ROCHELLE — More than 25 years ago the community came together in a remarkable demonstration of unity to build the KidsGround facility at Rochelle’s Cooper Park, which became one of the most used playgrounds in town.
With an original lifespan of 20 years, the time has come for Flagg-Rochelle Community Park District officials to replace KidsGround and plans are being made to do that in 2019.
At Monday night’s regular monthly park district meeting, superintendent of parks Don Elliott shared some preliminary plans to replace KidsGround with new equipment options on the same 10,800 square foot location at the popular park on the northwest side of Rochelle.
“It’s just time to replace the playground equipment there,” Elliott said. “The lifespan of the facility has been exhausted and it doesn’t meet today’s safety standards. There are many options we’ve looked at and can go any direction with the features and style.”
Given the history of how KidsGround was built with a great deal of volunteer labor, Elliott suggested the district consider another community build project this time too.
“There is a lot of community pride with KidsGround, and I think it would be a good idea to bring residents together again to help build a replacement,” Elliott added. “Leathers Associates can work with us any way we want to go on this project and they would provide a project manager on site to direct the building.”

Elliott presented several preliminary drawings to park board commissioners with costs ranging from $220,000 to $450,000, depending on the equipment features and playground surface chosen.
“The surface is one of the more expensive facets of the project,” he explained. “You can go with a manufactured rubberized surface that would last for several years with little maintenance or you can go with a less expensive wood chip surface, but that would require more replacement every couple of years.”
Elliott said money for the project would come from the district’s annual capital fund budget.
Park commissioner Dale Wells, who sits on the district’s capital committee, said he would like to see some other design proposals that would include a combination of the current style and newer style equipment.
“Some of the designs I had seen earlier really made me say ‘wow,’ and I wonder if we can get some estimates on what those would cost,” he said. “I’d like to throw out a budget figure of $300,000 for the project and get going on it.”
Elliott said he would expect demolition of the old playground would take place next winter and the building would be planned to start in the spring of 2019. In the meantime, he will work with designers and eventually bring some plans back to the board in the coming months before rolling a specific plan out to the public.

Other business
• The park board voted 5-0 on Monday night to accept the resignation of commissioner Michael Cruz, who is stepping off the board due to a career change. The district will be advertising the board opening on its website and in the News-Leader in hopes of appointing a replacement in the next couple of months.
• The district is also still searching for a park director and has posted the job description on the district website. Applications are being accepted until July 13 for the position that has been vacant since early March.