Facility rentals and private events continued to be the most common source of funding for park respondents, with more than three-quarters (76.4%) indicating this is a source of funding. This compares with 61% of all other respondents to the Industry Report
Survey.
The next most common source of funding for parks in 2026 was municipal and city taxes, with 63.6% of park respondents indicating they receive funding this way, compared with just 11.9% of non-park respondents. Membership and admission fees followed close behind as a funding source, with 63.3% of parks and 65.4% of non-park respondents indicating they received funding through these kinds of fees.
In addition to events and rentals, and municipal taxes, park respondents were more likely than others to indicate that they received funding through government grants (53.9% of park respondents vs. 25.5% of non-park respondents), concessions (34.4% vs. 20.8%), district taxes (12.1% vs. 6.3%) and state taxes (9.4% vs. 5.8%).
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