Setting the stage for a special event: coordinating special fitness events is a complicated task for park and recreation departments, but can reap huge benefits.

Once the noise subsides, the stage is clear and the park has emptied, the park and recreation department staff are tasked with picking up garbage, surveying the damage and replenishing their supplies. The park is almost unrecognizable with strewn plastic cups and finish line tape covering its grounds. The amount of hours involved in coordinating a large-scale special fitness event means more than just printing fliers and preparing park property; in many cases, the unforeseen tasks can mean additional costs.

Road races have steadily increased by 60 percent since 1993, according to the non-profit association Running USA, and more than 36 million people participate in events ranging from 5K races to triathlons. These races are taking place everywhere, from large cities to small towns, and bringing both benefits and challenges to the local park and recreation department.

Carrollton, Ga., has hosted a triathlon since 1995. The race was initially held in Atlanta, which is about 50 miles east of the town, but it was moved due to traffic problems. Since the move, the Carrollton Triathlon has consistently attracted around 400 participants to the town with a population of 20,000, and is considered a sprint triathlon. Participants begin at Lake Carroll for a quarter-mile swim, followed by a 14-mile bike ride through the town and surrounding county. The race finishes with a 3.4-mile run that circles the municipal lake. The triathlon is coordinated by the Carrollton Parks, Recreation and Cultural Arts Department, and at one point was produced solely by the department.

Glen McGinnis, executive assistant for special projects, says the park department decided to produce the triathlon in 1998 after a bad experience with a corporate race coordinator who never paid the department the negotiated $1,500 rental fee for use of the department's property. "It was hard that year to do it that way because we just weren't in the race business necessarily," recalls McGinnis.

Producing any fitness competition requires coordination from police, fire, rescue and waste management, among other municipal groups. Race coordinators are outside contractors who handle the majority of the mediation duties involved in managing a special event. Without a coordinator, McGinnis said the additional responsibilities the department encountered included taking care of registration fees, payments to the different groups involved, supplies such as T-shirts and aid stations, sponsorships and coordination of volunteers. What normally would have been taken care of by the race coordinator was now the responsibility of the park department. McGinnis said his department spent more than $ 10,000 for the event and only broke even for its trouble.

After that year, McGinnis found a local race coordinator who has been working with the park department ever since. "Sometimes you learn from your mistakes and you move on and you find somebody who's more reputable and a better company to deal with," he says. "We tried it ourselves--that was not the best solution--so now we found a great company that has really helped us out a lot."

Even though many special fitness events around the country take place on park property, park departments are usually secondary partners in the production of their event because of their inability to supply necessary staff and volunteers. The Honolulu Marathon in Hawaii is an example of this situation. When the marathon first began in 1973, it was produced by the Honolulu Parks and Recreation Department. Initiated by the Mid-Pacific Road Runners Club (MPRR), the park department provided the staff, supplies and money to produce the event. MPRR helped with running logistics and setting the course, which snakes through six public parks of the downtown city on Oahu.

Tommy Kono, then a member of the park department's recreation support services staff, helped produce the marathon, which attracted 162 people that year. Hosting a small marathon was easy for his park department because "parks and recreation people can take orders and give orders," he says. "They're very good at that kind of stuff because they deal with the public." In addition to 30 stall, volunteers provided the extra presence needed at aid stations and registration tables.

But the success of the marathon soon pushed the park department out of the producer role, and into a facilitator role. "The parks and recreation would come in to help stage things, but as it grew, the parks and recreation [department] started withdrawing because it started taking up too much manpower," Kono says.

After the fourth year, the municipal departments such as police and fire no longer wanted to volunteer for the event because it required too much of their staff and became a burden on their budget. Other costs associated with the marathon, including supplies and maintenance, were too much for the park department budget to handle. In 1977, the non-profit Honolulu Marathon Association was formed and volunteers began handling the event, which had grown to more than 4,000 participants. The departments' role is to get all these things going; and once it starts going, we want it to be self-sustaining," Kono says.

In addition to the marathon, Kono started jogging clinics. The weekly events began as a way to get people interested in exercise who may have been intimidated by long-distance running. "I was looking at all the ways of trying to get people physically active," Kono says.

The clinics grew just as quickly as the marathon, and by the late 1970s, there were about 700 people attending the clinics. By this time, the park and recreation department gradually stepped away and created community branches for volunteers to take over the clinics. "It's the never-ending problem of creating things and then staffing them," Kono says.

Starting events and eventually releasing them to the community is widespread for many park and recreation departments. In Chicago, the annual Bike Chicago event has grown from one city-sponsored event to a three-month-long event hosted by different community groups.

Fifteen years ago, the initial event was the Bike to Work Rally, which was led by the Mayor's Office of Special Events. The rally encouraged people to bike to work and held door prizes and gave away T-shirts in Daley Plaza. After two years, the event expanded to a week and eventually a month of fitness events. It was at this point that the mayor's office enlisted help from other municipal agencies including the Chicago Park District.

