Kenmore’s parks update on July 22 put athletic-field capacity and school partnerships at the center of a long-running debate about how to meet growing recreation demand.

Tom Beckwith told the Planning Commission that regional population trends and Kenmore’s projected growth will shift demand toward more older-adult uses (trails, walking) while youth athletics will still require high-capacity fields. He explained ways to increase field capacity — converting to rectangular multiuse fields, installing turf and lights, and managing schedules — but cautioned that some sites have hard physical limits. "We don't do grass anymore. We do turf, and we do lights to increase the capacity of of that field," Beckwith said.

Several residents and commissioners pressed about joint use agreements with North Shore School District. Beckwith and Debbie Bennett, Kenmore’s community development director, explained that school-district agreements vary by jurisdiction and that North Shore has multiple cities inside its boundaries, which complicates uniform city-specific deals. Beckwith said the district has raised user fees in part to pay for maintenance rather than relying on volunteer labor: "...their fees are a little higher. And the bigger issue for the school district is maintenance and repair, not just who gets to use them."

Staff and consultants outlined several capacity responses: retrofit existing fields for multiuse play; add turf and lights where possible; reconfigure fields to make them age-universal (movable base lines and outfields); and consider scheduling and practice-time management to expand usable hours. They noted constraints: some school and park properties are small or older and cannot be physically expanded; regional facilities (large county parks) absorb overflow demand; and negotiations across multiple jurisdictions or school districts can be legally and operationally complex.

No formal agreements were made at the meeting. Staff encouraged residents to participate in school bond and levy processes and said the upcoming plan chapters will include park-by-park assessments describing which sites can be modified for increased capacity and which cannot.