OUTSTANDING ATHLETE

Induction Year: 2006 | Graduation Year: 1979

Carrie grew up on the Scarff family nursery just south of New Carlisle and is part of the fifth generation of Scarffs to live on that same land. Her grandfather went to school in the octagonal building that still stands east of Olive Branch Junior High. Carrie’s class was one of the last to attend the old New Carlisle elementary school, and no doubt she gained some toughness on the playground’s infamous “battlefield.”  Growing up with two older brothers, Carrie learned sports and competition early, too, playing baseball, basketball, football, and tennis. In a special version of baseball devised by her brother, Bill, Carrie was alone on a team against her two older brothers. To this day, Bill swears the game was fair.

In the ninth grade, in 1975, Carrie played on the first girl’s basketball team for Olive Branch Junior High. She doesn’t remember their record, but she does remember that the girls were ready to play, ready to be athletic and competitive, and weren’t star struck or giddy about being the first girls ever to play basketball for their school. The girls had been ready for a team long before everyone else.

In her three years of high school, Carrie lettered nine times, three years each in volleyball, basketball and softball. She shared basketball MVP honors her sophomore year with another sophomore, Theresa Ferrante. The softball team missed going to the state championship in heartbreaking one-run losses in the regional finals both her junior and senior years. All three teams won their league championship her senior year. She can still recount, in great detail, the last game she played in each of the three sports.  Those were her saddest moments in high school, but now she recalls them as tributes to the teammates, coaches, friends and teachers who made her years at Tecumseh so special.

After high school, Carrie followed in the footsteps of most of the Scarffs, becoming an Ohio State Buckeye. With a degree in landscape architecture, she worked in Columbus for a year before moving to San Diego. There, she built a career as a planner and landscape architect, all the while spending weekends on the beach or in the mountains. She continued to play softball and volleyball, and also began studying fiction writing at the University of California at San Diego. Though San Diego was every bit as beautiful and fun as its reputation, the desert landscape and six-lane freeways never felt quite right. After nine years, Carrie returned to Ohio in 1994 with a plan to spend a year assembling a portfolio of short stories for application to graduate school in creative writing. While she applied to universities all over the country, Bowling Green offered her the best opportunity and she spent two of the best years of her life writing and teaching writing in Bowling Green, Ohio. Since graduating with her masters in fine arts, Carrie has had four short stories published in literary journals around the country and continues to write short stories and poetry.

Because a master’s degree in creative writing offers nothing in terms of job prospects, Carrie returned to planning to earn her way through life. She was fortunate to land a job for Five Rivers MetroParks in Dayton. At the time she started there, the agency was embarking on RiverScape, downtown Dayton’s $31 million riverfront revitalization project. Carrie became the project manager and spent the next six years working with a wonderful team to design and build one of the most beautiful and exciting community gathering spots in the region.  RiverScape continues to garner awards and attract larger crowds each year.

After RiverScape, Carrie was promoted to Director of Development. In that position she landed over $10 million in grants for MetroParks and oversaw the planning and construction final pieces of Montgomery County’s share of the regional bikeway system, considered one of the best in the country. Late last year, Carrie was promoted again, this time to Deputy Director of the agency. In this role, she oversees Cox Arboretum MetroPark, Wegerzyn Gardens MetroPark, RiverScape MetroPark, MetroParks’ marketing, and Five Rivers Outdoors, an outdoor adventure pursuits initiative that Carrie launched two years ago. Carrie has a special affinity for Five Rivers Outdoors.

In her years since graduate school, Carrie has backpacked the Appalachian Trail in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, and Massachusetts, and the Ouchita Trail in Arkansas. She’s taken expedition canoe trips to the Boundary Waters in Minnesota, and expedition bike trips along the Natchez Trace Parkway from Natchez to Nashville, through the New England states and across the state of New York. She also stays active by playing tennis and riding her bike to work from her home near downtown Dayton.