Last updated: March 2, 2022
Article
St. Paul Island: Creating a Community Park in the Middle of the Bering Sea
By Evelyn Moreno
Three-hundred miles west from Alaska’s mainland, the Aleut Community of St. Paul Island is honoring their connection to baseball and expanding its outdoor recreation opportunities by restoring the historic field, and surrounding area, that have actively been used since the 1880s.
Dylan Conduzzi, a project manager for the Aleut Community of St. Paul Tribal Government, rediscovered the rich history of baseball on the island while doing research on the underutilized land surrounding the field. After confirming that the island was home to the first baseball team in Alaska, Conduzzi, along with other tribal government members, shared their findings with residents.
Inspired to transform the old baseball field and vacant space into a vibrant community park, the Aleut Community of St. Paul Island applied for technical assistance from the National Park Service – Rivers, Trails and Conservation Assistance program in 2017.
The project site, St. Paul Park, is part of a larger community improvement project and expands beyond the baseball field, covering three underutilized parcels of land that consist of dirt and rocks, poor drainage, potholes, an eroding playground, and lack designated boundaries and bleachers.
St. Paul Island, one of the five Pribilof Islands in the middle of the Bering Sea, is home to a growing community of nearly 500 residents. Located north of St. Paul School, the site has been consistently used by community members for ball games and special events.
Conduzzi was compiling research on the land for a downtown improvement project when he stumbled upon “Knock Down and Skin ‘Em,” the baseball team that played on the island more than 150 years ago. “What started as a downtown and park restoration project now includes a piece of retained lost history,” Conduzzi said. “It references the first ball team in Alaska and really makes history around that ball game.”
A planning group was formed in order to scope out the project and identify goals. The St. Paul Park planning team consisted of members from the Aleut Community of St. Paul Tribal Government and National Park Service staff from the Alaska Region. The team identified three focus areas for the park; provide a safe and resilient recreation space, promote community health and strengthen the sense of place of the island.
To help the community envision what the space could look like, the National Park Service conducted a design charrette with elementary, middle and high school students from the neighboring school. Students came up with ideas for the park ranging from a covered playground meant to deflect wind and rain to roller-coasters and zip-lines. The students displayed their designs at a community event where residents provided feedback and shared their own goals for the community space.
“I think they [the students] enjoyed the design charrette and felt like they were a part of building something new for St. Paul Island,” said Kevin Doniere, a National Park Service landscape architect who helped organize the event. “Once they design something or they develop something that gets put into the park, they take a ton of ownership in that, and then they take care of it.”
Doniere and Taylor Sharman, a community assistance fellow with the National Park Service – Rivers, Trails and Conservation Assistance program, compiled all the ideas from the meetings and developed three landscape designs that they then presented to the community and gathered feedback on.
Following the site visit and design charrette for St. Paul Park, Doniere and Sharman worked with Paul Clark, the former Alaska program manager for the National Park Service – Rivers, Trails and Conservation Assistance program, on developing a concept plan for the project. The plan lays out the project’s goals, design guidelines, resource and funding opportunities, topography and implementation phases that the tribal government can refer to as they move forward in restoring the baseball field and creating a diverse outdoor recreation space.
Conduzzi shared his personal excitement for the project as well as the community’s support for it. The restoration of the field and construction of the park will not only honor the history of the island and create safe outdoor recreation opportunities, but it will also provide the community with a multi-purpose space they can gather on for generations to come.
“To have access to the National Park Service has given us [the Aleut community of St. Paul Island] actual visual aids,” Conduzzi said. “The partnership allowed the community to have a direct voice in the process and created something that we could look at. And, that's important because when we talk about seeking funding from secondary partners or through grants, you need to be able to tell a story around this. The National Park Service has certainly been a really active partner and has given us a unique perspective.”
After refining the ideas from the community meetings and having additional meetings with members from the tribal government, Doniere finalized the landscape design for St. Paul Park in Sept. 2019. The master plan highlights the original baseball field, playground, basketball court and trail connections.
“It's a neat project and full credit of course goes to the tribal government for coming up with the idea,” said Clark, who recently retired from the National Park Service. “I think it shows how the Rivers, Trails and Conservation Assistance program can move something forward. They [the Aleut Community of St. Paul Island] had a PowerPoint with clip art to show the design vision and now they have access to a professional rendered drawing and a concept plan that can help them with fundraising and with the construction of the park.”
The Aleut Community of St. Paul Island are continuing the momentum of this multi-year project by setting a timeline, securing funding and preparing the land for development. The community hopes to plant the grass for the baseball field this summer.
Though the National Park Service is no longer playing an active role in the project – Clark, Doniere and Sharman are looking forward to its fruition.
“The National Park Service – Rivers, Trails and Conservation Assistance program is a major avenue for communities to get connected to outdoor recreation, green spaces or potentially federal lands,” said Doniere, who has collaborated with Clark on other community assistance projects throughout the state. “It is a technical resource for communities to develop their ideas into realities and one of the most rewarding parts is helping them make their projects happen.”