The Crookston Park Board met on Monday to review the summer activity numbers, receive an update on the summer baseball tournaments, and preview the winter activity schedule.
SUMMER ACTIVITIES RECAP
Parks and Recreation Director Scott Butt provided a recap of the summer activities to the board. Overall, enrollment in summer activities increased from 445 in 2025 to 472 in 2026. Some of the activities that saw growth between years were 12u girls softball, Babe Ruth baseball, first- and second-grade golf, and T-ball Big Boppers. Tennis also saw growth, as an additional time slot from 9:00 to 10:00 a.m. was added to accommodate increased tennis sign-ups. Butt and the board were encouraged by the consistency in the enrollment numbers year-to-year, which helps when the department is looking at adjustments to it annual budget. “You know what you’re going to have to an extent,” says Butt. “When you budget your revenues, you can you can have a pretty good idea of what you need to budget in those line items, and to have that consistency makes it a lot easier than trying to guess what your revenues are going to be, because you’d rather be as close to being right as you can than to take a guess that, ‘hey what are we going to have this year in this number in this program?’ So the consistency really helps you with the budgeting standpoint.”
| Activity | Spring/Summer 2025 | Spring/Summer 2026 |
| 10U Baseball | 15 | 25 |
| 9U Baseball | 14 | combined with 10U Baseball |
| 10U Girls Softball | 19 | 12 |
| 11U Baseball | 13 | combined with 12U Baseball |
| 12U Baseball | 15 | 26 |
| 12U Girls Softball | 0 | 11 |
| 8U Girls Softball | 16 | 10 |
| Babe Ruth Baseball | 11 | 20 |
| Baseball Skills and Drills | 36 | 36 |
| Club Kid (2nd-6th Grade) | 82 | 76 |
| Golf 1st and 2nd Grade | 21 | 28 |
| Golf 3rd and 4th Grade | 27 | 25 |
| Golf 5th and 6th Grade | 19 | combined with 7th and 8th Grade |
| Golf 7th and 8th Grade | 10 | 19 |
| Legion Baseball | 18 | 14 |
| Men’s Softball League | 8 | 7 |
| t-Ball Big Boppers | 38 | 47 |
| Tennis (4 hours/week) | 11 | 13 |
| Tennis (Monday and Wednesday 10-11 a.m.) | 10 | 5 |
| Tennis (Monday and Wednesday 11 a.m.-12 p.m.) | 8 | 11 |
| Tennis (Tuesday and Thursday 10-11 a.m.) | 20 | 18 |
| Tennis (Tuesday and Thursday 11 a.m.-12 p.m.) | 10 | 20 |
| Tennis Tuesday and Thursday 9-10 a.m.) | N/A | 13 |
| Women’s Sand Volleyball | 12 | 11 |
| Total | 445 | 472 |
Butt also thanked the staff members and volunteers who helped organize and coach the summer activities, as well as Tri-Valley for providing efficient transportation to and from activities for children who live across Crookston. “Parents don’t have to worry about if they’re getting their child to whatever program there is, and you know it’s really affordable. And the fact that we’re very lucky in this community to have an organization like Tri Valley that can run those buses, and they get those kids where they go, and they do a great job with it. So I think from a standpoint of, as a community, we really are very lucky and fortunate to have that.”
LEGION BASEBALL TOURNAMENT
Butt also provided a recap of the Legion tournament hosted at Jim Karn Field from July 17-19. In total, eight teams competed, drawing fans from around the region. He noted that Crookston hosted two baseball tournaments in back-to-back weekends in July, along with high school sectional tournaments in June. The feedback from visitors has been incredible and keeps Crookston on track to continue hosting tournaments annually. With that comes some field work later this fall, thanks to the work of the Crookston Baseball Association, including the removal of lips in the infield and sod replacement, new gate fencing around the field, and enclosures for the visitor and home bullpens. “They’re open to ideas, and they have a lot of great ideas on their own, and the towns around like to come and play on the field,” Butt explained. “It’s really nice when you say to the baseball association, ‘I want to make these improvements, and they say, ‘Get us a number.’ You really feel like this is really cool because we’re able to make improvements, and you don’t always see that everywhere. And one of the things I talked to the baseball association about was to get rid of the lips, and they’re all on board, and we’re going to get in there and start cutting sod out and getting it level again. From a maintenance standpoint, you can do a lot of things, but sometimes you just got to go in and cut and put some new sod in, and we’ll do that here this fall.”
BLUE LINE YOUTH HOCKEY CAMP
The Crookston Blue Line Club’s first annual youth hockey camp was held from July 27-31. Butt talked to the club, who reported that 53 kids across all age groups signed up and attended the camp, with 51 of the kids living in Crookston. The local figure skating club also reserved some ice time and brought in around 100 people. Based on those numbers, the current plan is to continue offering the hockey camp but potentially move it earlier in the summer. The club told Butt that many of the kids were excited to see the clear ice without paint, comparing it to playing hockey on a frozen pond. “We really want to build off of this because I think the idea of being able to have some summer ice is a really neat thing, and the fact that we didn’t paint the ice, we just had it clear, the kids really enjoyed it,” said Butt. “Some of them thought they were playing pond hockey, and all in all, it was really a good week for us. And I thought it was well received.”
WINTER ACTIVITIES PREVIEW
The final agenda item was a discussion about the upcoming winter activity schedule. The department is working on getting the Funfinder for fall and winter together and released within the next week following Ox Cart Days. Butt spoke about how busy things have been all summer long, and the inclusion of Ox Cart Days responsibilities adds to it. Butt and his department remain focused on their current tasks and work hard all year long to ensure that activities and events proceed as scheduled. He said, “We’re able to do an awful lot of things, and it really is a testament to what the people in this town want to do, and how they take care of things, and we really have a great group of people between the associations that we have, and they work really hard to make everything goes as smoothly as they can, and upgrades, and so we’re busy, but it’s a good busy.”
Before the board adjourned, Butt reminded them that the pool feasibility study should be submitted to the city this week, and that the board will review it as soon as Butt and Interim City Administrator Darin Selzler receive it.
The next Crookston Park Board meeting is scheduled for Monday, September 14, at 4:30 p.m. in the conference room at City Hall.
