Park Board approves ActiveNet as new registration software provider

  • Elmhurst Park District

After an extensive review of software solution options, the Park Board approved ActiveNet as the District’s new registration software provider during its December 18 meeting, and last week, District staff finalized the contract with the new vendor.

Active Network LLC (ActiveNet) is a well-established software provider, with over 1,500 clients, including 33 Park Districts in Illinois, such as Chicago and Naperville Park Districts.

Elmhurst Park District began the search for a new software vendor this year after repeated system failures during high volume registration dates. It became apparent that the registration software, RecTrac, provided by Vermont Systems, Inc., was not capable of fulfilling the needs of the Elmhurst community. 

The Park District hired an IT consultant in July to review software vendors and conduct demonstrations with staff. Three vendors were identified as potential solutions and staff completed in-depth demos with each to determine which could best meet the community’s needs. Additional investigations this fall, including more demos and reference checks, solidified staff’s decision to recommend ActiveNet. 

ActiveNet was able to demonstrate the ability to successfully process a high volume of registrants at one time, which was critical to the Park District and the primary reason ActiveNet was selected. 

As the software provider to Chicago Park District, ActiveNet confirmed that their software can successfully deal with big registration days. To emphasize their capabilities, the vendor cited a recent Chicago Park District registration date which successfully processed more than double the amount of household logins that Elmhurst Park District had on its largest single registration date back in fall 2018.

Now that a new software is selected, Park District staff anticipate implementation of ActiveNet to take approximately a year, with the first registration event with the new software planned for winter 2024. In the meantime, the Park District will continue to be proactive in improving the registration experience as Spring Registration begins this February. These plans include separating out summer camp, gymnastics and Courts Plus registration from general registration to reduce traffic volume. Get the latest updates on registration at epd.org.