School’s playground to get softer surface

Several businesses and individuals have donated to the effort.

By DENISE DICK

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

POLAND — A softer landing for children and less maintenance are aims of a plan driven by parents to renovate the Dobbins Elementary School playground.

“This is a project to enhance the safety of the playground,” said Kimberly Rossi-Pallante, co-chairwoman of the renovation committee. “In no way is it unsafe.”

The committee is raising money to install a new, bonded-rubber surface, called Happy Landing, around the playground equipment. The total cost is estimated at $115,000, so the group plans to do it in phases with the cost of the first phase about $30,000.

A fund-raising dinner is set for 1 to 3 p.m. Sunday in the Poland Seminary High School cafeteria. Outback Steakhouse is hosting the dinner. Tickets are $20 and include steak and chicken with vegetables, salad, bread and butter and dessert. There is no charge for children’s hot dogs.

“All of the money raised will go into the playground account,” said Debbie Masluk, the other committee co-chairwoman,

Tickets are available by calling Dobbins at (330) 757-7011. The event includes a silent auction, 50-50 raffle and Chinese auction.

Information about making donations to the renovation also is available by calling the school.

Other playground projects already completed include a new swing set funded by a $5,000 donation from Boardman businessman and philanthropist Anthony Lariccia and four benches paid for with a $1,750 grant from the Recycling and Reuse Division of Mahoning County, or the Green Team.

Committee members secured donations from area businesses, both in Poland and the surrounding area, to fill baskets for the raffle and Chinese auction. Children at the school assembled the baskets.

“People have been very generous,” Rossi-Pallante said.

Among the items donated for the auctions are sports equipment signed by boxer Ray “Boom Boom” Mancini, Ohio State University football coach Jim Tressel and the Stoops brothers, football coaches from the Mahoning Valley.

“We’re still trying to get Kelly Pavlik,” Rossi-Pallante said.

Parents Becky Burkert, Barb Hierro, Kelly Boydston and Dawn Burke also serve on the committee.

Masluk and Rossi-Pallante also listed Henry Nemenz, Dean’s Dairy, Lutz Greenhouse, Countryside Farms, Dutch Shaffer, Poland high school student Ian Burley, the high school, Balloon-Tastic, Giant Eagle, Dave Kelleck (Outback’s managing partner) and other businesses who helped with donations and other assistance with the fund-raising efforts.

The rubber surface would provide a softer surface for children who take a spill while playing on the equipment, but it also dries faster and requires less maintenance than the mulch that covers the area, the co-chairwomen said.

Their children look forward to the change too.

“It will be better than the mulch because when you fall down, you don’t get splinters,” said first-grader Erika Rossi-Pallante.

Fourth-graders Abigail and Madeline Masluk won’t get to enjoy the new surface during school recess as they’ll attend another school next year. But they plan to play there and appreciate the softer landing while not in school.

The Masluk girls formerly attended a school in Fort Wayne, Ind., that had the Happy Landing surface and believe it’s better than the mulch.

“Because you bounce off it,” Erika added.

Emily Masluk, also a first-grader, doesn’t like the mulch, either. When it snows or rains, children not wearing boots can’t play in the areas with mulch, she said. “It would dry faster,” Emily said of the rubber surface.