County Innovations and Solutions

^{Photo courtesy of Sonoma County, Calif. Parks and Recreation}

A Sonoma County, Calif. lifeguard lets two young park visitors run off after successfully fitting them for lifejackets.

It was a bad record.

Over the course of 10 years, 21 people drowned in Sonoma County, Calif.'s Russian River, with five dying near county parks along the river in 2012.

That prompted the creation of the Russian River Water Safety Patrol, and in 2013, the team pitched a shutout no drownings with 17 saves. In 2014, they repeated that clean sheet.

For David Robinson, an aquatics specialist with the county's regional parks department who manages the patrol, the success came in a new approach that required a step back and a look at vulnerabilities. Though outreach to children and Spanish-speaking swimmers had cut down fatalities in targeted populations, people kept dying on the river.

"We already provided a youth outreach program," he said. "We gave free swimming lessons, held water safety events and gave discounts for additional lessons."

Robinson and his colleagues found the gap between the people they had reached with their educational efforts and the people who were drowning involved visitors from outside the county or older youth.

The parks department shifted their efforts to focus more on public outreach to those visitors who had fallen through earlier cracks. That meant adding lifeguards to augment the existing park ranger staff, Thursday through Sunday the river's busiest days in season.

Between Memorial Day and Labor Day, when the parks saw the most visitors, park rangers and life guards were out en force. Grants paid for additional life jackets, which were set up in loaner stations at the four beaches the team patrolled, which team members then helped visitors properly fit.

How those team members operated also involved some changes.

"We had park rangers wearing different uniforms and taking a different approach to their jobs," Robinson said. "They weren't out there to enforce the rules, they were there to help. If they saw someone breaking the rules, like drinking on beaches that didn't allow alcohol, they would call it in for someone else to handle, but they were out there to talk to people, stay on the public's positive side."

Lifeguards also patrolled the river in kayaks.

The program allocated $30,000 to lifeguards and $25,000 to park rangers, along with $10,000 in equipment in 2013. In 2014, the county added $20,000 in lifeguard help to expand operations to Mondays.