‘Unsustainable path.’ Parks Tacoma cuts jobs, mulls fee increases, program cuts
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Facing a $6–$8M shortfall, Parks Tacoma enacted layoffs and a hiring freeze.
- District budget $212.8M; 49% of revenue from taxes; 464 staff oversee 80 parks.
- Managers raised program fees (pickleball example); more rate hikes or cuts pending.
Facing a $6 million to $8 million budget deficit by year’s end, Parks Tacoma has instituted layoffs and a hiring freeze. The agency also anticipates recreational fee increases and possible program cuts as it finalizes a budget amendment in November.
Rising costs and lower-than-projected revenues, coupled with the inability to propose another tax increase, have put Tacoma’s park district in a challenging position.
Parks Tacoma has 464 employees (not including seasonal part-time workers), Parks Tacoma spokesperson Stacia Glenn told The News Tribune on Tuesday. Its budget was about $212.8 million in 2025-2026, with 49% of its revenue coming from taxes. The park district oversees 80 parks, in addition to four community centers, 18 gardens, five pools, 10 spraygrounds, the Meadow Park Golf Course, Fort Nisqually Living History Museum, Northwest Wildlife Trek, Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium, the Point Defiance Marina and the W.W. Seymour Botanical Conservatory.
Last week 10 Parks Tacoma employees accepted voluntary separation packages, 14 were laid off and 25 positions were frozen, Glenn told The News Tribune. Among the positions frozen last week were executive employees and administrators, in addition to an outreach-and-engagement coordinator, a park guide, five maintenance staff, five recreation specialists, a visitor service supervisor and an event coordinator.
The park district spends 66% of its operating budget on salaries and benefits (about $141 million) and 22% on services ($46.8 million), according to the 2025-2026 budget.
Parks Tacoma expected to collect about $70.7 in property taxes and $33 million in sales taxes in 2025-2026, according to the budget. Other revenue included about $69 million in earned revenue, $9.4 million in donations, $8.6 million in shared costs/subsidies from the city of Tacoma, $2 million in grants and $5 million from the fund balance, among other sources, according to the budget.
Pickleball fees go up. Are more rate changes to come?
Effective Oct. 1, Parks Tacoma significantly increased its pickleball rates for the popular Grit City Gherkins Pickleball Club. Monthly passes went from $7 to $25, annual passes went from $65 to $200 and drop-in rates increased from $3 to $10, Glenn said Tuesday.
“Some fee adjustments are being made to align program fees with comparable marketplace pricing to ensure sustainability as program and service expenses have increased. Many of the program fees haven’t been adjusted for rising costs in multiple years,” she said in an email. “[Pickleball] rates haven’t been adjusted since the league was launched in 2022, and the fee structure was out of alignment. That process of realignment is not necessarily tied to the budget.”
There may be more membership rate and program fee increases to come.
The Parks Tacoma Board will be discussing how to address the budget shortfall during public meetings in October and November, which occur every second and fourth Monday.
Community and recreation centers, youth-focused recreational and education programs, parks maintenance, events and business operations and administrative support will likely be affected, Parks Tacoma’s chief financial and administrative officer Tania Wink said in a Committee of a Whole meeting Aug. 18.
“As further shortfalls are identified, the department will need to implement cost reductions, evaluate program suspensions and consider workforce impacts to maintain fiscal balance and year-end cash flow,” according to her presentation.
Staff will consider health and safety when making cuts, in addition to board and levy priorities, which include: afterschool care, wildfire and urban forestry, community safety and park rangers, park maintenance and restrooms, aging and older adult services and leveraging funds through partnerships, according to a presentation from Parks Tacoma executive director Shon Sylvia on Aug. 18.
Parks staff also will consider programs with low participation versus high community impact, as well as consolidating or reducing duplicated types of services, according to his presentation.
Why is this happening?
On its website, Parks Tacoma says the park district had a healthy fund reserve balance in 2023, but in 2023-2024 “the pace of growth necessary to restore services following closures brought on by the pandemic, combined with public pressure to quickly restore programs based on new levy lid lift funding, meant we had to ramp up spending more quickly than anticipated.”
“While several expenditures were planned one-time costs, we did not fully define all of them at the time. As a result, we had to use more of our reserve funds to cover 2024 expenses than originally expected and our costs are now rising faster than our revenues,” according to Parks Tacoma.
Glenn told The News Tribune on Wednesday that Parks Tacoma is facing “additional pressure, like many public agencies, to close the gap between lower-than-projected revenues and higher expenses.”
“In 2024, the Parks Tacoma General Fund was over budget by $7 million, which was addressed by using reserves. This came to light during the closeout of the 2024 financial year, after the 2025-2026 budget was adopted,” Glenn said in an email. “It’s a complicated set of factors that compounded, prompting escalating actions to address rising expenses and lower revenues.”
Glenn said lower-than-expected revenue factors include lower property taxes, grants, lease payments and contracts. That’s in addition to higher-than-expected costs, including for technology systems, security and insurance costs related to liability, property, employee health and dental benefits, she said.
“The District has a policy of holding 5% in reserves of overall General Fund expenditures. Since the reserves balance in 2023 was 22%, we had planned to spend $4 million on operational expenses to cover additional costs and bring us to 11%, still above policy,” Glenn said. “The shortfalls in revenue and higher expenses caused us to dip deeper into those funds than planned, putting us on an unsustainable path.”
Are more taxes coming?
Glenn said it’s not possible for Parks Tacoma to propose another levy or tax increase to fund services “because our operations are already at full taxing capacity.”
In 2022 more than 62% of voters approved a proposition to restore the property tax levy rate to $0.75/$1,000 of assessed value, which funds nearly a third of Parks Tacoma operations. In 2014 voters approved a $198 million capital bond measure to fund infrastructure improvements at Point Defiance Park and a new Pacific Seas Aquarium at Point Defiance Zoo, among other projects.
“Levies and sales tax measures go toward our General Fund, while the capital bond measures go toward our capital improvement projects,” Glenn said. “Legally, we cannot use capital funds for anything other than capital projects.”
Glenn said Parks Tacoma is evaluating how programs could be modified or operate more efficiently, “which could mean an increase in fees or elimination of certain programs.”
Proposed solutions will be presented when the Park Board discusses the budget later this month and in November, she said.
This story was originally published October 2, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
