We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Heidi Lemmon a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Heidi, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?
Our Mission
To educate, inform and assist in the development and use of well designed skateparks.
Our services are free and we work with communities all over the world. (501 c3 nonprofit est 2002)
www.skateparkassociation.org
When I started this organization in 1996 it was because skateboarding was illegal in most cities in the USA.
(see photo of my team 2000 arrested while on the way to host a skateboard event for the City of Los Angeles).
To bring about change I founded a non profit, wrote safety guidelines for skateparks, organized the qualified builders and set ASTM International Construction Standards sec F:08, set up after school skateparks on school grounds, partnered with California Police Activities League and was on the National PAL board, attended many recreation and parks trade shows, enlisted the help of skate shops, skaters, BMX riders, parents and anyone who could or would help. One big boost for us was the support of a good friend and fitness guru, Charlene Prickett. Charlene is from Little Rock AR and grew up friends with Bill Clinton. When Clinton was elected President he appointed her to his fitness council and she educated cities about the health benefits of skateboarding and BMX. We grew quite fast during the Clinton era.
The XGames were also a huge supporter and they sponsored my organization for 10 years by giving us a free booth and accommodations at summer XGames. This really helped spread the word and give skateboarders and BMX a voice. Gillette Right Guard Xtreme Sport donated funding for 2 years and that allowed us to travel, get to trade shows and start producing free events in the inner city areas of Los Angeles , resulting on over 30 parks in Los Angeles
Social change is hard. It takes time and a lot of effort and hard work. Once we got the cities on board to build parks we had to convince them to pay for them. Some were actually trying to make the kids raise the funds. This is / was wrong because the cities paid for every other playing field, sports facility, tennis court, baseball diamond or swimming pool and now put their hands in their pockets and pretended to be broke.
In 2002 Tony Hawk founded his own nonprofit, The Tony Hawk Foundation. Cities could apply for a grant to get their park going. Back then the grants were small but very prestigious and have increased every year and today they can fund an entire park.
Also around 2002 we worked with World Cup Skateboarding to form an International Governing body for skateboarding as well as a National Governing body for skateboarding because the Rollerskating industry was trying to take over for the Olympics.
In 2005 I resigned off the board because I could see Gary Ream was blocking all efforts to set up the NGB and then he made a deal to place Skateboarding under the Rollerskating Federation Internationally and place himself as the head of all skateboarding under the IOC. In hindsight that is my biggest regret, letting a summer camp director be in charge of skateboarding. You are probably wondering how that turned out.. well not so great.
In Aug 2022 the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC) did an audit of USA Skateboarding and forced Ream out and fired or forced the resignation of almost everyone involved. https://www.insidethegames.biz/articles/1126759/world-skate-show-support-for-gary-ream
Reams’ deal with the Rollerskating Federation under the International Olympic Committee (IOC) was still locked in. *There are no plans to remove Gary Ream as chair of the World Skate Skateboarding Technical Commission, despite him being forced to stand down from his position in the United States following allegations which included financial impropriety. @inside the games aug 2022
USA Skateboarding elected a new board of directors and were also decertified. As it stands now the USOPC is managing the Olympic skateboarding team and USA Skateboarding is decertified.
Gary Ream also failed to fill out the paperwork for adaptive skateboarding which is now left out through LA 2028. We are trying to help with that situation but most likely will work with other groups to produce an adaptive event around the Olympics at the same time.
Our mission is still relevant although the focus has changed. Cities are now requesting help to make sure their parks are built right and we supply them with a list of qualified builders and designers and walk them through construction to opening day.
My day to day is not as difficult as it was in the beginning. The skatepark builders are my biggest allies and partners in promoting the benefits of skateparks. Cities claim the skatepark is the most used facility they have, if it was built right.
We also produce events and host 2 big ones in Venice CA with Recreation and Parks. The Venice Ladies Jam and the Venice Beach Games.
Our team including myself; Cindy Whitehead, Lonny Hiramoto, Kimi Kallman, Robert Howard, Bart Saric (on the mic) and Daniel Perez (DJ).
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
We are here to help cities get a good park, so they don’t waste your money. Help you produce an event or produce it for you.
Fight the *World Skate fees they are trying to attach to pubic skateparks.
Set up coaching programs and school programs.
*World skate is the new name for the Rollerskating Federation formerly known as FIRS
Six years ago I started a kids skateboard company with graduated sizes from 3 to 12 years old. The system was created by skateboarding hall of fame icon Paul Schmitt for Nyjah Huston when Nyjah was growing up. It just makes sense. Kids have smaller skis, snowboards, bicycles, surfboards etc so why not skateboards.
Skateboarding is fun and skateboard family is forever!
Can you share your view on NFTs? (Note: this is for education/entertainment purposes only, readers should not construe this as advice)
I have an NFT that I got from Bright Moments. It was valued around $10,000 shortly after I got it and I think its dropped in value by about 80%. Its not something I would ever frame or hang in my home f place of business. My advice is go for real art that you can touch, that you like to see & made by a real artist.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
In the 1990s the skateboard industry was making all their money off street skating and they were not supportive of public skateparks. private parks were not supportive of public skateparks, city councils and police were not supportive of skateboarders and parents in general thought it was an activity for delinquents. I had support from kids and some of their parents. The kids kept me going and the older skaters who remembered skateparks from the 70s but all in all it was a path of no respect for years.
I was fortunate that I cared more about the kids/ skaters than I did about what he general public thought of me.
I remember parents that told me off and even stopped speaking to me because I chose to help the skaters and bmx riders.
I dont regret any of it and have made much better friends from this than I ever had before. 
Contact Info:
- Website: www.skateparkassociation.org
- Instagram: www.saltrags.com
- Facebook: Heidi Lemmon
- Linkedin: Heidi Lemmon
- Twitter: deleted
Image Credits
photo of venice skatepark matt fisher dogtown photo edizen stowell venice paparazzi personal photo of the event team by Ian Logan