-winning U.S. entries--Coralville, Baltimore, Los Angeles and Miami-Dade County--shows how these communities have gained the reputation of being some of the most livable communities in the world.

CORALVILLE, IOWA

First Place, Category B (average daytime population of 20,001-75,000)

Coralville, Iowa, in east-central Iowa, is a city of great civic pride in the midst of the Great Plains. Coralville became interested in the Nations in Bloom competition principally through the efforts of its Parks and Recreation Department. "Nations in Bloom was a wonderful experience and a delightful chance to exchange `green' success stories with colleagues from around the world," says Juli Seydell Johnson, director of parks and recreation of Coralville.

Coralville's presentation demonstrated that, for its community, careful attention to the award-judging criteria was the path to a final award. In recent years, Coralville city leaders have initiated a number of projects that exemplify the spirit of Nations in Bloom. These have included heritage preservation projects; landscape and thoroughfare enhancements; partnerships with housing developers for open space planning; community involvement in redevelopment projects; and a number of environmentally sensitive best management practices in prairie grass preservation, brownfields restoration and wetland enhancements.

Coralville's success in its population category--the only first-place award granted to a U.S. city--shows that you don't have to be big to get it right.

BALTIMORE, MD.

Third Place, Category D (average daytime population of 200,001-1,000,000)

Affectionately known as "Charm City," Baltimore is a bustling industrial city near the Chesapeake Bay with a unique maritime history. Perhaps the best example of the transformation of this once-dingy city is the sparkling top-to-bottom renewal of the Inner Harbor. The Inner Harbor now boasts world-class destinations for enjoying entertainment, culture, education and American history. More than 13 million visitors make Baltimore a travel destination annually, and the combination of retail shops, restaurants and heritage attractions make Baltimore a vibrant, livable and enjoyable place to be.

Baltimore's award-winning presentation revolved around the facilities and parks of the Baltimore City Department of Recreation and Parks, but all agencies and departments contributed to the application. William Stine, chief horticulturalist, says, "It took a full year to gather information, take photos and prepare our application. We touched base with volunteers in other city agencies and in all in-house departments. We then systematically winnowed our information to prepare an application that followed the criteria closely and clearly."

Baltimore has one of the oldest and largest urban park systems in America. Now totaling over 5,700 acres in size, the city's first parks were acquired early in the 19th century. Mirroring the development of the urban parks movement, acquiring small urban squares gave way to setting aside large pastoral expenses and stream valley parks. The Olmsted brothers, sons of Frederick Law Olmsted, conceived an extensive park system for the Baltimore region that linked population centers and stream valleys by a hierarchy of parks and parkways. More than 100 years later, Baltimore boasts an outstanding collection of parks, historic sites and protected stream valleys.

Bolstered by a backbone of arboretums, historic mansions, urban squares and monuments, the Department of Recreation and Parks has employed many environmentally sensitive practices in managing its city's parks and gateways. Activities include a broad range of interpretive and educational programs, volunteer-led tree planting and buffer plantings on streamsides, and many partnerships with community organizations and watershed associations.

Baltimore's community involvement was described in the award nomination this way: "A web of partnerships, community associations, nonprofit associations, environmental organizations and others have come together in support of each others efforts to promote the ultimate goal of a greener, more livable Baltimore."

Planning for the future has been an integral part of Baltimore's forward thinking. Master plans have been recently completed or are under way for nearly all of the city's parks. Partnerships such as the recent commitment of the National Audubon Society to build an environmental learning center at Patterson Park, and the gateways project, which identifies and landscapes streets, bridges and entrances to Baltimore, exemplify the recognition that, even with outstanding city parks and historic amenities, the path for the future lies in creative partnerships, use of volunteers and alternative funding methods.

LOS ANGELES, CALIF.

Second Place, Category E (average daytime population more than 1,000,000)

Los Angeles needs little background introduction, even to an international panel of judges and competitors. Founded in 1769 by Franciscan missionaries and named "The City of the Angels," Los Angeles was incorporated in 1850. Today, Los Angeles encompasses a vast 470 square miles and is home to nearly four million residents within the city boundaries. LOs Angeles boasts 382 separate city parks, totaling more than 15,000 acres, including the largest municipal park in the country, Griffith Park, at 4,217 acres.

