Downtown Jackson Partners is the most recent organization to follow the lead of the Greater Belhaven Foundation and the LeFleur East Foundation.
Each of those nonprofits provides maintenance and makes improvements with donated funds or in collaboration with other nonprofits for at least one of the parks in the city of Jackson.
Other cities across the U.S. also look to nonprofits for the maintenance of parks. For example, the city of New York has entrusted Central Park Conservancy with the day-to-day care of Central Park, an 843-acre space that welcomes 42 million visitors annually.
Downtown Jackson Partners recently signed an agreement with the city of Jackson to maintain and care for Smith Park, a 2.4-acre green space downtown that dates to 1838 and includes a platform stage, pavilion and several monuments.
Located behind the Governor’s Mansion and bounded by East Amite, North West, Yazoo and North Congress streets, Smith Park is the only public square that remains from the original checkerboard plan for the city drawn by Peter A. VanDorn in 1822, according to the Mississippi Department of Archives and History (MDAH).
After Jackson was founded, the block of land served as a grazing area for the livestock that drifted throughout the city, until a fence was erected in 1884 to protect the space and give it a more park-like appearance, according to MDAH.
James Smith, a Scottish industrialist who operated furniture and hardware stores in Jackson from 1834 until 1850, donated $2,000 for the fence, and his name has been associated with the park ever since.
Liz Brister, executive director of Downtown Jackson Partners (DJP), said the agreement gives the nonprofit the authority to plan and make improvements. DJP sought the agreement so it could raise funds for a $3 million renovation of the park, which has been in the works for several years.
Fundraising has not yet launched, she said. The plans need to be tweaked so that they complement but do not duplicate those for Margaret Ann Crigler Park, which will occupy the site of the former Eudora Welty Library, she said.
Downtown Jackson Partners plans to offer “Hump Day,” an event each Wednesday through May 14 at Smith Park. Featured from 11:30 a.m. until 1:30 p.m. will be food trucks, music and an appearance by the event mascot, a live camel named Frank.
“We want people who live and work downtown to enjoy the park,” Brister said.
Last August, the LeFleur East Foundation signed a memorandum of agreement with the city to make improvements to Parham Bridges Park, located at Old Canton and Ridgewood roads, as part of its master plan for the park.
“Our vision is to redo the 30-acre city park,” said Clay Hays, the Jackson cardiologist and resident who serves as chair of the foundation board of directors.
The project is the first redesign of the entire park since its creation. The late W.P. Bridges Sr. donated the tract to the city for a green space in the 1970s.
Virgi Lindsay, who represents Ward 7, said the improvements LeFleur East Foundation plans to make show what collaboration can accomplish. “We need as much assistance as possible from the public with our parks,” she said.
So far, the foundation has converted some tennis courts into pickleball courts, resurfaced four tennis courts and had trees that were in danger of falling cut. The foundation also paid for security at the park for several months.
The foundation is working with Belhaven University, which uses Parham Bridges as its home courts, to put in new windscreens that feature a Belhaven logo. New windscreens for 12 tennis courts would cost about $25,000, Hays said.
When additional funds are raised, additional tennis courts will get a new surface, he said.
Hinds County Supervisor Robert Graham, who represents District 1, has committed to resurfacing the main parking lot at the park, and the Walker Foundation has given the foundation a $25,000 grant to help pay for a gate for the entrance so that it can be secured, Hays said.
The master plan, estimated to cost $9.6 million to implement in its entirety, is being phase in as donations allow.
The master plan calls for fencing the perimeter of the park as a safety measure so it can be locked after hours, removing the existing clubhouse to make space for a pop-up vendor area and building a new clubhouse with an outdoor event space and reconfiguring the entrances to the park. The master plan also includes making drainage improvements, adding a canopy to the children’s playground to block the sun, creating a sculpture garden and expanding the walking trail to the nearby Willie Morris Library.
Plans are still in place for Park Golf to build a three-hole, mini golf course west of the playground at Parham Bridges. The mini golf project, estimated to cost $300,000 to $500,000, celebrated a groundbreaking in October 2023 but no work has been done.
The Greater Belhaven Foundation provides support for Laurel Street Park at 1841 Laurel St., Belhaven Park at 1000 Poplar Boulevard, Belhaven Heights Park at 731 Madison St. and the Belhaven Mountain Bike Trails.
The Greater Belhaven Foundation pays for the parks to be mowed, even though the city occasionally handles the task, said Mary Alex Thigpen, executive director of the foundation.
The parks are an amenity valued by Belhaven residents, who through the years have raised funds to add equipment and use their time to maintain them. “We want to maintain the green spaces because they’re part of the neighborhood’s quality of life,” she said.
Families regularly gather at the Laurel Street Park so their children can enjoy the playground and the foundation schedules gatherings at them.
Through the years, the Belhaven Garden Club and Friends of Laurel Park have played a significant role in raising funds to upgrade Laurel Street Park.
In the last year, the Greater Belhaven Foundation collaborated with the National Fitness Campaign, the city of Jackson, the Jackson Heart Foundation, the Community Foundation of Mississippi and other partners for the installation of a Keith Haring Fitness Court at Belhaven Heights Park, she said. It’s the only Keith Haring Fitness Court, which combines an art installation with fitness equipment in the city.
The Belhaven foundation also installed a connector trail between the Keith Haring Fitness Court and the Museum Trail so the fitness court can be easily accessed from the trail, she said.
At Laurel Street Park, the foundation installed new playground equipment and added mulch and sand, she said. At Belhaven Park, six new vandal-proof lighting bollards were installed.
The Foundation Renaissance Foundation was instrumental in improvements to a green space on Northview Drive and Dunbar Streets that was once known as Cherokee Heights Park but was renamed Fondren Park in 2011.
The Fondren Renaissance Foundation received a $588,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in 2007. The foundation used the funds to add a pavilion, playground equipment, picnic tables, new lighting, parking spaces and a walking trail in 2011.
The city of Jackson now maintains Fondren Park.
