Partner Profile: Todd Clark
Akron Civic Commons is highlighting the neighbors and partners that make our work in downtown Akron, Ohio & Erie Canal Park, and Summit Lake possible. This week, we’re highlighting Todd Clark, Recreation Supervisor at Summit Lake Community Center, park lover, bird photographer, and nature super-fan!
Tell us a bit about your role at the Summit Lake Community Center.
As a Recreation Supervisor I oversee all aspects of the building’s utilization and programming. This includes mundane day-to-day activities, from restocking the toilet paper rolls and overseeing the scheduling and supervision of building staff, to the more dynamic roles of working with both individual neighbors and community partners to develop a shared vision of what Summit Lake Community Center can be to the immediate neighborhood and the City of Akron. While I do manage the community center and supervise staff, a lot of what I do here is facilitate use of the building to fit the needs of the Summit Lake Neighborhood community.
I’ve been in this position for just about one year now, but what a year it has been! COVID-19 has presented a year of challenges; I really believe we are all kind of learning our jobs all over again because of the pandemic. But even with what has been a year of significant challenges, I love Summit Lake and am thrilled to be a part of the community here.
What is it that you most enjoy about this position?
The two things I most love about this position are the location and the people.
I’m a parks person. I love being outside and I love greenspaces. Here at Summit Lake we have a gorgeous 100-acre lake, walking trails, and an amazing assortment of wildlife for an urban environment. The location attracts neighborhood residents, fishermen, bird watchers, hikers, cyclists, kayakers, picnicking families, and more. I really believe that with our community center, basketball courts, ballfields, playgrounds, and all the other amenities I’ve mentioned that we truly have something for everyone here. Summit Lake is a great place for the community to gather while connecting to both their community and nearby nature.
As much as I love the space here though, it takes people to activate a space and make it into a place worth caring about. The people in the community, from individual residents to our partnering community organizations, have really made my role here enjoyable.
The supervisor before me came from this neighborhood and had a personal connection to nearly everyone in the neighborhood. He was an insider, had an established network in the community, and was a fixture in the community center. He did a great job and that is evident here in how the community views their community center. I’m an outsider. I didn’t grow up in this community and I don’t have the network of connections the former supervisor had cultivated. But in my first few weeks I met several of our neighborhood residents who welcomed me with open arms… literally. I’m not much of a hugger, especially in the era of COVID 19, but some of our wonderful residents are and knowing that they accepted me and embraced me was one of the best welcomes I could have hoped for in my new community.
While we’re talking about the people of the community, I don’t want to overlook our younger residents either. I had the opportunity to host Outdoor Discovery Summer Camps at Summit Lake this year. Through that programming, made possible in large part by the Akron Civic Commons, I had the opportunity to meet and interact with several of the young children in the neighborhood. Now, months later, nothing puts a smile on my face quite like when I am walking or driving through the neighborhood and one of our kids runs out to greet me with “Mr. Todd!” and shows me their latest discovery or shares a story about their day. These kids are our future and I am very fortunate to play a small role in their personal development and growth.
What were some adjustments you were able to make to continue offering programs for the community during COVID?
COVID came very soon after I took on my role as supervisor at the community center. I had just launched a few programs intended to bring in additional visitors into the community center during our early morning hours. One of these initiatives was a free community coffee cart in our lower lounge. I mean, what better morning can you have than sipping a cup of coffee, tea, or hot chocolate while overlooking the waters of Summit Lake and conversing with your friends and neighbors from the comfort of our lounge? Of course, early on, communal foods and beverages were something we were told to avoid, so this program terminated after about the third week.
After that came 5-weeks of the community centers being completely shut down. While a lot of great recreation programs were impacted by this closure, my greatest concern during this time was the loss of more basic needs that we fulfilled through the community center. Food insecurity is a real issue for several of our neighbors and it is only by the aid of great community partners like Good Samaritan Hunger Center and The Salvation Army of Summit County that we are able to meet this need at Summit Lake. Fortunately we were able to work with those partners during the closure and beyond to continue to offer services. This required quick and creative thinking, but by being flexible and adapting to the changing conditions we were able to provide these services in a different manner. Both Good Samaritan and the Salvation Army transitioned to distributing food and serving meals outside of our building while adopting and implementing best practices and safety measures during the pandemic.
