How does Recreation & Community Centres
benefit our Community?

Recreation, fitness, sports, and arts/culture are essential elements of a healthy community.

Community recreation facilities become a center stage for our sport/cultural & public lives. They become the place where community celebrations can commence and be held (festivals, holiday events, and public ceremonies), where marathons begin, where children learn the skills of sport (and life), where the seasons are marked, and where cultures mix.

When towns and neighborhoods have thriving public facilities residents have a stronger sense of community. A stronger sense of community leads to safer, happier, healthier living.

Recreation is Essential to Personal Health

• It helps people live longer
• It prolongs independent living for seniors– keeping seniors vital and involved in community life
• It can reduce obesity in young people by as much as 50%
• Recreation and fitness significantly reduce the risk of coronary heart disease and stroke
• Recreation and fitness combat osteoporosis, diabetes, and help in preventing specific types of cancers– particularly in the colon, breast and lungs
• Recreation and fitness help prevent and rehabilitate back problems
• Recreation contributes to good mental health
• Recreation enhances overall health and well-being
• It is a proven therapeutic tool for assisting with recovery from trauma and injury

Recreation is Key to Balanced Development

• Recreation is essential to the development of our children and youth
  o We learn motor skills (physical) through play and sports
  o We learn social skills through play and sports
  o We learn creativity through play and arts/cultural activity
  o We develop intellectual capacities and concepts—and many other life skills—
  through play
• Recreation provides an holistic opportunity for adults to develop their full potential
• Interaction with others, in the course of recreation, teaches teamwork, tolerance, cooperation, leadership, management and other essential interpersonal skills
• Physical recreation is a necessary antidote to today's more sedentary lifestyle that so often revolves around computers and television
• Creative recreation stimulates ideas, innovation, invention and critical thinking
• Social recreation enhances quality of life and reduces isolation, loneliness, and depression
  

Recreation is Essential to Quality of Life

• Recreation builds self-esteem and positive self-image
• Recreation enhances life satisfaction levels
• Recreation enhances perceived quality of life –for individuals, families and communities
• Recreation & sports nurtures growth, acquisition of life skills and independent living for those with a disability

Recreation Provides Positive Opportunities for Our Youth

• Recreation & sports reduce self-destructive behavior and negative activity in youth – an antidote to smoking, substance abuse, suicide and depression
• Recreation reduces crime
• Recreation reduces racism – building understanding between diverse cultures
• Recreation reduces isolation, loneliness and alienation
• It stimulates group projects, community involvement, activism, and volunteerism
• It instills values of patience, tolerance, honesty, integrity, and perseverance
• It fosters cooperation, collaboration, critical thinking, innovation, creativity, and leadership

Recreation Builds Strong Families and Healthy Communities

• Families that play together, stay together
• Recreation provides safe developmental opportunities for the latch-key child
• Recreation, sports and arts/culture produce leaders who serve their communities in many ways
• Recreation, sports and arts/culture build social skills and stimulate participation in community life
• Recreation is often the catalyst that builds strong, self-sufficient communities (ie sport groups, arts guilds)
• Art/culture helps people understand their neighbors, their history and their environment
• Recreation and arts/culture build pride in a community Recreation Reduces Health Care, Social Service and Police/Justice Costs
• Fitness and well-being reduce both the incidence and severity of illness and disability – lowering healthcare costs
• Recreation supports families– reducing costs of social service intervention and foster care
• Recreation reduces crime and social dysfunction– reducing police, justice and incarceration costs
  

Recreation and parks are significant economic generators.

• Recreation, sports, and fitness improves work performance – increased productivity, decreased absenteeism, decreased staff turnover, reduced ‘on the job’ accidents.
• Recreation, parks, and arts/culture attract businesses to the community – prime economic development and relocation magnets.
• Recreation, parks, sports, and arts/culture are the attractions that draw tourism – the third largest and one of the fastest growing industries in the world today.
• Recreation, parks, fitness, sports, and arts/culture are significant employment generators on their own – providing many jobs.
• Small investments in recreation, parks, sports, and arts/culture often yield large economic returns – money generated by events, capital development, and provision of ongoing services is spent several times in the community (the multiplier effect).
• Parks and open spaces increase property value, and therefore tax revenue, on adjacent land – many developers are automatically including parkland, golf courses, etc. as marketing features.

From "The Benefits Catalog", Canadian Parks & Recreation Association, 1997.