When I was asked to serve on the New London Community Center Task Force, I doubted that I could bring any special expertise to the group. I’m a family physician who works at the Community Health Center in New London. I don’t have any special knowledge about building community centers, recreational programming, financing, or siting such a facility.

Then I thought about the patients I see. How often I want to tell patients with low back pain to go to a swimming pool to swim or even just to walk waist-deep in water, but realize that New London residents don’t have a year-round swimming pool to go to.

Or to advise obese patients with diabetes to exercise, but who don’t have a gym membership.

I contrast the lack of community recreational resources to what I had seen when I was working on a medical education project in Dundee, Scotland. The