Children who go to Kent’s West Fenwick Park get to enjoy a new playground because of a donation by United Way of King County and others.
Volunteers installed the playground Dec. 13 at the 37-acre park along Reith Road at 42nd Avenue South on the West Hill. Valley Buick GMC of Auburn, the NFL and Everett-based SiteLines Park and Playground Equipment were part of the donation program.
Steven Greimann, resource development officer for United Way, estimated the value of the playground contribution at more than $10,000, including cash from GMC and in-kind donations by United Way and the city of Kent.
“While United Way usually focuses on addressing human service needs (e.g., housing, food, youth development) we know that the intersection of economic development, gathering places, social services and community creates healthy communities,” Greimann said in an email. “So through developing a stronger relationship with the city (of Kent), we became aware of local community interest in developing gathering places where children can be more active and worked with the Parks Department to identify a park where the play set was needed.”
Seattle Seahawks defensive back Marcus Trufant showed up to help install the playground. The equipment was purchased from proceeds from last year’s Super Bowl Package Auction, said Victoria Andrews, city parks special programs manager. Eight other cities in NFL markets also received the new playground equipment through the NFL-GMC and United Way program.
This marks the third new playground installed in 2011 at Kent parks. Lake Meridian Park and Tudor Square Park also received new play equipment.
The city parks department spent $350,000, including $75,000 from a King County matching grant, to build the new Lake Meridian playground that officially opened at the Fourth of July Splash festival.
Volunteers in October built a new playground at Tudor Square Park on the East Hill. Funds from Humana, Inc. (a health care company based in Louisville, Ky.,) and KaBoom! (a national non-profit organization based in Washington, D.C., that has built more than 2,000 playgrounds in the past 15 years), combined to pay for most of the new equipment.
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