Pacific Southwest region.

It's a little known fact that Nike CEO and founder Phil Knight, who grew up in Southeast Portland, was a Portland Parks & Recreation summer parks director at gents Park in 1960. This year, as Portland Parks & Recreation kicked off its popular Summer Playgrounds Program and readied itself for a summer attendance of more than 75,000 children, it announced that long-time corporate partner Nike donated $25,000 to fund five full-time coordinators for the 2003 program. The live parks slated to receive NikeGO programming this summer are: Alberta Park, Argay Park, Essex Park, Irving Park, NE 7th and Pier Park.

NikeGO is a grassroots community affairs program with a mission to increase physical activity in youth by offering children ages 8-15 the motivation to discover the joy of movement and the fun of physical activity. The program targets serious lifestyle issues that are leading to significantly increased obesity, diabetes and eating disorders among youth from all communities across the country. Increasing physical activity is the goal.

The Summer Playground Programs operate Monday through Friday throughout the summer. Summer playground hours are typically 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and daily programming consists of structured and non-structured activities including sports, games, mad arts and crafts. In addition to providing free activities for youth, the playground programs serve free lunches to participants; more than 62,000 free lunches were served in 2003.

Approximately 5,500 people gathered in June for the unprecedented opportunity to bike and walk the historic Arroyo Seco Parkway, a recently designated National Scenic Byway, for the inaugural ArroyoFest celebration of the Arroyo Seco region in Los Angeles County. The purpose of the event was to raise awareness about the unique transportation, environmental mud cultural challenges and opportunities surrounding the Arroyo. The Parkway parallels the Arroyo Seco, a 22-mile canyon stream that flows from the Angeles National Forest through several cities and communities before joining the Los Angeles River northeast of downtown Los Angeles. Efforts to restore the 46.6-square-mile Arroyo Seco watershed have been catalyzed through the vision of local nonprofit organizations North East Trees and the Arroyo Seco Foundation, which have been receiving assistance through the Rivers, Trails and Conservation Assistance Program (RTCA). RTCA assisted in the development of the watershed restoration feasibility study through outreach, research and document development. As part of outreach efforts, RTCA provided support to the planning and execution of the ArroyoFest event which was largely coordinated through Occidental College's Urban and Environmental Policy Institute. The watershed project has also received support through RTCA's Art & Community Landscapes program. For more information, contact Anne Dove at [e-mail] or 323-441-9307.

The League of California Cities has published Open and Public III: A User's Guide to the Ralph M. Brown Act, 2000. This easy-to-read guide is full of valuable information covering all aspects of the state's open meeting law for local agencies. The guide pays extra attention to problem areas and, in some cases, offers suggestions on how to minimize potential problems. For more information, go to www.cacities.org.

In June, the Los Angeles Center for Educational Research received a $15,000 grant from the Amateur Athletic Foundation to support after-school programs at local middle schools. The AAF is endowed with surplus funds from the 1984 Olympic Games and awards grants to benefit local youth sports programs. For more information about AAF, visit www.aafla.org.