Harvey Feldman was a passionate advocate for parks and recreation for over fifty years, believing they were critical to the well-being of the community. He took great pride in the Minneapolis park system, where he served as a top official for 20 years.

“It seems like all along, I believed that parks and recreation could improve people’s lives,” Feldman said when he was inducted into the American Academy of Park and Recreation Management, an elite group of park managers, in 2007. . That was my motivation then and it continues to be my motivation today.”

Feldman, 84, of New Hope, died Nov. 5 in Tucson, Ariz., where he and his wife, Andrea, had a second home. He was sick, but the exact cause of death had not yet been determined.

Feldman, parks director at New Hope and Richfield, St. He served as interim parks director at St. Louis Park and assistant parks superintendent in Minneapolis, training the next generation of aspiring park managers before becoming director of the University of Minnesota Recreation Facilities Management Institute.

“Harvey represented the highest standard of public service,” said Rip Rapson, former deputy mayor of Minneapolis. “He was as dedicated as possible to the mission of the Minneapolis Parks and Recreation system, working tirelessly to create the forward-looking, innovative infrastructure and programming that makes Minneapolis unique among its peers.”

Feldman grew up in north Minneapolis and attended North High School; there he played football, basketball and baseball and was named Hy Truman’s outstanding Jewish scholar-athlete by the Mercury Club in 1957. Brett Feldman of Minneapolis said his father wanted to major in that field. Be a dancer or a professional baseball player. But he couldn’t hit a curveball during tryouts for the U.S. Gopher team, so he focused on his career in parks and recreation.

Feldman, who had just left the United States, became New Hope’s first park manager in 1963, at the age of 23. In 1968, he led a referendum to purchase land in New Hope and build the city’s park system. In 2022, a bridge at Northwood Park in New Hope was named after him.

“He used this avenue to instill the wonder of parks and recreation, encourage people to think about parks, and connect with residents to make the system even better,” said New Hope Parks Director Susan Rader.