Work begins on NRHEG inclusive playground

You don’t have to know much to know that playtime is an essential part of a child’s development in any number of areas, from physical to emotional to social to cognitive.

And yet, the most obvious areas – playgrounds – have long been off-limits to kids with different abilities.

The New Richland-Hartland-Ellendale-Geneva (NRHEG) Elementary School in Ellendale is changing that, as significant work on the first phase of its inclusive playground was completed last week.

A crew of four with Owatonna Groundmasters was on site, leveling, measuring, pouring concrete and assembling equipment that will allow kids of all abilities to play.

Jon Truelson, an owner of the company, said they have done multiple installations for Flagship Recreation, the Minnesota company that designs and builds the equipment.

The names seem to indicate the kind of fun to be had: a four-person teeter-totter called a we-saw; an Oodle swing, which allows for multi-direction swinging for two kids; and a collection of oversize musical instruments that are free-standing, to allow for easy access.

“The equipment has to go in specific places,” said Flex Morgan, an employee of Owatonna Groundmasters. “My ground plan shows where we have to measure from, to make sure they’re in the right place.”

That’s to ensure safety throughout the use-zone, or the area around playground equipment where a child might land if they fall. It forms a buffer of sorts around each piece.

The crew planned to do a bit more excavating to pour the concrete bases for some of the equipment but expected to be finished with the installation by the end of last week.

“We’re doing the install, but I know Ulland Brothers did all the excavation and will come back to put the mulch in,” said Truelson. “We’ll spend the first two hours going through the plan, putting flags up and marking exactly where the equipment will go. We’ll lay the whole playground out before we start doing anything.”

Once it was set up, they built a border around the perimeter, including the area where phase two will be built eventually.

“The next phase will have a we-swing,” he said, which includes a ramp leading to a piece of equipment that will hold a secured wheelchair, allowed the user to swing with friends.

“They’re planning ahead,” Truelson said of the committee that has organized the playground, including the fundraising portion.

“When we come back, down the road, to do phase two, they’ll have everything ready,” he said of the playground area. “We’ll just have to move the mulch and assemble” the new equipment.

The project wasn’t as complex as some the crew has done, Truelson said, because they don’t have to build off an existing playground. There was ample space adjacent to the existing playground for the adaptive area.

The group also got ahead of some of the inflationary increases.

“They actually had the equipment last year,” Truelson said, “and stored it inside the building, because every year brings a cost increase.”

Perhaps not surprisingly, NRHEG students themselves were the initial fundraisers.

“We had a ‘Coins for Change’ drive at our elementary school,” PE teacher Wendy Schultz said last summer. “The kids brought in coins or bills” – and raised about $5,000 for equipment for their classmates.

There is still a ways to go to meet the $200,000 goal to finish the project.

Donations may be mailed to NRHEG Elementary School, 600 School St., or to the Ellendale Community Action Group at P.O. Box 218, Ellendale, Minn., 56026.