DNR
Home PageIdeas List
The following is a list of ideas that have been updated.
Staff Expansion | Funding | New Facilities and Areas | Diversity | Programs or Events
Staff and Training |
Marketing and Promotions | Miscellaneous
Printable version of Ideas List (PDF)
Get arts grant and hire folk arts specialist -- Target diverse themes and activities -- Latino, American Indian and African American arts and culture).
Hire grant writer on two-year contract to see if they can justify the expense of the position
***Develop and implement a general revenue strategy to find a way to begin receiving general revenue support for state parks. Trails, Katy Trail, new capital improvement and other programs? Plan to increase this support to significant levels over time and therefore allow the dedicated tax to do more.
Fund all military sites from the dedicated gaming revenues now earmarked for Veterans Cemeteries.
Upgrade state park stores and develop sound business plans to generate more revenue -- Watkins Center, Scott Joplin, Maus House and Mammy Shaw? Use Maus House each spring for a store for annual house cleaning sales.
More aggressive marketing to increase visitation, combined with fee enhancements.
Determine cost/benefit of establishing entrance fees for state parks
***Develop long-term revenue program
a) Differentiated fees -- and keep some money at the park/site for their benefit
b) Use Canadian revenue model to set percent of state subsidy goals for each park. These goals determine how each park fee structure is set. This will set individual revenue goals and expenditure limits
c) Concessions -- Find ways to help the concessionaires increase their businesses and their payments to the state.
*** Get a long-term funding package in place to get our parks and sites up to date on all water and wastewater standards and requirements. Determine if it is useful to use State Revolving Fund loan or bonding program for state park water/wastewater projects.
***Develop capital improvement matching grant program to encourage local fundraising for smaller projects Basically, set aside $50,000 to $100,000 a year to match local and non-profit dollars for project development
***Take a share of the Land and Water Conservation Fund for state parks acquisitions. (We can legally take 50 percent.)
Consider using our revenue bond authority to upgrade revenue infrastructure like campgrounds, concessions and group camps.
New Facilities and Areas Ideas
Camp Hawthorne:
-- Offer Bass Pro Shops the option of creating a year-round WOW campus.
-- Develop a new request for proposal (RFP) for business development of concession facilities
-- Contact key corporations about partnerships to create a destination retreat and conference center.
-- Develop a concept or a plan for Camp Hawthorne – Consider a DNR retreat to do department planning proposal or DNR institute or Joseph Jaeger Academy focus
-- Develop Camp Hawthorne for recreational use. (DNR planning group) - New boat ramp for smaller boats - Zone Girl Scout cove for smaller recreation boats
Designate Johnson's Shut-Ins State Park scour channel as state geologic natural area.
Park model village or group complex. at some parks. Enhance group camps; they need to be scenic and close to significant resources.
*** Create a list of historic structures in system worth preserving and develop a plan to address these needs by prioritizing and then applying a triage model to determine asset allocations.
Work with the Missouri State Parks Foundation to develop a program to assist concessionaires to upgrade their facilities. Get agreement with a bank or banks to fund the project and let the bank write off some of the interest as a donation to the MSPF. DSP would guarantee the main loan.
Develop dog parks in recreational-orientated state parks in populated areas.
Develop a plan to allow dogs in cabins (some, not all).
Acquire Liberty Arsenal.
***Develop and implement a plan to ensure we have one mile of accessible trails in every park/historic site.
***Complete an assessment of group camps and swimming pools. Determine the longer term need for them. Consider alternate uses and prepare a cost estimate for renovation. (Now estimated at $2 million per camp with 14 camps in the system.)
Work with Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT) to renovate the Route 66 State Park bridge.
Identify opportunities and develop scenic byway applications for key routes to selected state parks. There are federal funds for promotions, visitor centers and historic preservation.
***Develop a historic affiliates program (funded by the Missouri State Parks Foundation) to work with private, local and non-profit entities that are preserving, interpreting and managing key sites that complement the statewide, regional and national interpretative themes important to our statewide interpretive plan. This would involve an agreement to develop joint promotion, programs, technical assistance and funding. Develop an agreement where you might help with exhibits, some funding, and joint programs. This could be a five-year agreement with renewal options.
