Helen Gym

Helen Gym sat down with our Parks & Rec Heroes Teen Podcast Team for a virtual conversation about her run for mayor. Her answers to our candidate questionnaire are below the video.

Parks & Rec Funding

Understaffing of Parks & Rec hurts us all but the pain is not shared equally. How will you ensure that Parks & Rec best serves our most vulnerable communities?

As Mayor, I am committed to eliminating program desserts and making serious investments in Parks and Recreation centers, particularly in neighborhoods that have been overlooked and under-resourced for far too long. For years, I’ve fought for evening and weekend hours and full staffing at Parks and Recreation centers because I know that when our young people have the supports, structure, and programming they need — they thrive.

This is especially important in the neighborhoods in Philadelphia facing high rates of gun violence, where young people and community members need safe, joyful, and well-resourced spaces to play and learn and more than ever. In my administration the Parks and Recreation Department will play a critical role in providing early morning to late evening wrap-around support for youth that extends through the summer months and pays special attention to mental health support, job training, and conflict mediation skills. As Mayor, I will treat our Parks and Rec centers like the vital community anchors that they are and invest in the facilities, staffing, and programming accordingly.

Philadelphia spends $50 per capita each year on Parks & Rec operations. Baltimore spends $125. What amount would you plan to reach by the end of your first term?

By the end of my first term, I want to fund Parks and Rec operations at the levels that would ensure full, safe staffing levels on evenings and weekends in every neighborhood.

Will you lead an effort to find more dedicated funding sources for Parks & Rec?

Yes. I called for full funding of our Parks and Recreation Department pre-pandemic, and succeeded in a historic gain in funding for libraries and Parks and Recreation hiring in the 2022 budget — but it’s clear that our work cannot stop there. Funding levels have barely returned to where they were at prior to the 2009 financial crisis. I am dedicated to increasing Parks & Rec funding to ensure that all Philadelphians have access to safe, clean, joyful, and quality outdoor spaces.

Will you support continued funding of Rebuild?

Yes. While on the City Council, I was a strong supporter of Rebuild and I will continue to champion the urgent revitalization of our city’s parks, libraries, and playgrounds as Mayor. While the Kenney Administration did important work to kickstart Rebuild, I think the initiative still has a long way to go to live up to its full potential. As Mayor, I will grow funding for the Rebuild program to revitalize, decarbonize, and grow our neighborhood public spaces. This is how we lift our city up, neighborhood by neighborhood, and make our residents feel like this city loves them back.

What qualities are you looking for in your Parks & Rec Commissioner?

As Mayor, I will hire a Parks and Recreation Commissioner that truly believes in the transformative role that our parks, playgrounds, and recreation facilities have to play in community safety, youth enrichment, and neighborhood revitalization. I will hire someone who is equity-minded and acutely aware of the needs of Philadelphia's diverse communities, and who has innovative ideas to expand quality Parks and Rec programming to every neighborhood in the city. I will hire someone who sees Parks and Recreation as key to stabilizing our city, empowering our neighborhoods, and uplifting our young people.

Safe & Clean Sites

 Do you see a connection between keeping our parks clean and well-maintained and reducing gun violence?

Yes. Research backs this up!

 How will you make sure Philadelphia’s 300 parks and rec centers are safe and clean?

As Mayor, I will increase funding levels and ensure safe staffing so that all rec centers are clean and well-maintained.

What will you do about short dumping in parks and empty lots?

Illegal dumping is less likely to take place in well-lit, well-maintained, and well-managed neighborhoods. My administration will focus on making important investments in communities up front and improving how our city delivers services in order to not only address illegal dumping and unsafe environmental conditions, but prevent it from occurring in the first place.

As a Councilmember, I was a proud champion for the Just Services budget campaign, which made significant investments in cleaning and greening vacant lots, improving street lighting, towing abandoned cars, and addressing hazardous building conditions. As Mayor, I will continue this work, which has been proven to reduce violence and improve neighborhood conditions. My administration will lead an immediate campaign to clean and green communities – increasing trash pickups, sealing 50% of vacant lots and towing 10,000 abandoned cars in my first year. Cleaning and greening our communities will not only make them safer, but is a key strategy in preventing illegal dumping and the toxic accumulation of waste.

As Mayor, I will restore the Zero Waste and Litter Cabinet to coordinate anti-waste efforts across city government.

