The Augusta Parks and Recreation Department is hemorrhaging employees, and the staffing issues are causing problems at recreation sites all over the county.
At the Aquatic Center alone, 43 people have quit or been fired in the past four years, according to city documents, an Excel file that lists all city employees hired and fired between 2018 and 2021.
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So far in 2021, 27 parks and recreation employees have either quit or been fired. This year’s turnover is on par to surpass last year when there were 30 dismissals. In 2019, 75 employees quit or received a pink slip.
In a large department such as parks and recreation, the numbers may not seem that high, but many of those who quit or were fired are not easily replaced because they work in specialized positions such as maintaining safe chemical levels at the city-owned swimming pools.
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According to Aquatic Center maintenance records, chemical levels in the pool fluctuate wildly. Records from the required daily water testing logs show that on some days, the chemical levels are way over the correct levels and on other days the chemical levels fall far below the recommended amount. This means swimmers are likely taking the chance between possibly suffering chemical burns or potential ingesting bacteria depending on which day they come to swim.
Rebecca Harper, who directs the Aiken Augusta Swim League, verified that swimmers have been turned away due to dangerous chemical levels in the pool.
Meanwhile, other areas under the supervision of the parks and recreation department, which has been headed up by Maurice McDowell since 2020, are documented to be neglected and become what District 3 Commissioner Catherine Smith McKnight calls “embarrassing eyesores.”
The Warren Road Community Center has now become an illegal dumping ground because there are not enough employees to police the property. With only one or two employees in the building, no one is keeping an eye out on the parking lot to prevent such mischief.
The city recreation department manages 60 properties throughout the county. Facilities such as the Newman Tennis Center appear immaculate, but other areas including the relatively small Hickman Park in the Summerville area have knee-deep grass and even grass growing in pavement cracks on the tennis courts.
Over at Magnolia Cemetery, fire ant hills are almost as tall as the grave markers, and some markers are covered by the untrimmed grass. Maintenance at the city-owned cemeteries appears to consist of only a cursory mowing job every month.
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Riverwalk, as documented in photos by District 8 Commissioner Brandon Garrett, is also in bad shape.
District 10 Commissioner John Clarke says that he is alarmed at the attrition that has occurred among staff in the Parks and Recreation Department and says the Augusta commission needs to be paying attention.
“I know that several very competent community center directors have either quit or took early retirement. I am told that morale is low in that department. We, as commissioners, need to start asking why this is happening,” Clarke said. “We need to determine where the buck stops because it is obvious to everyone that the work, the maintenance is not being done across the county.”
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Clarke said his first step is to follow what is going on with contract negotiations between the Aiken Augusta Swim League and the parks and recreation department as well as starting the conversation about having the city make sure that the pools operated by the city are safe by having a private firm take over management of the chemical levels.
“We can’t have people swimming in a petri dish of bacteria,” he added. “It is obvious that something needs to change out there (the aquatic center), but I am taking this one step at a time. I am not pointing a finger, but I am going to keep asking what is going on in the rec department, even if it means the city needs to start doing exit interviews to find out why so many people are quitting or being fired.”
McDowell, could not be reached for comment.
Scott Hudson is the Senior Reporter for The Augusta Press. Reach him at scott@theaugustapress.com.
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