Rocky Houston likes to get a handle on the details behind Parks & Recreation services

By Morgan Rothborne, Ashland.news

An expansive whiteboard filled with tidy handwriting delineating lists and responsibilities from throughout Ashland’s parks and recreation system dominates the minimal space in Rocky Houston’s new office. The only decorations are a small piece of Japanese-style calligraphy and a bobblehead figurine his previous staff had made in his likeness, self-described as a “bespectacled bureaucrat.” 

“I like to be very boring,” he said.  

Houston demurred when asked about a vision for the future. Only a few weeks into the role of Ashland’s new Parks & Recreation Director, he has instead focused on “asking lots of ‘why’ questions.”

“I call it going to director school. Everyone needs to teach me,” he said. 

Ashland Parks & Recreation is vast. The commission owns a variety of properties including open spaces, trails and parks of various sizes from smaller neighborhood parks such as Clay Street all the way up to the largess of Lithia Park. APRC also has amenities such as the Oak Knoll Golf Course, the Ashland Senior Center and the Daniel Meyer Pool to think about.

Parks and recreation has innate “chaos and fun,” he said, adding that a methodical approach to the work is a counterweight, keeping the systems supporting the fun running smoothly. 

Before painting any pictures of the future, Houston wants to have a foundational knowledge of what he called the basics. More strategic planning, more maps, firm numbers and data on the total acreage of parks in Ashland, what level of service is needed at each park and how can parks be more equitable and efficient with where and how services are provided? 

There are also facilities to consider: How many and what kind per thousand residents? What are the standards for those facilities? Across the system, everything should be consistent and priorities brought into clarity by answers to these questions, Houston said. 

“We only have so many dollars, we need to be as frugal as we can to get the best bang for our buck,” he said. 

By determining the number of assets in the system and the type of use each asset experiences, and aligning that with industry standards for the work, a maintenance management plan can become a kind of equation to calculate how many hours of maintenance per year every facility requires. Problems like vandalism also impact maintenance and mean it’s important to prioritize finishing the work of restaffing after pandemic losses. There have to be enough employees to allow for quality of life necessities such as time off or sick days. 

“We’re coming into the budget cycle for next year. This is a great time to do an inventory, understand conditions, open up the hood and kind of look into those things,” he said. 

Even in answering all those questions and gathering all that data, Houston pointed to a potentially external source of vision for his tenure as director. 

“I think staff, the community and the commission will provide direction in regards to how well we are doing and where we need to go. And then there’s always that hard question of can we afford to go where we want to go and how do we get there?” he said. 

It takes a couple budget cycles to really know why things are the way they are and how best to organize them, he said. Houston has experience learning new things. 

“When I was in high school, people were like, ‘What are you going to do when you grow up?’ I’d say ‘Well I’m going to go to college,’ and it would be ‘But what are you going to do?’ I thought I was going to be an engineer, a teacher; I didn’t know,” he said. 

After graduating with bachelors degrees in both history and psychology, Houston said he worked in sales, social services and other professions before coming into parks and recreation. 

“Intrinsically I really like to make my space better — spatially that can be my city, my community. When I was in social work I was helping the lives of those children I was working with, and in parks I think it’s the same thing, I’m helping move Ashland forward. Creating that livability, that element that I think is consistent,” he said. 

After spending the previous three years with Clark County as Parks and Lands Division Manager, “spatially improving” Ashland meant a better standard of living for Houston and his wife now that their children are off to college. Ashland will be a beautiful place to work until it’s time to retire. For the foreseeable future, Houston will be studying Ashland Parks & Recreation. 

“Analysis helps direct us in regards to our capital campaigns,” he said. “Again, I’m going to be very boring. I like to have a rubric that has criteria that helps us plan,” 

Email Ashland.news reporter Morgan Rothborne at [email protected].

Related stories:

New Parks Director chosen by unanimous vote — in public (July 12, 2024)

Ashland Parks & Recreation Commission to vote on new director (July 9, 2024)

New director hired, Ashland Parks & Recreation Commission announcese (June 13, 2024)