Ohio State Parks named best in the country

The recognition came from the American Academy for Park and Recreation Administration in partnership with the National Recreation and Park Association.

Ohio was given the Gold Medal Award. It came down to three states — Florida, Wyoming and Ohio, and Ohio was the winner.

There are four state parks around Youngstown. Lake Milton is the area’s newest, having been founded in 1988.

The other three are Mosquito Lake, Guilford Lake, and Beaver Creek, which were all founded in 1949 — the same year the state’s park system was formed.

“I mean to be named the best state park system in the entire country is a real achievement,” said Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine.

One of DeWine’s staffers said the governor loves the state parks and is most proud that all of them are free to get into.

“The other thing that many states can’t say is that they’re all free. You go in there, you pay something to camp or stay in one of our lodges, but if you go in there during the day and just go hike, go fish, whatever you want to do, there’s no charge at all,” DeWine said.

DeWine said he was proud of the award.

“There’s one or two or five or 10 close to everybody in the state of Ohio. So, it’s another thing we can frankly brag about. We’re Ohioans. We don’t brag a lot, but we ought to be bragging about these state parks, and I think this is validation today of what we’ve been telling people how great these parks are,” DeWine said.

The park systems were evaluated on long-range planning, community engagement, environmental stewardship and the ability to innovate and adapt. For Ohio, the judges highlighted the newest state park, Great Council State Park near Xenia, which opened last year.

“Since I’ve been governor the last seven years, this is the only state park that we have added. It’s a small park. Great Council is focused on telling the story of the Shawnee Indians and the settlers during a really critical period of time,” DeWine said.

There are 76 total state parks in Ohio — including 9,300 campsites, 1,200 miles of trails, 10 lodges and 7,100 programs.

“We’ve gone through in the last 10 years and brought every one of the loges back up to speed where it really should be,” DeWine said.

When asked if he could see more state parks in the future, DeWine says he believes Ohio is where it needs to be. He says the key now is to make sure every state park has a great experience for people.

“Our focus instead has been in building up the infrastructure. We want places where people can go camp,” DeWine said.