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Chicago Park District staff began removing signs bearing the name “Douglas Park” Thursday morning. The Park District Board voted Wednesday to officially remove the former namesake of the North Lawndale park, 1401 S. Sacramento Drive. Commissioners opened a 45-day public comment period to solicit ideas for renaming the park. A campaign to rename the park after Frederick Douglass and his wife Anna Murray-Douglass has been in the works for years. Frederick Douglass, a former slave and abolitionist, escaped in large part because of the support of his first wife Anna Murray-Douglass. The park district plans to have the old signs...

After New York Jewish Community elected officials defied New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio by forcing open two more community parks, the Mayor pushed back in a press conference deploring those who "take the law into their own hands." New York State Senator Simcha Felder Monday tweeted: “We’ve asked nicely and waited patiently. We’ve made every logical argument. The people have spoken and they’re running out of patience. If the NYC Mayor won’t open ALL our playgrounds, Simcha Eichenstein, Kalman Yeger, and I will cut the locks open ourselves." ..... The three then arrived at a park on Avenue...

A day before Flag Day, two city employees were spotted using the Stars and Stripes to mop the floor of a filthy Coney Island restroom, a witness told The Post. Jose Gonzalez, a Guardian Angel who was on patrol on the boardwalk Saturday afternoon, said he saw two employees from the Parks Department wiping down a men’s bathroom with a flag mop. An enraged elderly veteran confronted them, saying they “can’t use the flag to wipe up urine and s–t from the floor.”

After three years of stalling, throat clearing and excuse-making, three years of inaction and silence, it’s now time for the Chicago Park District to officially rename Douglas Park for noted African American abolitionist Frederick Douglass. Unofficially, the deed has already been done. Nearly every entrance sign I saw Tuesday morning as I drove around and through the 162-acre West Side park has been edited with paint or stickers to add the extra S. A close inspection of the several signs that still read “Douglas Park” reveals that someone — A Park District employee? A fan of Stephen A. Douglas, the...

Paradise Falls, located 40 miles north of Los Angeles, has long been one of the state's 'most-treasured natural wonders', but The Conejo Open Space Conservation Agency barricaded access to the attraction Friday in light of bad behavior. . . . 'While trash cans are available, many simply left it for COSCA staff to clean up and trash accumulated faster than it could be removed.' According to the organization, there were additional problems with 'human waste and sanitation as many used areas along the creek both upstream and downstream as a toilet'. One official told Thousand Oaks Acorn that people were...

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) - A Florida man is charged with providing material support to the Islamic State extremist group, including attempting to buy multiple weapons and scouting potential targets for an attack in the Tampa Bay area, federal prosecutors said Wednesday. A criminal complaint charges Muhammed Momtaz Al-Azhari, a 23-year-old U.S. citizen, with attempting to provide material support or resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization. The charge carries a potential 20-year prison term. **SNIP** According to the affidavit, Al-Azhari scouted a number of targets in the Tampa Bay region, including beaches, parks and even the Tampa FBI field...

These awesome (and hilarious) posters teach us how to social distance inside national parks open to the public Don't forget to constantly wash your hands, of course. A little humor goes a long way, especially during these unprecedented times, and the National Parks Service seems not to have forgotten that. The service has released a few hilarious posters to teach folks how to properly behave while visiting each destination. Although, admittedly, most parks have stayed open throughout the pandemic, Americans seem to be more and more comfortable actually frequenting them in recent days—and what better way to remind them to...

California Gov. Gavin Newsom will be closing all beaches and state parks across the state starting Friday to help slow the spread of the coronavirus, according to a memo sent to California police chiefs Wednesday. The decision comes less than a week after Newsom called out the massive crowds that flocked to Newport Beach in Orange County last weekend during a heatwave. Newsom called the beach crowds an example of "what not to do" for the state to make progress toward easing restrictions in the statewide stay-at-home order.

Several protesters flocked to a park in Wisconsin demanding that Governor Tony Evans reopen dozens of open spaces which he closed amid the coronavirus outbreak. Around two dozen people held a rally at Lapham Peak in Delafield in defiance of Evers directing the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources to close 40 state parks, forests and recreational areas on April 9. Evers decided to close the parks after thousands visited them when the state waived admission fees. The governor said the decision was made out of an abundance of caution to help protect citizens from COVID-19, as well as the "unprecedented...

Thurston County commissioners voted 2-1 on Thursday to reopen the county’s three trails and many trailheads it manages, which have been closed along with most of the county’s facilities in an effort to slow the spread of COVID-19. **SNIP** During this shutdown, he said, mental and physical health are important. “I think it’s critical that we have access to these trails to the extent possible,” Menser said. That opened a discussion that Commissioner Gary Edwards rapidly expanded. Edwards posited that perhaps the county should open all its parks, too. The decision to close county parks was “stupid,” he said, and...