One of our greatest recreation programming accomplishments during the summer of 2020 was our ability to offer Summer Camps to neighborhood kids despite the pandemic. In the past, multiple organizations offered camps at Summit Lake. The building and grounds would be full of kids running, laughing, and playing. Offering a Summer Camp in 2020, however, required operating safely within the guidelines established for us, including only permitting nine (9) campers for each camp. It takes a degree of creativity to scale down camp activities that work for groups of 20 to 30 kids down to groups of only nine, but with a smaller group there is also the opportunity for more meaningful interactions with each individual camper. With the help of community partners like the Akron Civic Commons and the Ohio & Erie Canalway Coalition, and with the flexibility of partners utilizing the Summit Lake Community Center, we were able to offer an exceptional and very well received 8-weeks of Outdoor Discover Camps for the community here at Summit Lake. Each of our 11 community centers throughout the City of Akron offered a different camp experience best suited to their facility and staffs’ talents. An outdoor discovery camp, with nature walks, fishing, canoeing, and traditional camp games, just made sense for Summit Lake.
Lastly, the Recreation and Parks Division needed to continue to reach the community while we could not physically get together. I was fortunate to be a part of the social media team that was developed to create content to connect with members of the community virtually. While virtual experiences are no substitute for authentic interaction, creating meaningful and engaging digital programming and content became an essential part of our public outreach during the pandemic. Summit Lake is a perfect backdrop to create nature-based programming to share with the public through social media. We began with increased social media posts about wildlife throughout Akron, but with my familiarity with a collection site known as iNatrualist we soon grew that into a series of programs using the iNaturalist platform. In May we launched the Akron Birds project through iNaturalist to enable the public to identify and share their findings of feathered friends throughout the City of Akron. This program even received recognition from Mayor Horrigan as a digital recreation offering for the City. Akron Birds was followed by a larger collection project, the 2020 Akron BioBlitz, which is ongoing through the end of 2020. This larger project allows participating members to discover and showcase their finds of a much wider spectrum of wildlife found throughout the City of Akron. Since its launch in July, the project has over 230 observations of over 170 different species right here in Akron, Ohio. We have also developed a series of Nature Near You videos which premier on a biweekly basis. These short videos, shared through our City of Akron Recreation and Parks page on Facebook, introduce our community to the natural world and opportunities to explore in both our parks and in their own backyards.
The fact that we have been able to adapt and overcome, plus the flexibility of our community partners, has been a key part of our success in continuing to serve the community during the pandemic.
How do you see the Community Center moving forward and easing back into the services you offer?
Unfortunately, all the evidence points to COVID-19 being with us for a while. It has created a new framework in which we have to think going forward; one in which we have to envision what the future looks like, how that future impacts recreation and parks, and how others can be around each other safely during that time. Right now I think the key to our future is thinking small, just like we did with our Summer Camps, and reaching people virtually when we cannot safely gather in person. I’m optimistic that we will be able to gradually return to offering the full array of services and amenities that the community center can offer. I know the demand for use of the basketball courts and our rental facilities is high, but it can only be once we can safely fully restore these services to the public that we can do so in good conscience.
The community centers through Akron and the Akron public are fortunate to have a Mayor that recognizes the value that equitable access to recreation and parks brings to the community. With the continued support from the City and our cautious adherence to guidelines from the local and State levels I believe we will be able to effectively move forward in restoring the community centers to a sense of normalcy in the coming year. Community Centers should be just that, the center of the community. We have to remain optimistic. We’re essential to the neighbors we serve.
Anything else you’d like us to know?
I am really excited to see the ongoing planning and preparations for the North Shore Development at Summit Lake. The activation of the North Shore by extending the trail to circle the lake and provide an expansion of activities and access to the lake have the potential to propel Summit Lake to a must-visit location in Northeast Ohio. With the funding support being raised and the majority of the construction anticipated in the next few years, Summit Lake is going to be an exciting place to watch. There’s no place in Akron I’d rather be at this moment than here at Summit Lake.