10:45 AM - 12:15 PM
[HCG19-P05] How is the Designated Manager of the Okinawa Peace Memorial Park Evaluated? -Focusing on the Memorial Function as an Evaluation Item
Keywords:Designated administrator system, Park management, Prayer park
As social issues become increasingly complex, parks must play a variety of roles. Some are created with specific themes, such as disaster prevention, sports, ecosystem conservation, and green infrastructure, and they must be managed according to their unique characteristics. Prayer parks are one example. Japan, which has experienced repeated natural disasters and war damage, has a number of prayer parks. Since people's memories of disasters generally fade with time, prayer parks aid in mourning the victims and continuing to communicate about disasters. Facilities unique to prayer parks, such as memorial monuments and museums, are included. It is also unique to use the parks as a venue for memorial events. To maintain an air of prayerfulness over the long term, we must evaluate the parks’ prayer functions and efforts as we would its other functions and reflect them in future management practices. We must begin discussions on the evaluation of parks’ memorial function, including the items and methods of evaluation. This paper analyzes examples of evaluations of prayer parks run by the government and clarifies the evaluation items and their contents. Then, we clarify the unique uses of prayer parks and the efforts of their administrators, before considering the evaluation of the parks’ memorial function.
This paper analyzes the results of annual evaluations of designated managers of prayer parks that have adopted the "designated management system." This system was introduced in 2003 to delegate the management of public facilities to designated private operators. The Okinawa Peace Memorial Park, one of Japan's representative prayer parks, was selected for the analysis as it uses the designated management system and its annual evaluation results are publicly available. Referring to previous studies on evaluation indicators for designated park management operations, the annual evaluation reports for the past three years, the evaluation items, and their descriptions were coded. In addition, the portion of the data related to the memorial function was extracted and coded as "memorial."
All text and figures in the documents were coded for analysis, resulting in 20 types and 476 codes. The most common code, "income and expenditure," accounted for 12% of all codes. It was followed by "facility management," "utilization status," "management framework," "service improvement," "legal compliance," "risk management," "community cooperation," "financial status," and "user satisfaction," accounting for about 10% each. This is standard evaluation content, with a certain number of general items regarded as evaluation items for the designated management system, which aims to cut costs and improve services at public facilities. These contents frequently appeared in the first half of the data summarizing maintenance and management operations. In addition, we extracted all data related to the memorial function and appended 45 of the "memorial" codes. Of these, about 30% overlapped with "community collaboration," and about 20% overlapped with "citizen participation," "informative," and "cleanup." The "memorial" code was less common in the section evaluating maintenance and management operations; most descriptions were concentrated in the "voluntary projects" section of the document. The park’s designated manager held several events each year based on the concept of memorials, which were evaluated as voluntary projects.
In conclusion, we found that a variety of operations unique to prayer parks are being carried out, but inferred that these events overlap with "regional cooperation" and "citizen participation," which have been noted in previous studies as lacking in evaluation. Further, operations related to the memorial function are not easily reflected in the evaluation system, as they fall mainly under the framework of "voluntary projects."
This paper analyzes the results of annual evaluations of designated managers of prayer parks that have adopted the "designated management system." This system was introduced in 2003 to delegate the management of public facilities to designated private operators. The Okinawa Peace Memorial Park, one of Japan's representative prayer parks, was selected for the analysis as it uses the designated management system and its annual evaluation results are publicly available. Referring to previous studies on evaluation indicators for designated park management operations, the annual evaluation reports for the past three years, the evaluation items, and their descriptions were coded. In addition, the portion of the data related to the memorial function was extracted and coded as "memorial."
All text and figures in the documents were coded for analysis, resulting in 20 types and 476 codes. The most common code, "income and expenditure," accounted for 12% of all codes. It was followed by "facility management," "utilization status," "management framework," "service improvement," "legal compliance," "risk management," "community cooperation," "financial status," and "user satisfaction," accounting for about 10% each. This is standard evaluation content, with a certain number of general items regarded as evaluation items for the designated management system, which aims to cut costs and improve services at public facilities. These contents frequently appeared in the first half of the data summarizing maintenance and management operations. In addition, we extracted all data related to the memorial function and appended 45 of the "memorial" codes. Of these, about 30% overlapped with "community collaboration," and about 20% overlapped with "citizen participation," "informative," and "cleanup." The "memorial" code was less common in the section evaluating maintenance and management operations; most descriptions were concentrated in the "voluntary projects" section of the document. The park’s designated manager held several events each year based on the concept of memorials, which were evaluated as voluntary projects.
In conclusion, we found that a variety of operations unique to prayer parks are being carried out, but inferred that these events overlap with "regional cooperation" and "citizen participation," which have been noted in previous studies as lacking in evaluation. Further, operations related to the memorial function are not easily reflected in the evaluation system, as they fall mainly under the framework of "voluntary projects."