All hands on deck
By John Joyce
Published in News on November 15, 2015 3:05 AM
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News-Argus/CASEY MOZINGO
Community groups and individuals turned out Saturday to help improve Herman Park during the KaBoom! build. Hundreds of peope helped assemble playground equipment, spread mulch and build benches for kids of all ages to enjoy.
It looked like organized chaos set to music.
Dozens marched like ants over huge mounds of mulch, turning shovel after shovel over into wheelbarrows.
While a DJ pumped upbeat music through speakers posted atop the gazebo, teams of four, eight and 10 worked in unison to assemble their assigned components or to dig a proper-sized hole the exact distance from a hole previously dug by another team.
The KaBoom! playground build got under way in Herman Park Saturday morning after months of planning, design meetings and conference calls.
Little by little, with each team completing its assigned task, the park came together.
"We had anticipated there would be 300 here helping us this morning," David Weil said.
By 9:30 a.m., 249 people had registered to volunteer. Countless more simply walked up and grabbed a shovel or a hammer and went to work.
"I think it's wonderful. And everybody seems to enjoy participating in it. Everyone has a job and it is coming together very rapidly," he said.
Weil is one of many partners -- including Wayne First, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of N.C. and United Way, among others -- responsible for KaBoom! choosing Goldsboro as its most recent recipient of a fully sponsored playground build.
The idea came about thanks to Gary Bartlett, of Wayne First, who saw a YouTube video depicting a KaBoom! playground build in another city. He said to himself, "Why not Goldsboro?"
"There had been a design day in October, and we've had several conference calls, but in all sincerity, everything that KaBoom! has is so well-organized. It has a purpose and you might not see the vision, but it comes together," he said.
From concept to construction took about a year.
Blue Cross Bue Sheild footed 45 percent of the funding -- with a total price tag of $100,000 -- and the rest came from other partners, Weil said.
Bartlett said the need for the park became evident when a city of Goldsboro Parks and Recreation bond was denied by voters more than a year ago.
"That certainly put them in a bind," he said. "This is sort of like a boost in the arm where our kids can have something very good to play on."
KaBoom! playground materials are built around two concepts -- safety and education. In Weil's day, playgrounds were built with steel, meant to be sturdy.
"There isn't anybody who is of my vintage who hasn't been hit in the head by a steel swing or fallen off a steel set of monkey bars or something like that," Weil said.
"Today they make these things out of, well they still have metal interiors, but they have coatings of plastic around them. When this park was built, plastic hadn't been invented," he joked.
In addition to more safety being built into the apparatus, so, too, are learning devices.
"The equipment that comes in here is not only for funplay, but there are different levels of skill, from a 2-year-old to a 12-year-old, that teach cognitive skills along with physical skills. It is a kid's dream world. It teaches you to think," Bartlett said.
Volunteers from all over N.C. showed up to pitch in Saturday. There were groups from as far away as Fayetteville and Durham, from Wake Forest, as well as from here in Wayne County.
The University of Mount Olive's Fellowship of Christian Athletes busied themselves with a visual component of the playground -- a window portion of playground equipment with shapes cut out and a Plexiglas window -- after first helping erect a larger part of the playground.
Mila Amaral, a sophomore at UMO, said growing up she had a playground similar to the one her team was helping build Saturday, and it was very important to her childhood. Helping to rebuild an aging park was something she and her fellow FCA leaders felt strongly about.
"It's very simple.They have a team leader and they have the instructions right there. So we just read it and look at it to see how is best go about it," she said. "Then the leaders come around and check if we are doing OK."
BCBS has helped contribute to seven previous KaBoom! playground builds throughout the state, communications specialist Jessica Rauschenberg said.
She introduced King Prather, a BCBS team leader at Saturday's build who said his company's mission remains focused on building healthier members and healthier communities.
Prather said giving back to the community is part of what keeps him involved in the BCBS/KaBoom! partnership, but on a more personal note, building citizens and building health in this country starts with kids.
"This is really a classroom for kids. They come out here they learn about integrity, they learn about teamwork, they learn about fair play and sportsmanship. And those are all things that help build you into a solid citizen as you get older," he said.
Once construction is complete, the playground will be blocked off for 72 hours so the cement can set. A ribbon-cutting will be held later in the week to officially open the playground.
"We will have something with the kids lined up so they can cut the ribbon to their own park. There will probably be play on it before that, but something nice for the kids to do, and to see them run up to it and really make it theirs," Prather said.