The highly developed urban character of much of the land within city boundaries caused the city to reassess the role of the hundreds of neighborhood parks in a citywide effort known as the CLASS (CLean and Safe Spaces) program. The mission of the CLASS program is to increase safety in neighborhoods by encouraging everyday family use of parks. The program was conceived to improve the physical aspects of the parks in high-risk areas and to develop meaningful programming targeted to youth ages 11-15.

The program has been a resounding success. It won the 2002 National Humanitarian Award. Natural landscapes in $7 parks have been cleaned, replanted and made safe. A "Youth Plus" component added reading rooms and computer areas to more than 20 parks. Hundreds of thousands of plants, trees and shrubs were planted. One community volunteer was quoted in the LOs Angeles Times as saying, "It's like baking a cake and having it turn out really well. I'm so, so happy."

Benefits are evident at all levels, including youth participation and involvement (from 300 to more than 4,000 teens participating), community events (health fairs, festivals and walkathons) and establishing active, participatory volunteers (park advisory boards).

Heritage management and environmental management are integral parts of the CLASS program. Preserving historical sites and a richly diverse cultural history are part of the mission of the Department of Parks and Recreation. Monuments, museums and historic sites serve as focal points for thematic festivals and special events. In addition, the CLASS Parks Task Force used environmentally sensitive practices to refurbish and rehabilitate the $7 designated parks. Reclaiming water, recycling materials and rehabilitating landscapes were a particular focus of CLASS program park retrofits.

Community involvement was critical to success. Because of a visible commitment by the mayor to rehabilitate one urban park every two weeks until every park site was finished, the entire staff of the department had to work in close cooperation with community leaders, other city departments and neighbors of the individual parks.

The CLASS program has been held up as a model pilot program for others to achieve the same level of standards at other decaying parks and facilities. Planning for the future, the city council authorized funds for 20 more parks in the next two years. The benefits of parks and recreation in Los Angeles have never been more apparent to the community when teens were presented with safe, healthful alternative to antisocial behavior, loitering and drug use.

MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, FLA.

Heritage Management Award

Miami-Dade County pulses with the beat of the dynamically changing South Florida landscape. Colorful, culturally diverse and vibrant with life, Miami-Dade exemplifies the evolution of South Florida. Within the last quarter-century, a pastoral rural-agricultural community has largely given up its agrarian roots and shifted to a tourism-based economy. However, while these changes have promoted an image of an ever-changing, ever-growing community, Miami-Dade also keeps a careful eye and a protective hand on the past.

Miami-Dade County's entry for Nations in Bloom concentrated primarily on the efforts made to preserve the rapidly disappearing cultural history landscape in this community. Known as a locality of important archeological resources for more than a century, Miami-Dade citizens were nonetheless surprised and delighted to learn of the discovery of the "Miami Circle" in 1998, the first and only complete Tequesta Indian structure ever found--and right in the middle of downtown Miami. A grassroots campaign to save the Circle saw overwhelming community support emerge for acquiring, preserving and interpreting the site, which is now in public ownership and benefiting from a public planning process to share the educational and historical values with the city.

Miami-Dade County's impeccable attention to historic site preservation was at the heart of its Nations in Bloom presentation. Numerous structural and nonstructural sites have been preserved for public use, and made available to the public for traditional as well as creative uses.

Preserving the historic landscape in Miami-Dade is a priority for all sectors of the community. The destruction of one of the most significant archeological, architectural and environmental sites, known as the Deering Estate at Cutler, along Biscayne Bay in Hurricane Andrew resulted in an unparalleled $12 million dollar rehabilitation and restoration effort involving many organizations, businesses and individuals.

Miami-Dade County masterfully demonstrated to the judges and other contestants how a community that's committed to valuing, preserving and managing its cultural heritage for the benefit of its community is a fitting winner of the Heritage Management Special Category award of Nations in Bloom.

Winning Combinations

Several common themes resonate in each of these award-winning nominations, according to those knowledgeable about the competition.

