What Comes Next for East Lansing’s Parks?

More than 61% of voters voted against a dedicated parks millage in November’s election, leaving questions about future funding and services up in the air.

East Lansing Info spoke with Interim Director of Parks, Recreation & Arts Justin Drwencke about next steps after the millage failure. Drwencke said he has had some preliminary conversations with City Manager Robert Belleman, who is waiting for direction from the City Council.

“Our two new council members have only had one meeting together and haven’t done much business yet,” he said. “What I’m focused on now is working with the team to pull together metrics and details about our programs so we can answer questions about who our programs serve, what the costs are, what revenues are associated with them, and share that information with council as requested or with the financial health review team that it sounds like will be established.”

The failure of the millage does not automatically cut parks funding. The millage would have increased property taxes to create a dedicated source of funding to parks, insulating the department from cuts. Without the millage, the department could see contributions from the city’s general fund cut. City leaders will consider cuts across city departments next budget season, as East Lansing is budgeted to run at a deficit this fiscal year. The parks department is scheduled to receive about $2.6 million from the general fund, about 40% of its total budget, this fiscal year. 

To increase revenue, parks-related services could see fees increased, as the city is operating during an era of high inflation, Drwencke said. 

With the prospect of cuts hanging over city employees’ heads, Drwencke said he’s encouraging staff in his department to focus on the work they do and the impact it has on the community. 

“We have an interesting dynamic right now where some of our staff have been here 20 years and have gone through this four or five times before,” he said. “Some of our staff are newer, [hired] within the past couple of years, and this might be their first time seeing broader conversations about the budget and experiencing fear about job security.

“What I’ve focused on over the past several weeks is helping them remember why we do this work and why we come in every day—really emphasizing that we play a critical role in the community, bringing people together and providing safe spaces for families and children. By re-centering on our purpose as a department, I think it has helped people work through those challenges.”

Drwencke said he is engaging with program coordinators now, asking targeted questions to gain a deeper understanding of how programs function and their broader impact.

“I think there’s a lot of advocacy that can be done simply by explaining that value,” he said.

At least one member of the City Council is open to including cuts to parks and recreation as one action to help balance the city budget. In his appearance on the East Lansing Insider podcast, Mayor Erik Altmann spoke about the millage results and the future of the parks.

“My rationale for putting the millage on the ballot is that I don’t think it’s fair to cut programs unless you give people a chance to decide whether they wanna pay for them,” he said, while reiterating that he is just one vote on the council.

Altmann also said the city cannot cut public safety or public works any more than it has in the last 15 years.

“You can run a city without parks and rec,” he said. “It’s not fun, but we did it for decades.”

The vote against the millage came after a communications campaign the city launched to spread information about the millage. 

Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, requests show the city sent an 8.5-by-5.5-inch postcard to nearly 13,000 households. ASAP Printing was paid $1,413.77 for the printing, and an $4,671.21 was spent on postage. Additionally, the fall 2025 issue of the city’s Connect newsletter included a page with information about the millage. The city spent $6,750.18 on printing the newsletter, plus $3,735.93 in postage and shipping costs.

Under Michigan law, municipalities may use taxpayer funds to explain what a millage is, the cost to taxpayers and what services the millage will pay for. Cities cannot, however, advocate in favor or against a millage. City officials may express their own beliefs, as long as they aren’t using taxpayer funds to do so. 

In another FOIA request, ELi found more than 300 pages of emails between city staff as they prepared the city’s website and mailings to explain the millage to voters. The emails reflect steady communication between Drwencke, Belleman, a PR consultant and Communications Director Carrie Sampson.

Altmann also offered advice to Belleman on how information should be presented to residents.

“One overall set of questions that people may have that I don’t really come away with an answer for,” Altmann wrote in an email to Belleman, “[is] ‘How did we get there? Why now? Will we be in the same boat next year? And, possibly, wasn’t the income tax supposed to solve everything?’”

Altmann offered two possible answers to the question he posed.

“The city is a lean operation and does a lot with a little,” he wrote, “and/or ‘We are in some ways an affluent community but have never been an affluent government and have struggled to maintain services since at least the financial crisis of 2008. This is the plight of many municipalities in Michigan and especially those with large non-taxable nonprofits within their borders.’”

ELi asked Drwencke if he would have done anything differently with the millage.

“That’s a really tough question to answer,” he said. “What I will say is I think we could have benefited from the support of an additional advocacy organization—something like a 501(c)(4). We could have benefited from more support to help with messaging that might have had more flexibility than what we can do as government employees. Securing more communications and messaging support from a partner would have been a useful action.”

He said he wanted the community to know that, for now, programs are operating normally.

“We’re still here to provide the same high quality of service our community members expect and love,” he said. “We’re not making any immediate changes. We’ll be working through the annual budget process like every city department, and there will be many opportunities for public engagement as the process moves through various work sessions in front of Council.”