 Hello, Columbia. Welcome to our edition of Telling Our Story Exploring the Parks. I am your host, Wanda Austin Herndon. Join us as we explore our parks. Hello, Columbia. And welcome to Telling Our Story Exploring the Parks. I'm your host, Wanda Austin Herndon. And today we're at beautiful Emily Douglas Park. So come take a walk with us. Under the shades of the large oak trees nestled in the historic Shandon neighborhood of downtown Columbia, you will find this quaint and cozy park named Emily Douglas Park. Located at 2500 Wheat Street, the park has separate place spaces, large green space, dog park, and community center. The neighborhood center is open Monday through Friday from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. and offers an after-school care program for children ages 11 to 13 years of age. I came in for this community to help out with the kids, do programs. I grew up in the park so I wanted to make sure that it continued on. We have an after-school program and it's catered towards the teens simply because we're right across the street from Han. We do different things. We have food for them. They get a snack. They get a dinner. They get homework help. We play games. We do arts and crafts. We have a STEM program that we use and we also have a gaming program that we have come out once a month also. The City of Columbia Parks and Recreation Department will be offering a winter teen retreat for December the 27th through December the 30th. For more information in reference to the retreat, please contact Kim Mitchell at 803-545-3100. Situated in the back corner of the park, there is a dog park. It is quite popular for the residents of the neighborhood. Dogs are allowed throughout the entire park. However, when they're outside the doggy park, they must remain on a leash. The green space in New Douglas is big and offers a lot of space for several activities. The options are endless. The uniqueness of it being in this neighborhood, it being close to five points, you can look down in and it's always looked like a little hidden treasure over here and I like to be in places where there's not a lot of people and this this is not spot. It's a quiet awesome park. Emily Douglas Park also offers two separate play spaces. One of these is better suited for the older kids, which includes monkey bars and a large climbing structure and ballast swing. The second play area is designed for kids between the 80s of two and five years old. In this space you will find a perfectly sized play space with two slides, a bridge and various climbing structures. The spray pool of Emily Douglas is open during the summer weekdays from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. and then again from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. and closed on Saturday and Sundays. You're in the city so there are some noises, but for the most part you get a calm energy here. There's a sense of community, togetherness, nature, freedom that I think is really nice space, you know. One of my favorite things about Emily Douglas Park are the trees. I love the trees here. Thank you for joining us and stay tuned for our next episode of Telling Our Story Exploring the Parks. As with all our parks, our mission here at the City of Columbia Parks and Recreation is to change lives through a culture of transformational leadership, innovation and phenomenal customer service. Thank you for joining us today and please join us in the future for more episodes of Telling Our Story Exploring the Parks and remember we are Columbia.