 All outdoor canvassing scenes were shot in a neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, outside the Parks and Recreation studio. Michael Schur said they wanted to establish the type of groundwork public servants often had to conduct in a small town. Seth Gordon sought to make the canvassing scenes as realistic as possible, so he allowed a large amount of improvisation among the actors. The Pawnee residents who are vocally opposed to parks were based on real-life California residents the Parks and Recreation producers encountered who opposed the construction of parks in their hometown. One such group, "The Committee for a Better Park", was actually a group of residents opposed to parks in general, and the deceptiveness of their name and mission inspired the Parks producers while writing "Canvassing".
