Tricia Shimamura has been appointed as the new commissioner of the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, taking the helm of an agency responsible for maintaining accessible public spaces across the city.<\/p>\n
Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced the appointment of the New York City native on Saturday at High Bridge Park in The Bronx, elevating her from her current role as Manhattan borough commissioner for the department.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m excited to be announcing the appointment of a Parks Commissioner who has spent her career showing up and listening to communities across our city,\u201d Mamdani said. \u201cUnder the leadership of Tricia Shimamura, our Parks Department will strive to make this a city that every New Yorker can afford to not just live in but enjoy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Shimamura has more than a decade of experience advancing infrastructure projects and working with communities across New York City.<\/p>\n
Since March 2024, she has led the Manhattan branch of the agency during the Inwood Hill Park fires and has overseen the first phase of reopening East River Park. She also expanded community outreach and advocated for millions of dollars in funding for capital projects and public programs.<\/p>\n
Shimamura previously served as deputy chief of staff to Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney and was director of government relations at Columbia University. She also worked in the office of Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine, overseeing the Community Affairs Unit and managing relationships with 12 Manhattan community boards, and was a social worker in Brooklyn.<\/p>\n
\u201cEarly in my career as a social worker, I saw firsthand how government fell short for working families and students\u2014and how our public infrastructure too often mirrored those failures,\u201d Shimamura said at the appointment. \u201cAs Parks Commissioner, I will ensure our parks are not only free, but welcoming, vibrant spaces that every New Yorker can be proud of.\u201d<\/p>\n
During the speech, Mamdani also thanked Shimamura\u2019s predecessor, Iris Rodriguez-Rosa, who was appointed in June 2025 after decades of service to the department. <\/p>\n
\u201cTricia will be following in truly great footsteps. I want to recognize and express my gratitude to former commissioner Iris Rodriguez Rosa, the first Latina to ever hold the role, for her 47 years of service to our city, a testament of her love of New York and quantifiable evidence of a genuinely remarkable career,\u201d he shared.<\/p>\n
The new mayor also highlighted how crucial parks are to the five boroughs: <\/p>\n
\u201cWhether it\u2019s here at the gorgeous High Bridge Park, running the loop at Astoria Park, hiking in Pelham Bay Park, seeing the cherry blossoms at Conference House in Staten Island, watching the sunset from Sunset Park, or playing cricket like I did in Ferry Point Park,\u201d he stated. \u201cThese parks are more than simple green spaces in a city that is typically full of concrete. They are what makes our home feel like home.\u201d<\/p>\n
Staten Island is known as the Borough of Parks and has over 170 parks and 12,000 acres of park land, which are currently being led by Borough Parks Chief Joseph Homsey, who will now serve under Shimamura. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tricia Shimamura has been appointed as the new commissioner of the New York City Department of Parks &…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":103518,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[9,24,63,134,136,135],"class_list":{"0":"post-103517","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-staten-island","8":"tag-new-york","9":"tag-new-york-city","10":"tag-nyc","11":"tag-staten-island","12":"tag-staten-island-headlines","13":"tag-staten-island-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103517","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103517"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103517\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/103518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}