A community-driven fundraiser to replace an aging playground in the hamlet of Moon River is entering its final push. The wooden playground currently being used by about 40 children in the community was built with wood in the 1980s. “The kids love it,” said Rebecca Foss, a member of the Moon River Playground Committee. “Nobody has been injured on it or anything like that, but it is falling apart a little bit.” For more than four decades, the playground has acted as a community hub for Moon River, but the committee says a new, larger structure is needed. “We’ve been looking forward to having a new structure here for a while,” said Erica Larson with the playground committee. “This has been a couple years in the making. We’ve run into some roadblocks, and we saw how expensive it would be.” According to Foss, the committee, made up of four local mothers, received several quotes for playgrounds costing between $200,000 and $250,000. “We had to look at other options and found a used playground for $6,000 from BDI in Lethbridge,” said Foss. “We’ve put together a community initiative to install it.” Along with the cost of the second-hand structure, the committee is also spending $4,500 on safety supervision and certification fees and $10,000 on gravel. With a goal to raise $20,000 to cover the costs, the committee wanted to apply for grant funding but was ineligible. But Foss says that didn’t stop them. “This had to be a community effort, 100 per cent,” she said. Since April, the committee has been able to raise $17,000 through bottle drives, barbecues, car washes and bake sales. “It’s been incredible watching people come together,” said Larson. “The expectations that I had in the back of my mind have been blown away with people’s generosity. It’s been great, and it’s been a great community-building activity.” The current playground will be torn down on Saturday, with construction on the new one set to be complete by the middle of August. The group is putting out a call to the community to raise the remaining $3,000 to help with final touches. A GoFundMe has been created for the project. “I just hope they look at this place and they hold it as one of their core memories that they take forward with them into their adulthood,” said Larson. The new playground will feature a larger structure, more slides, swings and monkey bars.