"These communities were winners before they entered the competition, but they brought home the awards because of their commanding knowledge and outstanding presentations," says Barry Tindall, NRPA's director of public policy and a long-time observer of Nations in Bloom contestants. "Each of the finalists had good visual aids and made good presentations, but it was evident that the winning applicants had extensive contacts with all parts of the community. They had touched base with everyone in town who had anything to do with city services, and they knew their facts."

Other vital components for success were a high degree of citizen involvement; solid, science-based natural resource management strategies and attention to detail in each of the five judging categories. (Each category was worth a maximum of 20 percent of the total score.) Less-than-adequate answers in just one category have knocked leading contestants out of the competition.

William Stine, of the Baltimore Parks and Recreation Department, says, "The presentations of finalists in our judging group ranged from professional videos and high-end graphics down to simple slides and mounted photos. Whatever level of visual aids that were used was not as important as the context. The judges did not seem to be seeking a demonstration of high-tech excellence. What seemed most valuable in the presentation was to present a true story of your community's experiences." Adds Stine, "You need to show failures as well as successes. In showing your weaknesses, you have an opportunity to show what you are going to do about meeting your goals."

Alan Smith, chief executive of Nations in Bloom, says, "There are themes that run across all categories of finalists, from the very small towns to the largest urban cities. In each winning entry, it was evident that the applicants were thinking and questioning as they prepared their applications. They were determined to find the best practices in their communities and to look for innovation wherever it was occurring."

Adds Smith, "The judges seem to look for a desire and a willingness on the part of the contestants to seek out and exchange views. The finalists do not come just to win this competition--they come looking to find partners and to learn from others. One of the principal objectives of Nations in Bloom is the exchange of knowledge and best practice across national and cultural borders. Participation in Nations in Bloom should be considered an investment with the potential of great returns. No community's challenges are unique, and no community has all the answers. Each year entrants are surprised to learn that other communities in other countries and other cultures are facing similar challenges. As a result of Nations in Bloom participation, communities form partnerships that either save money or accelerate improvements in environmental management. There is a city in Sweden that asserts they now save three-quarters of a million dollars per year from ideas they gained from the Nations in Bloom competition. This exemplifies the spirit of Nations in Bloom winners."

Is Your Community Ready to Enter?

Looking over past American winners of Nations in Bloom awards, it is evident that local parks and recreation departments--are most often at the heart of winning entries. It's equally evident that success builds on success, and the communities that enter Nations in Bloom seem to continue to find innovative, creative ways to address environmental management and improve the quality of life.

Do you think your parks and recreation department, in partnership with your community, have what it takes to prepare a winning application? If you're the kind of community described here, you may be closer to success than you think. As the experiences of the award-winning communities of Coralville, Baltimore, Los Angeles and Miami-Dade have shown, the quality of life in their respective communities has been improved and enhanced by their collective efforts to show their best to the world at large in the Nations in Bloom.

U.S. Communities Finalists in 2002 Competition

Four communities have been selected by an international panel of judges to go on to the final stage of this year's Nations in Bloom competition, which occurred earlier this month in Stuttgart, Germany. At the final stage, communities are invited to make a verbal presentation, supported by video and slides, and then face a question-and-answer session from the judges. American finalists named were:

Category C (75,001-200,000): Modesto, Calif., Operations and Maintenance Department

Category D (200,001-1,000,000): Rochester, N.Y., Department of Parks, Recreation and Human Services

Category E (Over 1,000,000): Chicago, Ill., Chicago Park District 

Category E (Over 1,000,000): Phoenix, Ariz., Department of Parks, Recreation and Libraries

Nations in Bloom Special Cash Grant Award

Nations in Bloom implemented a special cash grant award in 2002, the Bursary Awards, to fund innovative projects in eligible communities that further the objectives of a livable community and satisfy, one or more of the Nations in Bloom judging criteria. There are no restrictions on format for the awards, which are worth approximately $15,000.

2003 Application Information

Applications for the 2003 Nations in Bloom competition will be available by Oct. 31 at www.nationsinbloom.com or from Barry Tindall, Director of Public Policy, NRPA, 1901 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Suite 900, Washington, DC 20006. For Nations in Bloom program information, contact Tindall at 202-887-0290 or [e-mail].

Richard Dolesh is senior policy associate in NRPA's Public Policy Division.