The park district coordinated several neighborhood park events, bike safety clinics, and tours through its parks for pedestrians and bicycle enthusiasts. Except for two large-scale events, Bike the Drive and Chicago Moves, the park district helps facilitate almost 100 community events during Bike Chicago.

"The local staff at the parks are pretty much responsible for helping to coordinate the events," says David Kennedy, deputy director of recreation and programs for the Park District. "But most of the events will somehow involve the community."

Bike the Drive is produced by the non-profit Chicagoland Bicycle Federation with help from the park district. The morning event has about 18,000 people biking along major thoroughfares. The department is mainly involved with the start and finish lines, which are held at one of its big parks, Grant Park. "We are just there to kind of make sure that it's a sate and friendly environment, and the park district isn't being trashed at the same time or any destruction happening," says Kennedy. Staff from the park district oversee the set tip of portable toilets, trucks and aid stations to ensure the protection of park property. To offset the costs, the agency charges a rental fee of about $15,000.

In contrast, Chicago Moves Day is a public event that encourages people to keep active. Initially started as a 20-minute exercise, it has grown to two hours. Chicago Moves Day attracts more than 1,000 people to Daley Plaza, and offers fitness activities such as Pilates, yoga, cycling and aerobics. "It's part of our mission to get the kids more active," says Colleen Lammel-Harmon, fitness senior program specialist for the Park District and past chair of the Mayor's Fitness Council, a department under the park district that organizes Chicago Moves Day.

While special fitness events require a myriad of details and complicated coordination with public and private groups, the endless benefits to the community help fulfill the park and recreation department's mission. "It's all in the nature of parks and recreation," says McGinnis in Carrollton, Ga. "You want to offer as many fun, exciting, leisure activities to the citizens as you can."

Impacting the Community

Holding a large-scale special event usually attracts more than just the nearby communities. Almost one-third of the 36 million people who participate in fitness competitions have a household income of more than $75,000, and they are willing to spend that money when visiting places during their events. Successful events usually generate revenue for the city, and that usually means big bucks in next year's budget for the park and recreation department.

In Carrollton, Ga., the annual triathlon brings in $130,000 to the town, and was the catalyst for attracting other fitness events such as the state gymnastics meet and the state police and fire games. According to Jonathan Dorsey, executive director of the Carrollton Area Convention and Visitors Bureau, about 50 percent of the town's total visitor revenue comes from recreation events. "Primarily, recreation tournaments drive ... the biggest single portion of our visitor market," he says.

Every year in December, the Honolulu Department of Parks and Recreation helps coordinate its marathon, which garners more than $95 million in economic impact to its city, ranking it second in the nation for most revenue generated from fitness events. Only the ING New York City Marathon ranks first, bringing in more than $140 million for the city. Now in its 32nd year, the marathon will attract an estimated 26,000 participants. It is considered the third largest marathon in the country, and ranks sixth in the world. "The Honolulu Marathon is probably the only thing that attracts so many people," says Tommy Kono, who helped coordinate the marathon from the Honolulu Parks and Recreation Department.

Supplying the opportunity for a city or town to generate extra revenue more than a decade ago was considered a small aspect of a park and recreation agency's role in the community. But with budget cuts trickling down to all departments, extra rental fees from special events can amount to a significant portion of a park and recreation department's budget, as well as more money allocated based on economic impact.

Special events have increasingly become a major part of park and recreation departments' programming since 1991, when the benefits-based approach was introduced. Benefits-based events do not focus on their social outcomes, but rather on what these events do for the community at-large. According to John Crompton, who authored Measuring the Economic Impact of Visitors to Sports Tournaments and Special Events, illustrating why your event has helped the community in the areas of economic impact, social injustice and environmental stewardship will help secure funding for your park and recreation programs.

"Our goal here is to provide as many quality programs as we can," says Glen McGinnis, executive assistant for special projects at Carrollton Parks, Recreation and Cultural Arts Department. "Obviously, you don't want to do it on a losing end financially."

TOP 10 REVENUE-GENERATING RACES *

$145 million

2005 ING New York City Marathon

New York, N.Y.

$90.7 million

2004 Honolulu Marathon

Oahu, Hawaii

$80 million

2003 LaSalle Bank Chicago Marathon 

Chicago, Ill.

$60 million

2004 City of Los Angeles Marathon

Los Angeles, Calif.

$41.4 million

2004 P.F. Chang's Rock 'n' Roll 

Arizona Marathon

Phoenix-Scottsdale-Tempe in Arizona

$29 million

2003 Under Armour Baltimore Marathon 

Baltimore, Md.

$12 million

2004 HP Houston Marathon 

Houston, Texas 

$9.6 million

2004 Lilac Bloomsday 12K

Spokane, Wash.

$8.5 million

2003 Grandma's marathon/2003 Crim

Festival of Races

Duluth, Minn.

$6.8 million

2004 Rite Aid Cleveland Marathon/10K

Cleveland, Ohio 

* Source: Running USA, www.runningusa.org