INDIANAPOLIS— Chelsea Murdock is a stay-at-home mom of three kids.
For her, parks are a big part of her Broad Ripple community, especially Canterbury Park.
“It’s where you meet everybody,” said Murdock. “We come here a lot. They upkeep the park really well.”
She says park maintenance helps her decide which parts to visit.
"It's super important,” said Murdock. “We obviously return to the parks that are upkept the most. We love our Indy Parks; sometimes we sneak off to the Carmel Parks."
Indy Parks could face a slight budget decrease for 2026; however, the city says it will not impact staffing or park maintenance.
WRTV Investigates has highlighted problems with maintaining parks across the city, including high weeds, trash and broken equipment.
On Thursday, WRTV visited Canterbury Park and found holes in the benches you could put your hand through.
Indy Parks is expecting to get $40 million in its 2026 capital budget, which will help with replacing park equipment and new park developments. The capital budget includes funding from the Lilly Endowment Grant and the American Rescue Plan Act.
The proposed operating budget for Indy Parks is $33.3 million, a $70,000 decrease from the 2025 operating budget.
New Indy Parks director Brittany Crone said the decrease will not have an impact on staffing or park maintenance.
"We are going to see a squeeze in our supplies budget, so if we were to want to purchase a bunch of life vests, we would have to hold off on that purchase,” said Crone.
Crone said the budget decrease would also impact their contract budget, which would include partnering with contractors and businesses for projects.
While Indy Parks can address things like benches, playground equipment and bathrooms, it’s actually another city agency responsible for trash, mowing and weed removal— the Department of Public Works (DPW).
DPW does some of the work themselves, but it also contracts with five companies to do the work.
WRTV Investigates filed a records request and learned the city paid the five contractors $641,288 in 2023.
Crone said at this point there are no plans to move all of the parks maintenance under Indy Parks entirely.
“I am in a state of listening and learning, and we have received numerous complaints,” said Crone. “We want to see the maintenance of our parks continue to be at a high level and improve wherever we can. We are in lock step with our team at DPW and have made strides in the conversation. We are looking forward to how that can improve."
Indy Parks will present its budget to the City-County Council on September 4, and then the council will vote on the entire budget in October.
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A retired 16-year Indy Parks employee, Pete Wenzel, says the city needs to reevaluate how it maintains parks.
“The city has divided up the maintenance of parks into so many small areas that it really doesn't get the attention that it needs,” said Wenzel. “It's just a maze of management that really goes to no one person, and that's the biggest problem. The face of Indy Parks maintenance is nobody."
WRTV Investigates found Ridenour Park overrun with weeds, trash and outdated equipment.
Ridenour Park is DPW’s responsibility, not a contractor’s park to maintain.
Wenzel said the condition of Ridenour Park highlights how the city’s maintenance structure is broken.
“Their periodic maintenance is to let parks get to such a terrible condition that they can't maintain them, and they have to renovate them,” said Wenzel. “It’s a horrible use of taxpayer dollars.”
The city’s invested a historic $142 million in parks over several years, thanks to funding from:
