Parks staff detail Pearl Street Mall maintenance hours, ambassadors expand tracking; new trash cans arriving on the Hill

Denise Dawson, senior urban parks manager for Parks and Recreation, gave the Downtown Management Commission a quarterly operations update on Jan. 14 that quantified staff time spent maintaining the Pearl Street Mall and described coordination with ambassadors and volunteer programs.

Dawson said park operations have four full-time staff positions assigned to Pearl Street operations; three positions are filled and one is vacant. Seasonal staff typically number four to seven during the summer; last year there were five. "For our irrigation, we spent approximately 715 hours last year," Dawson said. "The horticulture — planting, pruning and weeding — took about 788 hours, and trash collection accounted for roughly 1,580 hours." She also told commissioners that last…