The flag honoring Cambridge Olympians has not been raised for five years. (Photo: Charles Teague)

Now that winter is over, get out to a park this Patriot’s Day Weekend, have fun, help fix our parks and maybe win a cash prize from Cambridge4Trees. Use the SeeClickFix app to report needed repairs, especially safety issues. Teach kids and grandkids that we need to look out for others and that it is their city, too! We need the next generation to protect our parks, especially as parks are the best places for trees to grow and mature.

Cambridge4Trees volunteers already cleaned up a surprising amount in North Cambridge’s Linear Park, but there’s so much to do in parks across the city. The city lets so much run down and “defers” routine maintenance until, after decades, it executes massive, budget-busting renovations. At best, this routine only raises your taxes. At worst, people get hurt by busted-up pavement, they can’t really enjoy the park and it’s not “green.” We need to add “repair” to “reduce, reuse, recycle.” It is abusive to cavalierly throw away the embodied carbon of park paraphernalia by not even bothering to paint it.

Even more shameful is the disrepair of the Danehy Park installation honoring Cambridge Olympics medal winners. The Cambridge Black History Project documents the exemplary lives of Charles Jenkins and John Thomas. Five years have passed since a SeeClickFix report about the installation’s ragged flag, but Patriot’s Day will again pass without the athletes being honored with a flag-raising, as they were at the Olympics.

Patriot’s Day Weekend starts school vacation week. Get everybody out to a park and let’s get the city to allocate part of the billion-dollar budget to fixing our parks this year! Here’s how to do good and win a prize.