After four months of delays, the park in Richville has gotten a long-needed update to its playground equipment.
The update was originally set to take place in May with a community day, however, because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the project was completed over the course of four months. “A lot of volunteer hours went in this,” Terry Lee, the city of Richville’s mayor, said. “Clearing up trees and brush, stuff that’s just come down through the years and getting things ready.”
The community day with a cookout will likely take place next May, according to Leslie Lee, the city of Richville’s clerk and treasurer.
“We had a poster at the Wagon Wheel and it had a few different pieces of equipment that were in the price range of what we wanted to spend,” Leslie Lee said. “We had people vote for their favorite piece of equipment.” The new playground equipment that was chosen included a new climbing structure and new baby swings.
“There was an old wood structure that was holding the baby swings and they weren’t safe anymore,” Terry Lee said. “So we decided to put new steel ones in.”
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In addition to the new equipment clean up work was done to the park, new sand was put in, the slide was repainted, and the bleachers by the baseball field were repaired. Leslie Lee said a storm had taken the roof off of one of the baseball fields’ dugouts.
“We actually have someone who has offered to help pay for new roofs on the dugouts,” Terry said. “ Those will be replaced later this fall or early this winter.”
According to Leslie Lee, the park project was funded by the city and cost about $17,000, with $6,000 being on the playground equipment. “We’re going to send out a letter now that it’s all finished and ask for some donations from some key organization,” she said.
In a normal year, the Richville park sees a lot of use with baseball games, practices, and children at play. “It gets used. We figure it’s the one thing we do have so why not make it better?’ Terry Lee said. “Hopefully we can continue to put some more stuff in down the road that we feel we need.
“It was a fun project. It just took longer than planned."