J. Arthur Bloom said Wednesday that American media outlets doing the bidding of the Chinese might not be entirely ideologically driven. Bloom, a Daily Caller alum and managing editor of The American Conservative, told Fox News host Tucker Carlson that Comcast had business ties to Beijing that could explain the company-wide trepidation in directly challenging the coronavirus claims coming out of China. Carlson, co-founder of the Caller, began the segment by noting that anti-Trump bias could be driving some media outlets to side with China, but Bloom said that at least with regard to Comcast — parent company of NBC...

LUBBOCK, Texas — On Tuesday, Governor Greg Abbott announced that all Texas State Parks will close at the end of the business day on April 7, according to a press release from the Governors office. The following is a press release from the Governor’s office: At the direction of Gov. Greg Abbott, Texas State Parks will be closed to the public effective at the close of business Tuesday, April 7 in order to maintain the safest environment for visitors, volunteers and staff. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD) will continue to stay current with the latest public health recommendations...

Privatizing Public Lands Doesn't Mean Building Shopping Centers 07/18/2019Gor Mkrtchian Protected public lands in the United States — including national forests, national parks, and similar areas — cover nearly 500,000 square miles, or 14 percent of the land area of the United States. The existence of these government-controlled lands gives the federal government immense power over much of the United States, and in some US states, the federal government controls a majorityof the land area. Thanks to the popularity of some public lands, known for their natural beauty, federal control of so much land nonetheless remains popular, and the idea of privatizing...

Full title: Do recreational parks curb crime? Advocates claim they help drop rates, but experts say it hasn't been provenBefore Doty Park featured slides, swing sets and tennis courts, the Summerville recreational hub was a baseball field in the ’80s. Felicia Whetsell, who lives in the vibrant, predominantly black Brownsville community that surrounds Doty, said youth would come from Ridgeville to play ball. “It taught us a sense of community,” Whetsell said. Whetsell also said the park was a safe haven. It was where her father, who was a baseball coach, mentored young men and helped steer them on the...

Across the United States, some cities are building parks above the roadways in an effort to reconnect communities, often low-income neighborhoods, that had been splintered decades ago when new freeways were rammed through in the name of progress. When Marvin Anderson walks along the tree-lined streets of Rondo – his childhood neighborhood – in St. Paul, Minn., the memories come rushing back. “That’s what I miss about it ... the smells of the food, hearing laughter ... in the barbershop, over a soda fountain,” he says. Mr. Anderson was born in this primarily African-American neighborhood in 1949. As a child,...

[Martha's Vineyard] The Sheriff’s Meadow Foundation this week issued a public apology and launched an overhaul of its land management practices following the revelation that large numbers of trees and other plants had been dug up from two of its preserves and used to landscape an exclusive private property on the North Shore. *** The two foundation properties, the Caroline Tuthill Preserve in Edgartown and the Priscilla Hancock Meadow in Chilmark, were left damaged by heavy earth moving equipment brought in by contractors hired to landscape the 30-acre property of Dirk Ziff near Lambert’s Cove in West Tisbury.

If former President Barack Obama wants the Obama Presidential Center to define his legacy, he’s going to have to let life go full circle. That means climbing off his presidential high horse and returning to his roots as a community organizer. Once Obama announced his library would be in Chicago, it was as if the former president had suddenly turned into a greedy real estate developer. And unfortunately, the manner in which the project was unveiled wasn’t inclusive. Jeanette Taylor, the education director for the Kenwood Oakland Community Organization, Taylor said she asked the former president why he wouldn’t sign...

WAYNESBORO — President Trump's national infrastructure plan announced Monday that calls for a $1.5 trillion investment in roads, bridges and the rest of America's crumbling infrastructure, provides for about $200 billion in federal funds. The remainder of dollars would have to come from state, local and private sources. For the Shenandoah Valley, the good infrastructure plan news includes funding to help with the maintenance backlog in the national parks, including Shenandoah National Park, where there is a $56 million maintenance backlog. However, a couple of local government officials and one of Virginia's U.S. senators interviewed expressed doubt about the trickle...

The federal government shut down at midnight Saturday. As you may have noticed, there’s been chaos in the streets, looting from sea to shining sea, electricity outages, all sorts of — oh wait, no, we’re still all fine. That likely has something to do with the fact that the federal government shutting down isn't going to have too much of an impact on most people’s lives. The last time this happened, back in 2013, President Barack Obama realized this. That's why he decided to dramatize the whole affair by shutting down national parks, including the World War II Memorial in...

The Obama Foundation released plans last week for the presidential center it plans to build in Chicago's Jackson Park, but behind the scenes, a battle is taking place to keep the former Democratic president from building on that specific lot of land, and there's still a chance that it gets delayed when it seeks federal approval. What initially started out as a library has morphed into a 20-acre private "center," and some environmentalists and historians are unhappy with the Obama Foundation's plans to swoop in and take over a national historic place. The Obama Foundation originally said it would house...