Hunched around a meeting table late one evening in early May, stomachs full of pizza, members of the Franklin Park Coalition committee searching for a new executive director turned their eyes toward one of their own.

Consultant Rickie Thompson had just asked Corey Allen if he’d considered applying for the job himself. He hadn’t.

“I try not to cross-pollinate the things I love doing with the things I get paid to do,” Allen said later. “But this time, with the need for someone with my skill set, it made me a really good candidate for the position.”

Allen is no stranger to Franklin Park.

He has served as a member of the coalition’s board and volunteered countless hours to park programs and clean-ups since his youth. His best memories of Franklin Park are about days and evenings pedaling his bike alongside his mother, who glided down pathways like Circle Loop on roller-skates.

“It’s really humbling,” Allen said, “that now I’m on that same path and helping clean it up with Mayor Walsh and other groups.” Since assuming the directorship, Allen has largely avoided dipping his toes in any unfamiliar waters, instead opting to continue the programs set in place by his predecessors.

This summer has featured the usual diet of Saturday morning yoga classes and weekly Wednesday line-dancing with Mz. Rhythm. “There are usually anywhere from 50 to 80 folks for the dancing from age 8 to 80,” Allen said. “That’s really the coolest one because we give out notebooks to all the kids there, too… you know, as a way to keep them thinking about education.”

But one area he hopes to improve upon is the coalition’s marketing to Mattapan’s ever-diversifying demographic array. By summer’s end, salsa instructor Carolina Prieto will have taught two more classes — the fliers for which are in both English and Spanish— than in previous years.

“The goal,” Allen said, “is to try to diversify our programming to reach all our different audiences.”
Youth engagement is vital to Allen, who for years served on the board for the Mattapan Patriots, the local Pop Warner football chapter, and taught English at TechBoston Academy in Dorchester from 2007 to 2012. Reflecting that literary passion, Allen wants to stress Franklin Park’s rich history in the letters — acclaimed 19th-century transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson lived there when it was farmland — and encourage a learning environment to inspire Mattapan’s young.

“I want to help guide a transition with young folks having a love for the park,” he said, “because I’m not going to be the director of the coalition for the next 100 years.”

Some may know Allen from his previous bid to serve in the House of Representatives. Others may recognize the name from bylines on ESPNBoston.com, where he contributes as a freelancer.

Working at the head of the Franklin Park Coalition, though, marks a new chapter in Allen’s life, one that goes beyond himself.

“I did not take the job at the park to become the next Bill Gates,” he said. “I did it because I love the park.”