Mary Alice Lee has her Master's degree in urban planning. Her primary interest is the creation of parks.  She worked at the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation before joining the Trust for Public Land (TPL) in 2024. Now, she is the director of the NYC Playground Program. She is able to combine her interests in community outreach and urban planning to create parks and playgrounds that entire communities can enjoy. Because Mary Alice grew up in New York City with a limited school yard, she understands how important it is for kids here to have safe, fun, beautiful places to play. Read more about TPL and what programs they have in New York City below!

Q: What is the Trust for Public Land? 

A: The Trust for Public Land (TPL) is a national non-profit organization. Across the United States, we work to conserve and protect land and open space for people. We do this in federal, state, and local parks; community gardens; and playgrounds.

Q: What programs do you have in New York City?

A: Here in New York we have a special urban program called NYC Playground Program to fix up school yards.  TPL works with the Department of Education, the Parks Department, and Mayor Bloomberg's Office to turn parking lots and blacktops on school property into playgrounds. We have a unique design process where we work with the students of the school and members of the surrounding neighborhood to design a school yard park.  The goal is for the space to be used by both the school and the surrounding community.  During the school day, students use it for recess and physical education classes and after school and during the weekends, the community uses the space.

We also work a lot on community gardens throughout New York City. A few years ago we worked with the Mayor's Office to buy a number of community gardens. Now, we're in the process of handing the gardens over to individual land trusts. The community gardens are great because they are in every neighborhood-a number of them are in Harlem. They are cared for by neighbors who are working together to create a beautiful garden in their community.

If your local school is interested in having a new playground, Mary Alice and Maddalena would be happy to talk to them about the program and application process. Since the program is looking for schools that are connected to the community, there are a lot of opportunities to get involved in your neighborhood. TPL would be happy to work on more sites in Harlem because it's a great neighborhood that needs more open space! Email Mary Alice at maryalice.lee@tpl.org or Maddalena at Maddalena.Polletta@tpl.org for more information!

Read more from Mary Alice Lee and Maddalena Polletta by clicking the links below:

• Schools and communities work together to build playgrounds in NYC

To listen to our interview with Mary Alice Lee and Maddalena Polletta, click here for our podcast page.

Harlem Word is a series of interviews with Harlem health experts, written and reviewed by our Health Advisory Board.