By Kate Kealey, Des Moines Register
Anthony Arroyo, 27, had just started to walk again after rupturing his Achilles tendon in fall 2021 when his friend, Nico Robinson, suggested they should train for the Des Moines Marathon.
The following summer, Arroyo found himself trotting side-by-side with Robinson around Gray’s Lake. The Des Moines natives said they never would have guessed that four years later, they would be joined by 100 or more people on the 2-mile loop around the lake most Monday evenings, weather permitting.
Arroyo and Robinson also didn’t expect their group would catch the attention of the city, which now is requiring 515 Run Club to purchase a permit costing at least $4,300 for the group’s use of the park. And more fees could be coming for one of the club’s smaller scheduled runs using a city trail.
Though 515 Run Club has no membership fees, roster, requirements or sponsors, Des Moines Parks and Recreation has classified it as an organization, and it warned Arroyo and Robinson if they didn’t acquire the permit to use the park’s trails for the remainder of 2026, it would get Des Moines police involved.
Reluctantly paying the fee out of his own pocket, Robinson said he and other members of the group felt they had been treated unjustly.
They say the city’s application of park code has been inconsistent and is excessive, considering the group, which used the trails for nearly four years before the issue ever came up, has no rigid organizational structure and no income aside from the sale of optional T-shirts.
The most formal thing about it may be its social media accounts, maintained by a pair of volunteers called “co-leaders,” which list the time and place of runs and promote other running events ― most recently the Des Moines Women’s Half Marathon.
“I don’t want to charge anybody to do a social activity, especially when we are using a park that our tax dollars go toward,” Arroyo told the Des Moines Register. “This is about sweat equity. This is about no barrier to entry. I want anybody to come.”
Ian Knutsen, recreation superintendent for the parks department, said permits are a necessity for large groups like 515 Run Club, which Arroyo and Robinson acknowledge has, on occasion, drawn as many as 190 participants. The fees help maintain park safety and exempting 515 Run Club would be unfair to other organizations that use public facilities, Knutsen said.
“Des Moines Parks and Recreation values the positive energy the 515 Run Club brings to Gray’s Lake,” he said in an email to the Register. “Like all of the many organizations we host, the club is required to obtain the appropriate permits for trail use.”
The idea of having to shell out so much money to maintain something they see as completely informal is befuddling to Arroyo and Robinson.
The growth of the run club, which didn’t even have a name at first, was unintentional, Robinson said, adding there were runs where no one showed up. But Robinson and Arroyo kept running and inviting friends. Then those friends would bring their friends and eventually it became a crowd.
Finding themselves leading the grassroots gathering, the former high school football players said they are passionate about the runs remaining free and accessible to all.
“The 515 Run Club has always been founded on just friends showing up,” Robinson told the Register. “There’s no money involved. We’re not charging anybody for a dime to come up to the run club. You just have to show up.”
More runners mean 515 Run Club pays more money. How much more?
The first notification about the fee came in an email from the parks department March 10. Two weeks after the first notice, Knutsen sent another saying 515 Run Club must comply with parking guidelines at Gray’s Lake and submit a permit application.
The email also said the Des Moines Police Department would help “ensure those requirements are followed.”
The two-week delay for the permit submission was not bad faith on the part of 515 Run Club but instead a matter of finding the funds to cover the bill, Arroyo told Knutsen in an emailed response on March 27. Feeling “essentially threatened” by the prospect of police involvement, Robinson said, he paid the initial $120 trail fee with his own money.
“I get if we were causing a ruckus or anything, but we’re just out for a run,” Robinson said. “For it to be met with police presence doesn’t really seem fair.”
Generally, visitors can use Gray’s Lake during operational hours for free. Arroyo and Robinson question how their runs differ from any group of friends meeting at the park to run.
“It seems a little backward of them to now want to charge people to use this space, when its whole intention is to get people outside, riding bikes, running and walking around the lake,” Robinson said. “Now you’re basically policing us because we are bringing people to the park for what it’s intended to be utilized as.”
Fee demand came after new parks and rec code allowed police enforcement
The fee demand and mention of police enforcement followed a late-2025 amendment to Des Moines Parks and Recreation code authorizing the department to work with police. Prior to the code change, there was no enforceable penalty for a permit violation, Knutsen told the Register when asked about the amendment’s rationale.
“Unfortunately, police enforcement is sometimes necessary in parks to support public safety,” Knutsen said. “Enforcement has been requested previously for 515 Run Club due to other park users’ complaints of vehicles parking in nonparking areas, which creates safety hazards, increased maintenance costs and limits public access to the park and emergency services’ access to Gray’s Lake.”
In hopes of alleviating congestion at Gray’s Lake, known as the city’s most popular park, 515 Run Club runners have since started parking at Water Works Park on the other side of Fleur Drive.
But that created another complication: 515 Run Club also will have work with Des Moines Water Works Foundation for its use of the park since there are more than 100 participants, said Chris Burch, executive director of the Des Moines Water Works Park Foundation.
