This section of the website is a place where I stand on my virtual soapbox and proclaim my personal opinions on issues that I see of importance to the City of Los Banos and our community in general. I usually take the "What This Town Needs" articles seriously. This article is offered in a significantly more tongue-in-cheek manner.

We have just completed touring each and every park in the City Of Los Banos California in order to provide visitors to the OurLosBanos.com website a wonderful resource which describes every park in the city and provides visitors with photographs and salient descriptions of the equipment, amenities, and facilities offered at each park in Los Banos. In doing so, we came to the conclusion that became the thesis of this What This Town Needs article:

What this town REALLY NEEDS is a GOOD DEFINITION of the words "CITY PARK"!

That's right! I maintain that our city miserably lacks a good practical definition of the simple concept of "city park"! Our city appears to simply not comprehend what is understood by the average citizen when the words "city park" are attached to a spot of land. What a shame! What a crime!

I'm sure by this point you are wondering just how much alcohol I had consumed before I started penning this missive. I assure you I was not drunk and that though this diatribe is a bit peculiar I never have driven a keyboard drunk nor mixed alcohol and Internet publishing!

Let me ask you a question.... What comes to your mind when someone says "Let's take the kids to the park"? Do you see sandboxes, bright shiny play equipment, swingsets , and soccer fields to run around in? Do you see a place for the family to spend hours lounging, perhaps having a barbecue and going roller skating? That is what we envision when we hear the words "city park"! If you share this vision of city parks then be prepared!! Abject disappointment might be just around the corner for those who are not intimately familiar with some of the so-called parks in Los Banos!

The official City Of Los Banos website proudly proclaims on their parks page: "The Parks and Facilities Division maintains and operates the City's approximately 125+ acres of parks, open space, and landscape areas". The city then lists 37 places as 'parks' on their website. References to these numbers appear in everything from the mayor's 'State of The City' speeches to the information the Chamber of Commerce provides to folks coming into town.

But our secret investigation in the City of Los Banos has determined that "37 parks" is a BIG GOVERNMENT LIE, a CONSPIRACY, and a DISINFORMATION CAMPAIGN of the most vile sort - the likes of which have not practiced since the fall of the iron curtain!

You want EVIDENCE!?!?!
Evidence? Boy oh boy do I have evidence! Please allow me to present to you documented and unassailable PROOF of this deplorable deception! I am sure that by the time you finish this article it will be painfully obvious that Los Banos does NOT have THIRTY SEVEN city 'parks'! On the contrary, when you see this evidence you will KNOW beyond a moral certainty that Los Banos should only be allowed to claim a mere 32 city parks!

The following pieces of real estate have somehow been deemed by the powers that be as to be worthy of the title: "Los Banos City Parks"... we don't think so! You be the judge!

Exhibit Number One:
Please direct your browser to exhibit number ONE: JoLin Park. I do not know about you, but what I see here is not a park, but is indeed just a great grass filled hole. Nothing more! Do you see ONE piece of play equipment? Do you see a batting cage? Do you see a sandbox, horseshoe pit, slide, picnic table, soccer goal, or even a porta-potty? Neither do I! No what I see is simply a hole in the ground that has been lined with a bit of grass! This my dear friends is NOT A PARK!

Exhibit Number Two:
I bring before the jury of the community at large another piece of evidence that this town does not know what a "city park" is - this time in the form of Flagpole Park. Okay now folks, this is just silly. This spot of grass that sits right on the highway as you come into town and houses our "Welcome To" signs and structures has somehow been deemed to be a 'park'. I just can not see taking the family here to set up our lawn chairs just to spend 10 hours on a warm Saturday afternoon. Our family just is not that 'into' the sport of 'signage observation' and the exhaust fumes pouring from the four lanes of automobiles passing back and forth a few feet to the north would probably ruin the picnic! To call this a city park is a real linguistical stretch!

