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Mission: Restoring, enhancing and forever protecting louisville's olmsted-designed parks and parkways, connecting nature and neighborhood while strengthening the community's well-being.
Programs: The conservancy works in collaboration with louisville parks and recreation to develop master plans, and design capital projects, and review all outside proposals affecting the olmsted parks and parkways. Other planning and design services include historic research, selection of design standards, concept development, construction administration, and maintenance reviews. In some instances, such as the woodlands restoration, the conservancy actually manages and executes the project. Through the conservancy's active volunteer program, park champions, many individuals have contributed thousands of hours of work in the parks. Louisville metro residents are users of the three flagship parks - shawnee, iroquois, and cherokee; users of these and the other 15 olmsted parks are directly served by having enhanced parklands and environment. The conservancy operations span multiple calendar years and experiencecyclicality. Fund raising campaigns are undertaken over multiple years. Once the funds are secured, the conservancy undertakes various multi-year capital projects in the olmsted parks in collaboration with metro parks. Looking at an annual overhead ratio for the conservancy is misleading due to these fluctuations in revenues and expenses. Normalizing this ratio over a 3-5 year time period is a more accurate representation of the overhead ratio for the multi-year operating cycle of the conservancy.
This organization has completed some wonderful projects but needs to consider public sentiment as they set their goals. An example is their plan to remove the beloved teepee in Cherokee Park, a plan that is opposed by park users, historians and preservationists. At a recent public meeting, their director was dismissive of, and rude to, those with whom they disagreed. To learn more about plans to stop the Olmstead bulldozers, visit http://www.savehogansfountain.com
