Politics & Government
Equipment at Woodbury’s Bielenberg Playground Headed for Central America
Volunteers from Kids Around the World removed the equipment Monday as the city makes way for the all-inclusive Madison's Place playground.
One parcel. Two countries. Plenty of happy kids.
Crews from Kids Around the World on Monday removed the playground at Bielenberg Sports Center. The equipment is headed to Central America.
And the land will soon be home to Madison’s Place, a playground for kids of all abilities at the Bielenberg Sports Center set for construction this summer.
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Woodbury is the No. 1 city in Minnesota in terms of donating used playground equipment to Kids Around the World, said Paul Bierhaus, board member, who was at Bielenberg with several volunteers Monday.
The equipment at the sports center marks the fourth donated playground for Woodbury, according to Jason Egerstrom, communications coordinator. The first was in 2010, when Woodbury donated equipment from Colby Lake Park to a city in Poland.
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Glowgow, Poland, has “just been going bananas with it,” Bierhaus said. “Those kids had never seen a playground in their whole lifetime.”
From 1995 to 2009, Kids Around the World constructed about 100 playgrounds. Since 2009, when the organization began taking used equipment from cities, that number has swelled to 259, Bierhaus said.
The group takes equipment that typically doesn’t pass U.S. standards and donates it to places that are experiencing some sort of hardship. The equipment from Woodbury will be reconstructed in Central America, though an exact country hasn't been chosen.
Bierhaus said Amy Howard, parks service worker for Woodbury, has been a strong advocate of the program. She was at the playground Monday morning, along with fellow parks service worker Phil Galliger, helping remove equipment with the Kids Around the World volunteers.
The city gets free labor out of the arrangement, and can use those funds for new playground equipment, Bierhaus said.
“And it’s certainly not green to put it in a landfill,” he said.
For more information about Kids Around the World, visit its website.
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