Q&A: Oconee Forest Park Manager wants to improve sustainability

Katherine Davis  |  September 29, 2023

Brad Smith is an assistant forest resources manager at the University of Georgia and the park manager of Oconee Forest Park, a 60-acre natural recreation area on campus.

Q: What does a typical day look like for you as park manager?

A: Checking trails, checking trash cans, checking structures, answering emails from patrons, repairing bridges a lot here recently, felling hazard trees. Mostly trail maintenance honestly.

Q: What does sustainability mean to you?

A: In general, trying to create systems that are actually feasible by society that can run perpetually without eliminating a resource. At the park, trying to reuse materials and things as much as possible, as well as just trying to minimize the impact of the users. It’s such a multi-use space that I think it almost has inherent qualities of sustainability, because it can provide so much to so many people with so few inputs.

Q: What do you think are the biggest issues regarding sustainability within the park?

A: Probably the health of the lake, which is mostly going to be erosion and stormwater. And then probably just overuse of some of the trails.

Q: Speaking of the lake, I saw that it went through a big restoration a couple years ago. Did the project achieve what it was hoping for or was there room for improvement?

A: I wouldn’t go as far as to call it a restoration for the lake. I don’t know that all of the actions that occurred were as focused on improving the quality of the lake, and the water within, as it could have been. But overall, I definitely feel like it was an improvement. It has provided users with a more aesthetically pleasing and also an actual, usable space. And it probably has improved erosion on that side of the lake, where it was just kind of a beach to where now it’s at least vegetated.

Q: How do you think UGA as a whole could improve sustainability?

A: We throw away a massive amount of stuff. Being on the facility side of it, as well as the land side of it, just the amount of furniture that we throw away as a university is obscene. I have to give props to the sustainability and the waste management office, because they really are trying, but we still definitely have an issue of waste. And I think we could do more as far as we’ve got so many flat, impermeable surfaces. Where are our solar panels? Anytime that we’re putting in any sort of pavement, why isn’t it semipermeable concrete or asphalt? You shouldn’t wait for the county to force you to do that.

Comments trimmed for length and clarity.

Why I Wrote this Story

I wrote this story to get to know a professional on the sustainability beat that I could potentially come back to as a source in the future. It was also a good opportunity to become more comfortable with the interviewing process. The park that Smith manages is located on the University of Georgia campus, which gives the story proximity and engagement.