Consider an urban heritage marker program in Kansas City and St. Louis to mark significant urban historical sites with our signing program. These should have important state, regional and national themes. (Possible affiliate program activity)
Pave portion of Katy Trail State Park in urban areas, especially where it is heavily used and where it connects with other urban paved tracts.
Build drive-in and operate it at Route 66 State Park.
***Develop a more aggressive land acquisition strategy, including funding.
***Develop a program to target minority or non- traditional groups in the use of our group camps. Perhaps an annual Hispanic children’s camp. Reach out to Boys and Girls Clubs, church groups, Croations, etc.
Develop separate camping areas to serve traveling groups of campers: Camp Hawthorne, Cuivre River, Knob Noster, Big Lake, etc.
Build a yurt or primitive cabin at Prairie State Park (grant from Missouri Prairie Foundation?)
Build Missouri Legends Golf Course -- Payne Stuart, Hale Irwin, Bob Golby, Tom Watson -- at Mark Twain State Park.
***Develop an Urban Jr. Naturalist or Jr. Urban Explorer out of an urban center using UPOP, WOW or Bruce R. Watkins Center with a patch, vest or certificate. Invite parents for meal and awards upon completion.
***Goal by 2017 = 10 percent of divisional operational, exhibit and capital improvement budget directed to diversity themes and to make sure there is a park within one hour of every citizen.
*** Acquire and interpret Island Mound by 2011.
Establish “York Center” to discuss and archive materials on slavery at Bruce R. Watkins Center.
*** Develop a component of the historic site affiliates list that highlights diverse themes.
Develop an Urban Jr. Ranger, Naturalist or Urban Explorer out of UPOP program or Bruce Watkins Center with patch, vest or certificate. Invite parents for meal and awards.
Give out magnifying glass or other inexpensive kits to participants. Develop a neighborhood “points” system based on neighborhood visiting and experience in parks/sites. Playground, ball field, court, historical marker by registering. Assign a number of visits to a park/site. Make sure we cooperate with local parks and other agencies/Department of Conservation (MDC)/U.S. Forest Service (USFS)/the WOW team. Work in alderman district. If they visit, we will pay half of the cost and install playground, ball field, etc. Educate diverse population in their language about outdoor recreation ethics and safety.
***Consider black history sites for acquisition or development or affiliates program.
Related diversity sites to be incorporated into plan
Van Meter State Park
Iliniwek Village State Historic Site
Towosahgy State Historic Site
Arrow Rock State Historic Site (Santa Fe Trail)
Osage Village State Historic Site
Island MoundGet River of Life film footage to be incorporated into use at Scott Joplin House State Historic Site for music of the river and Missouri, especially the tape that was not used. The Division of Tourism owns the film.
Use Multicultural Affairs Committee (MAC) to do recruitment and for research in urban core areas.
Identify institutional controls/barriers to diversity.
Develop a “trusted” person within the community to be the spokesperson on our behalf to promote programs and sites.
Minority groups do not know what we have and how we can enrich their lives!
a) Relate their common experiences and connections with their environment to the ones we manage.
b) Get minority focus group – (Use MAC) to meet and identify common interests/values
c) Remember, you are either anti-racism or a racist! There is no middle ground!
Use State Historic Preservation Office in minority preservation effort.
Develop a river safety promotional program (also available in Spanish) to remind people that state park use, by its very nature, has hazards associated with it and to use common sense when in the outdoors.
Invite members of Major Taylor Foundation -- African-American Cyclists -- to the Katy Trail Ride.
Develop and sponsor a Folklife Festival Program. Partner with the Missouri Arts Council in Sedalia, Knob Noster, Babler, Route 66 or Robertsville state parks.
***Special event ideas
Inter-tribal powwow -- Van Meter State Park
Folklife Festival -- Fairgrounds Park/Babler State Park
Mother Road Festival -- Route 66 State Park
Cinco de Mayo Festival -- Knob Noster State Park
Juneteenth -- Scott Joplin House State Historic Site
Lewis and Clark Festival -- Lewis and Clark State Park or Confluence Point State Park
***Work with Missouri Arts Council to use our vacant historic homes as artist’s homes, to market products or develop an artist-in-resident program. Get someone (Missouri State Parks Foundation) to find a donor bank to lend money at low or no interest as a donation to fix up homes and set up artist colonies or artists in residences.