More Recreation Programming

What are your plans to increase neighborhood jobs for teens and young adults? What role will Parks & Rec play in your plans?

I believe that it is essential for youth to be connected to employment opportunities, particularly during the summer, to keep them engaged and focused on viable and safe opportunities to earn money for themselves and their families. A Gym administration will:

-Implement an annual Summer Safety Plan that ensures rigorous and well-funded paid work opportunities and programming for youth, especially in the zip codes most impacted by gun violence;

-Expand the outreach of the WorkReady program to prioritize youth in the zip codes with the highest rates of gun violence and to place a greater share of youth likely to be impacted by violence, and ensure a premium wage of at least $15/hour and access to sufficient hours;

-For Parks & Rec involvement in particular - expand CLIP and/or other LandCare programs to employ young people; and

-Explore Department of Commerce programs to provide tax incentives and grants to local businesses and organizations who hire, train and mentor youth, and ensure that these businesses and organizations receive technical support around youth mentoring, youth development, and trauma-informed professional supervision.

Parks & Rec, like other City agencies, faces serious challenges in hiring both permanent and seasonal staff. What steps will you take to fix the City’s broken hiring process?

As a City Councilmember, I called for full funding of our Parks and Recreation Department pre-pandemic, and succeeded in a historic gain in funding for libraries and Parks and Recreation hiring in the 2022 budget. I will continue this work as Mayor. My administration will work with the Civil Service Board and unions to modernize our hiring process for city agencies to ensure we can appropriately meet the public's need for services.

How will you expand recreation programming across Philadelphia?

As stated in previous responses, a Gym Administration will expand Parks & Recreation funding with a particular focus on expanding staffing, extending evening and weekend operating hours, improving facilities, establishing mental health supports, and providing other services in all communities, with a specific focus on the neighborhoods that are disproportionately impacted by the gun violence crisis.

How will you increase the number of after-school activity slots for students? What role will Parks & Rec play in your plans?

As Mayor, I will work with the District to recognize, value, and expand the number of support staff in schools, including afterschool program facilitators to ensure that students have around the clock access to enrichment activities. In addition to school-based afterschool programs, I will expand recreation center based programming through increased Parks & Rec operation funding.

What is your favorite thing to do at a park or rec center?

I love sitting with my family in the park on a bright Sunday morning and people-watching. It brings me so much joy to see kids playing sports, toddlers on the playground, and neighbors walking their dogs. It’s such a beautiful cross-section of Philadelphia’s character.

Grow The Urban Forest

What steps will you take to reduce heat islands in Philadelphia? Will street trees be a part of your plans?

We should think about increasing Philadelphia’s tree canopy through the lenses of public health, racial equity, climate justice, and community safety. I believe deeply in the research of Dr. Eugenia South, whose work shows profound mental and physical health benefits to cleaning and greening our neighborhoods. This is why neighborhood greening is a key element of my community safety plan. Dr. South’s large scale ongoing NIH-funded study will provide us with important models to scale up.

There’s growing recognition that lack of tree cover correlates to historic redlining, and threatens to significantly exacerbate inequity caused by climate change. I have strongly advocated for and championed increased funding, including winning nearly $2 million to begin implementation of the tree plan, as well as Neighborhood Preservation Initiative funds for alley tree maintenance, and investment of federal relief funds into vacant lot remediation.

I support strengthening standards for protecting heritage trees, preserving the existing canopy and increasing tree planting requirements for new development, as well as setting fees that will help support maintenance needs. Additionally, I support the creation of an Office of Urban Forestry, which is a recommendation in the tree plan.

We cannot achieve our goals in expanding tree cover without committing to ongoing investment in creating capacity to maintain it; ensuring that residents have access to city assistance to deal with currently overgrown trees and to keep future trees healthy will be critical to building the public support that will ultimately let Philadelphia significantly scale up tree planting in the neighborhoods most in need.

Do you support the Philadelphia Tree Plan goal to reach 30% tree canopy in 30 years?

Yes

Philadelphia has a waiting list of 23,500 trees to be pruned or removed. How will you eliminate this backlog? 

We must increase staffing levels for tree maintenance and neighborhood safety. I believe we should fund a major workforce program to train Philadelphia public school students for family-sustaining union public sector jobs as city arborists to plant and maintain the urban canopy.