Josh Flynn

This week I interviewed Malkia McLeod via e-mail; she is the Marketing and Media Relations Manager of the Baltimore City Department of Recreation and Parks. I just asked her some basic questions about what the department has been doing lately as well as her opinions about parks and citizen use in general.

When I asked McLeod about the general public’s knowledge of and involvement in the parks and areas around their communities, she explained that the department is constantly developing ways to promote Baltimoreans to get active and go green.

“We host several tree plantings through TreeBaltimore; offer trainings as well as volunteer cleanups, invasive removals (weeds) through our Park Conservation and Community Outreach Office; and establish partnerships with community organizations, non-profits and corporations through our Partnership Office. Our “Friends Groups” are organized to preserve the trees, foliage, and other natural resources of the parks as well as for charitable and educational purposes.”

McLeod stressed that urban green space is a necessity because it promotes a healthier city and gives a sense of cohesion.

She also provided me with some statistics from the National Park and Recreation Association about the nation’s park availability and usage.

• Research shows that 75% of Americans live within two miles of a public park.
• More than 75% of the population takes advantage of their local parks.
• This amounts to a staggering 192 million people visiting parks annually.

I was not able to find similar statistics for Baltimore, but I would like to investigate this further and see what people in the community think about the parks.

Possible Sites:

•    Great Falls (Md./VA line on Potomac River; ~1 hour)
•    Sugar Loaf Mountain (Dickerson, Md.; ~1 hour)
•    Gwynn Falls Trail/Leakin Park (Baltimore, Md.)

The Peg: The Baltimore area has many recreational spots and trails that are a lot closer to the city than most people may realize. I want to try to expose people to these areas as they have great value for both exercise and relaxation; and do so in a concise and interesting way. I want to try to limit the region to places that are close to within an hour of Baltimore.

Ideas for Media: I would like to incorporate as many photos as possible of different interesting parts of the trails as well as probably some video. I also would like to have audio interviews with people either involved with the Baltimore Department of Recreations and Parks as well as volunteers and people who use the trails and areas. Finally I think that Google Maps and maybe some other trail maps would be crucial to this project’s success. I want to give people clear directions and trail recommendations so they can actually use my information to visit the places I talk about.

Who can be interviewed?:
•    Baltimore Department of Recreations and Parks
•    National Park Service
•    People who use the trails
•    Volunteers who help maintain the trails

Technical & Other Restrictions: Obviously the weather plays a huge role in the availability of these locations and doing interviews. Any event or on-scene interviews could be canceled due to inclement weather; however there are ways around it. Technology is not so much of a concern as I will be able to use the necessary tools without power or the internet.

How is this different from what is out there?: There are many sites that list hiking trails and give people ideas of where to go. I want to take a more in depth look at these sites and show people what goes into maintaining them, as well as show that even inexperienced hikers can enjoy these locations in close proximity.

Possible Sites:
•   The Brewer’s Art (Baltimore, Md.)
•    Flying Dog Brewery (Frederick, Md.)
•    DuClaw Brewing Company (Bel Air, Md.)
•    Clipper City Brewing Company (Baltimore, Md.)

The Peg: When most Americans think of beer, they think of the light lager style beers like Coors Light, Bud Light or Miller Lite. Originally beer was much more flavorful and was a craft more than a mass production. There are still craft breweries all over that produce many styles of beer, and there are many very good brews right here in Maryland.

Ideas for Media: Photos with interviewees, audio/video interviews, a page that compares some of the different beers and styles and Google Maps to show locations.

Who can be interviewed?:
•    Owners and other employees of the breweries
•    Patrons of the restaurants
•    Rob Kasper – writes a blog for the Baltimore Sun about Beer

Technical & Other Restrictions: In some cases it might be hard for me to get an interview with an owner of one of these places just for a class project. I could probably talk to alternative sources, but ideally the people who started the businesses would obviously be the best source for the story.

How is this different from what is out there?: There are a lot of craft beer websites and publications, but there are not really any that take the Maryland scene and try to get a behind the scenes look at how all of these breweries got started.

Possible Sites:
•    Lauraville Improvement Association
•    Zeke’s Coffee
•    Great Soul Wellness Studio
•    Grind On Cafe
•    Tuesday Market Connection in Lauraville (Baltimore Sun) – Starts June 2nd.

The Peg: Lauraville is a tightly knit community in northeast Baltimore that is doing many things to improve both the quality of the area and the image that it is portraying. There are many locally owned and operated businesses that are trying to be responsible business owners and provide quality services to the Lauraville community. I’m sure there are some very interesting stories behind the businesses that have never been explored from a journalistic viewpoint.

Ideas for Media: Photos of the businesses, video/audio interviews with owners of these places, Google Maps showing where Lauraville is and where the businesses can be found; a lot of possibilities.

Who can be interviewed?:
•    Members of the Lauraville Improvement Association
•    Owners/employees of the local area businesses
•    People living in the Lauraville community
•    People visiting Lauraville events or businesses

Technical & Other Restrictions: There are not very many restrictions or problems doing this topic. I should be able to schedule interviews with the people I need to speak with, it is a pretty small community with very friendly people.

How is this different from what is out there?: There are not many websites or much media coverage dealing with Lauraville. I think it could be informative to people that don’t know about all that Lauraville has to offer, and the website I would create would be unlike anything currently existing.

I decided to examine the story from the Baltimore Sun about “German Thursdays” at a local bakery in Parkville, Md. The article was supplemented by this slideshow, which really improved the quality of audience understanding. When reading through the Sun article by Nicole Fuller, one can get a decent idea of what is going on in the scene, but the slideshow really drove the story home.

We all have preconceived visions and impressions of what somebody like Alfred Zeller or Dietrich Paul would look like, and have a mental image based on Fuller’s descriptions. Some people may be more familiar with traditional German music than others, but everybody still gets some kind of idea about what it would sound like while reading the article and imagining the instruments involved.

The accompanying slideshow really solidifies and more accurately illustrates what is going on in the Edelweiss Bakery and Café on Thursday afternoons. The ambient sound was very helpful in depicting the environment. Immediately you hear the accordion playing and Zeller and the others engaging in one of the German songs that continues throughout the slideshow. The actualities were well placed in relation to the images and the volume levels between the music and the actualities were done well. Not only did the actualities match up with the photos well, but they also selected very good quotes.

Some stories might not need this much multimedia reinforcement, but in a context like this with a feature story about music and people gathering, the images and audio from the slideshow made the story a lot more interesting and real than just reading a column in the newspaper.