Surveillance & Management Toolkit

In 2013, Liberty Parks and Recreation Department (LPRD) and key strategic partners in the City and community, including the Clay County Public Health Department, Liberty Public Schools, and Liberty Hospital, elected to work with GP RED’s Healthy Communities Research Group (HCRG) to participate as a Beta Site to test the Healthy Communities Surveillance and Management Toolkit.

The purpose of this project is to analyze, document, and evaluate five elements related to the repositioning of parks and recreation as a primary community public health provider:

• Creating a Warrant for Agency Action – Why? Who? What is the Impact?
• Convening Community Stakeholders and Champions – Residents? Partners? Providers?
• Policies, Laws, and Procedures – What is influencing active living?
• Fiscal Resources and Distribution – What funds? How should they be allocated?
• Inventory of Assets and Affordances – Programs? Parks? Facilities? Food?

Information was collected through a process that included many staff and stakeholder meetings. Templates were created and used to compile digital data. From an analysis of these elements, the project moved to creation of a systems portfolio, development of strategic concepts for improvement, and future modeling for the purposes of articulation, prioritization, management, and surveillance of outcomes over time.  A common Purpose Statement and Goals emerged through the creation of the Liberty Community Health Action Team (L‐CHAT) to focus on:

• Improving daily nutritional regimen
• Increasing levels of physical activity
• Increasing tolerance & inclusion of all