Oak Harbor promotes Craig Lamas-Cole to parks director

Oak Harbor handed its parks and recreation department to a familiar insider Tuesday, when the City Council unanimously approved Mayor Ronnie Wright’s appointment of Craig Lamas-Cole as director. The city drew 36 applications for the job, but leaders chose the recreation coordinator already working in the department, a move that keeps control of some of Oak Harbor’s most visible public spaces in local hands.

Lamas-Cole stepped into a department that has been through a reset. Brian Smith’s departure was announced March 30, after the city said Smith and officials mutually agreed to end the employment relationship. City Administrator Sabrina Combs served as acting director during the transition, while the city kept the department operating under a leadership structure the council only created in 2022, before Smith was hired later that year.

That history makes the next year especially important for residents who use Oak Harbor’s parks, camps and recreation programs. A recreation center feasibility study already pointed to clear demand for more meeting and event space, pickleball courts and other indoor recreation programming, giving the new director a concrete to-do list that reaches beyond routine maintenance and scheduling. How quickly the city moves on those needs will be one of the clearest tests of the new appointment.

Lamas-Cole’s background suggests he arrives with experience on both sides of that equation. His Washington Recreation and Park Association election materials list prior work for the City of Los Angeles as a recreation aide, recreation assistant and camp director, recreation coordinator and recreation facility director. Those materials also list a bachelor’s degree in economics, a credential that may prove useful as Oak Harbor weighs programming demands against limited space and budget.

He has already described Oak Harbor’s summer camp work as part of something larger than child care alone. In May, he said the camp is “a little bit more than just a place to go” and that the department is part of the community. That outlook matches the challenge now in front of him: keeping daily services running while shaping the next phase of recreation planning.

The new director will earn $129,108 a year. For Oak Harbor, the appointment is less about filling a vacancy than deciding who will steer parks, programs and public gathering spaces that shape daily life across the city.