Published: May 28, 2009 10:20 am      

Children tell designer what they want

WAKARUSA — Sure, it won’t be Cedar Point, but the new Wakarusa playground will still be a unique place to play.

Children from town spent a couple of hours Tuesday with designer Dennis Wille, telling them what they would like to see in their playground.

Wille, a designer with Leathers & Associates from Ithaca, N.Y., then presented those plans to the students and parents Tuesday night.

Children wanted a tire swing, wavy slide, shaky bridge, fire pole, climbing wall, snake slide, bouncy bridge, monkey bars, play house, mirror maze, circus cars, train and a unique tree house — to name a few.

Wille jokingly said that he wasn’t able to include the bungee jumping or roller coaster due to lack of space.

Project Playground, which will be built in the downtown park, will honor Diane Brown, a Wakarusa Elementary School nurse, and Lisa Lengacher, co-founder of The Compass, an after school program. Both women died within a short time of each other — Brown from a long battle with cancer and Lengacher unexpectedly.

The design will be priced out piece for piece. The configuration of the initial design may change due to feed back and fund raising, he said.

The playground will be built entirely by volunteers. Volunteer captains will work all five days and be in charge of volunteers that have been put into crews. The build will take place in the fall of 2010 from a Wednesday through a Saturday, with the completion on a Sunday.

“Little pieces of information” will be given out in “little steps,” according to Wille. Volunteers do not need to be skilled laborers. Kids will be involved in the building process in special areas designed for them, he said.

“The outcome is more than just a playground,” Willey said. He encouraged the adults present to “make the dreams of your children come true.”

Volunteer sign-up sheets will be located at Town Hall. They include child care, volunteers, food, public relations, general, materials, tools, construction and fund raising.

Clerk-Treasurer Joyce Hartman and Helen Hoffman, from the clerk’s office, are co-coordinators for the project.

Hartman said the current playground is very old. Hartman and Hoffman talked about what they could do to honor and remember Brown and Lengacher. Both women loved children and felt a playground was something that the children would enjoy.

The project will be funded through fund raising and memorial money.

Wille also helped design the playgrounds in Goshen and Nappanee.

For more information, contact Hartman at wakact@verizon.net, Hoffman at hoffman601@verizon.net or by calling Town Hall at 862-4314.