“I understand the notion of that as a city park or city trail or city infrastructure, etc., my group or I should be able to utilize that area, and there is some truth to that,” Burch said. “However, when we are talking about an organized activity, there is a bit of diligence that’s involved.”
Robinson said he wants to work with the parks department to ensure safety and access for all users of Gray’s Lake, but he believes it’s unfair for the city to claim parking violations at the park were strictly by 515 Run Club members.
“Gray’s Lake is a heavily used public park, and many visitors are present during the same time when our group meets,” Robinson said. “Attributing the actions of unidentified individuals at a public park to our group is neither fair nor accurate.”
Des Moines Parks and Recreation also contends 515 Run Club hosted vendors who were “peddling and/or soliciting without a permit.” Robinson said 515 Run Club isn’t affiliated with nor has accepted any money from vendors who have been present during the Gray’s Lake runs. The violation should be against the vendor and not the group of runners, he said.
“Once we became aware of vendor activity near our gathering that could create confusion, we clearly communicated that anyone selling items would need to obtain the proper permits on their own,” he said.
Other allegations of “explicit violations” by the group include posting non-permitted signs and having “event participants standing and/or gathering on the trail,” according to an email from Knutsen to the Register.
“Des Moines doesn’t have a lot of things like this,” Robinson said of the free gathering. “I want to make sure we are doing right by the people and this city, but also not be met with hurdles.”
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With permit in hand, 515 Run Club faces more even more fees
When Robinson paid the $120 fee, he thought it authorized 515 Run Club’s use of the Kruidenier Trail at Gray’s Lake every Monday until the end of 2026.
But then the parks department informed the group a separate permit must be obtained for each of the 36 planned runs in 2026, according to an email sent April 28. That brought 515 Run Club’s bill to at least $4,320.
Prior to 515 Run Club, no other organization had tried to submit recurring events, so the parks department’s system needed to be updated to accurately assess the group’s fees. When asked if 515 Run Club would have to cease operation or start charging participants because of the fees, Robinson said he would rather take the financial hit himself than stray from the group’s original mission.
“This is the hill I am willing to die on,” Robinson said, no run-pun intended. “So if that means I have to pay $5,000” ― some other fees are anticipated ― “to use a free, public park to give people a free space, I’m definitely willing to do so. And I would never ask anyone that’s on my leadership team in the 515 Run Club to pay a dime out of their pockets.”
Across 33 different organizations and 72 trail events, the parks department has collected $11,115 in trail event fees for 2026, the city told the Register. So 515 Run Club’s permit expense for weekly runs at Gray’s Lake is almost 40% of the total collected in trail fees in 2026 so far.
And the group will likely have to pay even more. The 515 Run Club facilitates two other weekly runs aside from the one at Gray’s Lake. Every Friday morning, roughly 20 people under the aegis of the club meet for a run starting at the Women of Achievement pedestrian bridge connecting downtown to the East Village across the Des Moines River. The parks department informed 515 Run Club that another trail-use permit was needed, charging the group roughly an additional $20 per weekly run in 2026.
On Wednesdays, 515 Run Club has another run of about 3 miles, starting at Exile Brewing Co. and also with about 20 runners in attendance. That’s not on parks property so not subject to the fees.
“Our concern is not about refusing to follow the rules,” Robinson said. “It is about the lack of clarity surrounding how those rules are being applied, and whether that application is consistent.”
There isn’t a minimum number of participants in the Parks and Recreation code that triggers a park-use fee, Knutsen told 515 Run Club in an email dated March 13. Even small events typically need a permit, the city said.
“When we have a group of a handful of people, we do not require a permit, but in 515’s case, the group has become large enough that it has impacted other users,” Knutsen said in the email. “Which is why we need permits moving forward.”
For trail events where organizers are unsure of the number of participants, the city website suggests basing the head count on the previous year’s participation, assuming the event takes place annually.
For the run club, it isn’t that straightforward. The runs have varying participant counts. Des Moines Parks and Recreation also amended the code in 2025 to allow for reimbursements when participant numbers are below the estimates on permits. But the fees also can increase if there are more.
“The fee supports administrative, operations, maintenance and other resources related to trail event use,” Knutsen told the Register. “So if the impact is less than expected due to fewer participants, then the ability to refund is available, and the converse for more participants.”
‘It just doesn’t make sense they would want to shut everything down’
Permits for public park use also are required for any advertised event to prevent scheduling conflicts and allow the parks department to do the necessary maintenance, according to the city.
Using social media to promote and schedule groups of individuals for a coordinated run isn’t excluded from the advertisement rule, Knutsen said in the March 13 email to Arroyo.
With more than 4,000 followers on Instagram and 200 on Facebook, Carter Larson and Shelby Askildson play a key role in maintaining 515 Run Club’s social media presence. But word of mouth and friends bringing other friends turned out to be the best form of advertisement for the group, Larson said.
“We’re bringing people together to run and enjoy the parks, which is exactly what they are intended for,” she said. “Come to any of the run clubs on any Monday night, and it’s genuinely one of the best groups of people you’ll ever be around. So it just doesn’t make sense why they would want to shut everything down.”
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