Exhibit Number Three:
I ask you, as 'finders of fact', to point your browsers at exhibit three.... Wolfsen Park. Yes that's right.... just across busy highway 152 from Flagpole 'park' is Wolfsen 'park'. Before we did our park-pages research we truly thought this was the side lawn for the nearby building that borders the park. Alternatively we thought Wolfsen 'park' was simply a grass strip put in front of the airport to make the airport sign look good. But no sir! This is an official Los Banos "City Park"! Wolfsen offers the same glorious list of amenities as Flagpole Park across the street, but fewer of them. Instead of many signs to observe there is only one. There is also less grass and no flagpole for the teeming throngs of visitors that must come to enjoy this park every week. Thankfully however, there is still lots of fast moving traffic and exhaust smoke for those who want to go and enjoy a day sniffing fumes in a park sitting only a few feet from a busy highway!

Exhibit Number Four:
Downtown Plaza. While not officially named a 'park' it is listed by the city AS a park so I'm compelled point this one out as well. Downtown Plaza 'Park' is simply a series of stilted looking cement benches in the heart of downtown Los Banos. There is painfully little shade and is probably a good place to eat lunch. But recreation? I hardly think of this as a place to take the wife, dog and kids for an afternoon of frivolity and fun!

Exhibit Number Five:
The final piece of evidence that this town needs to embed a good definition of city park into their collective lexicon - is called Airport 'Park'. When we were searching for this park, we had an address, and a general idea of where Airport park was supposed to be. We had a very difficult time finding Airport Park however. Why? Because we parked our car next to it after driving up and down the road several times looking for... well.. a real park! Had we misread? Had we copied down a wrong address? No sir! We had not! In fact this tiny spit of grass which is actually smaller than the individual tenants lawns at some apartments IS the 'city park' we were looking for... we just didn't know it. Now my friends, I do not know about you but a single picric bench placed on a lawn the size of a bathroom rug just does not sing out the idea of a "city park" to me... Airport 'park' just can not be truly taken seriously as a park can it? Apparently the city thinks so! I do however await being proven wrong. Perhaps next Mother's Day the city will switch venues.... Maybe instead of having the "Mother's Day In The Park Event" at Pacheco Park we can all gather at Airport Park! Won't THAT be cozy!

So again I ask the question. Are these really PARKS in the truest sense of the word?

No indeed, I think the evidence points to the fact that not every 'park' in Los Banos is indeed a 'park'. Perhaps there is some legal definition that lets us get massive federal grants or somesuch for these places, but if you are looking for the quintessential 'park city USA' park...

Well I will leave it to you to draw your own conclusions!

Now having made you endure all of this silliness I want to assure visitors to the OurLosBanos website that what may at first blush appear to be an acerbic attack on the city really is not intended to be such at all.

The City of Los Banos Ca. has done a flat out excellent job of maintaining a very high park to population ratio. There are very few towns that I know of that have done anywhere NEAR as well as Los Banos in this regard. I think most of the population truly appreciates this and I know our family really appreciates the dozens of real parks that this city offers us.

While there are a very few examples of parks in the city that are run down OR need to have equipment updated or replaced such as: Catholic Park, Cresthills Park, or JoLin Park Los Banos really does do VERY well overall in this regard and we have seen examples in town of absolutely superior places to enjoy an afternoon out with the family. In our opinion some of the absolute best parks in town are Medowlands park III and Gardens park 5 These are REAL parks and have wonderful facilities and equipment where families can enjoy the day. The anomalies that I featured in my five silly 'exhibits' above are the only examples of "parks that are not parks" in this town. Finding them defined as 'parks' struck me as truly humorous and it is my hope that this article has struck you in the same way as it was penned - that is in a humorous vein.

If you would like more detailed (and serious) information on the parks in Los Banos please visit the Los Banos Parks section of this website for a detailed and well photographed description of every park in the City of Los Banos as well as a list of amenities and facilities offered at each. In addition there are maps and comparative charts which will help you select exactly the right park venue for a day out, party, or gathering.

Do you have an opinion on the parks that are not parks in Los Banos? Do you have an opinion on this article? Please feel to share your polite opinions in our Los Banos Forums Section!