***Find corporate sponsorship or individual to fund a Rent -A-Camp program. Every family or X number of family groups per year would get a free night of camping with instruction.
Develop a farmers market/arts coop at selected parks.
***Expand interpretive program as people need to touch, feel, smell and experience history, the out of doors and more interpretation.
***Use of cell phone and GPS technology to promote, educate and interpret our parks and sites; cell phone museum tours
Develop a statewide oral history initiative
Bruce R. Watkins Center events -- Leon Jordan lectures, temporary exhibits, archives, WOW, virtual reality
Katy Trail Ride -- Get corporate sponsors
Develop an annual State Park Jamboree -- Get our campers and park users together. Spring Fling
***Designate period between Earth Day and Arbor Day as Conservation Week for activities and promotions and kick off to main recreation season and reports on state of environment, etc.
Use “related” marketing such as visiting Nathan Boone Homestead State Historic Site and Father Moses Berry Slave Museum and Home
***Implement state parks-based eco tours in Kansas City, St. Louis, Springfield, Columbia. Historic tours -- Civil War grandparents/grandkids. Co-sponsor could be Missouri State Parks Foundation. We develop program, provide staff and areas to visit -- start on a trial basis near St. Louis or in Kansas City.
***Develop scholarship/mentoring/experience/interpretation program with Lincoln University. Could Lincoln also be an affiliate site?
Develop a Ranger Leadership tract. Use Jaeger Academy model. Have 10 in program, which means in off season they go to parks and historic site-type training conferences, work in parks and sites and central office.
Train staff in search and rescue: Rangers, Johnson’s Shut-Ins State Park?
***Set up a mentor and follow-up for new state park and law enforcement employees, and enhancement of the Joseph Jaeger Academy for staff to identify, nurture and grow front line supervisors
Have retired DSP/DNR employee “team” to help recruited candidates get on register.
***Use Multicultural Affairs Committee team train and then go out to focus groups and listen. Examine policies. Why do so few minorities visit parks or are in work force?
***Get park staff (non-commissioned) trained in non-commissioned law enforcement procedures and techniques.
***Create a specialized historic restoration construction unit within the Planning and Development Program.
Marketing and Promotions Ideas
***Totally digitized and wireless by 2017
***Use Missouri State Parks Foundation and Missouri Parks Association as non-profit sponsors for concessionaires and parks to obtain Tourism Cooperative Marketing grants for parks and sites promotion.
***Parks and sites with new DNR logo signs by 2008!
***Work to get all highway signs with brown color.
***Update State Parks book (Missouri Parks Association)
Legislative tours -- Civil War
Get Civil War battles on Missouri Civil War Web site
Missouri State Parks -- Second Century
Set Active Stewardship Goals -- percent restored
Develop Statewide Wild Area Plan- number and acres
Set Recreation Goals
Set Historic Site Goals
Develop Training Goals
Develop Planning Goals
- Have all general management plans done by 2008
- Have all operation plans updated in 2007; Commit to renew on five-year cycle
- Develop plan to use bonds to pay/improve facilities
- Set 10 percent goals – Minority/Interpretive themes
- Reduce staff by 10 percent by 2010
- Complete capital improvement review and list
- All collections accessioned by 2010!
DNR/DSP sponsored Monthly Resource Managers’ breakfast -- for improved communication and coordination
1. DNR hosted
2. MDC
3. Division of Tourism
4. University of Missouri
5. MoDOT
Renewed awards program: Rejuvenate Masterpiece Awards 2017
Develop a salary equity plan -- 2008
One step six months
First and Second
Third = permanent
Send public meeting minutes and Masterpiece Journal to legislators
Publish public meeting minutes on Web site
Update equestrian brochure
Develop diversity visitation and employment targets and evaluation criteria
Work with Division of Tourism and MDC to develop marketing of Missouri’s natural resources
Develop a Civil War Commission and Planning group
When we have reduced staff during shoulder and off seasons, we need signing or some way to help visitors to find out where to go, what to do and how to do it. (Katy depot concept).
