Bob Smith first got his start at the Baltimore County Department of Recreation and Parks when he was 16, chalking local baseball diamonds, setting up sports fields for the day and working as a counselor at nearby summer camps. While he did not know it at the time, this was the beginning of a lifelong career—he would later return to the Department of Recreation and Parks after graduating from college.
Smith worked as a community supervisor there for over 18 years, after which he would go on to serve in a variety of leadership positions. In April of 2023, he was nominated to become the Baltimore County Department of Recreation and Parks’ director by Baltimore County Executive John “Johnny O” Olszewski Jr.
Responses have been edited for length and clarity.
Q: What brought you back to the Baltimore County Department of Recreation and Parks after you stopped working there part time as a teenager?
A: The ability to make an impact on the communities was important to me. … I grew up in a family of volunteers, my parents were part of the PTA and the recreation council. And so it was always kind of important for our family to be involved in the community. When the opportunity presented itself to make [my part-time work] a full-time career where I could work in a field that impacts the communities that I live in and that my friends and family members live in, I wanted to take a shot at that. I was lucky enough to get in 27 or so years ago, and I’ve been here ever since. Now I’m blessed enough to be leading this agency, which was not a career goal that I had when I started.
Q: What are your responsibilities as director?
A: I oversee every Recreation and Parks facility activity program across the county. So every playground like the ones at Rodgers Forge and Northwest Regional Park, all the programs that operate within the spectrum. We do a lot of programming in conjunction with our stakeholder recreation and nature councils, and they deliver the majority of the programs, so I have a lot of interaction with those stakeholder groups. One of the things we’re actually really excited that the kids are enjoying is that we’ve had quite a bit of improvement on the capital infrastructure of the agency. We’ve been replacing playgrounds that were older beloved playgrounds, going in and improving them.
Q: What are your favorite things to do in the summer in Baltimore County?
A: I like to get out for a weekend for a hike. So I like to spend time in Oregon Ridge’s trail system, Cromwell Valley, Lake Roland Park. … There’s some really good trail systems, like Marshy Point on the east side, which has some really good trail systems along the waterway there. So I like to get out of our parks and get in a weekend hike on the trail system, and go out and have some lunch.
Q: Does the Department of Recreation and Parks have any events planned for the summer?
A: We have a variety of programs. We’ll have Movies in the Park where we have portable movie screens, we’ll come out to various parks throughout Baltimore County and have a free movie night. We’ll have a Juneteenth event that’ll be planned. We have a Pride event that is planned. We have an art showing at our Holt Center for the Arts. … We have a slew of summer camp activities that will happen in a variety of our parks all across the system.
We also just started a youth basketball summer league. We’re using one site on the east side and one on the west side, and we have open registration where you can register as a participant or as a whole team. We’ve worked with Del. [Carl] Jackson and a number of other stakeholders in the county to put this league together. A whole summer basketball league was something people have been asking for for years, and we’re excited to kick that off.
Q: What else should people look forward to?
A: I was just at a meeting down in Sparrows Point where we worked with Tradepoint Atlantic on a land donation that was Bethlehem Steel property in the southeast of Baltimore County. We broke ground there last August, and we should open this January. We’re building a brand-new park on the water there with a 16,000 square foot gymnasium and activity center, a synthetic turf field, a canoe and kayak launch, a walking path and a 10,000 square foot fully accessible playground. It’s going to be based on the history of the area. We’re very excited for that.
