Rec-Park director knew well in advance of major nonprofit problems—and did nothing

Almost a year before the San Francisco Parks Alliance imploded, senior staff at the Recreation and Parks Department, including Director Phil Ginsburg, knew that the organization was in a financial crisis and stiffing community groups, records obtained by 48hills show.

In fact, Ginsburg spent almost six months, between June 2024 and December, 2024, trying to find out why the Parks Alliance wasn’t paying its bills.

But over the course of the fall, 2024, and early spring, 2025, Ginsberg never told the mayor, the supes, the city attorney, or other agencies impacted by the Parks Alliance meltdown that the crisis was happening. He didn’t take that step until April, 2025—at which point some of the money owed to community groups was gone.

Documents obtained under the California Public Records A