Adding Time To Donate To Skate Campaign

By Kendra Bobowick

She needed extra time.

Making an appeal first to the Parks and Recreation Commission, and most recently this week to the Fairfield Hills Authority, Lori Capozziello received more time to raise funds and support for a skate park.

“All I’m asking is for another year to raise funds,” she had asked Tuesday. She got it. October 2009 is the new target date, agreed Fairfield Hills Authority members this week. Their agreement is critical for setting aside land near Cochran House to locate the park. Rising from her seat before the authority, Ms Capozziello exclaimed, “Thank you so much, I really appreciate it.”

Several minutes earlier she had said, looking at a fundraising deadline that had nearly run out since Ms Capozziello began the Donate to Skate campaign within the last year and a half, she needed an extension in order to keep her end of a tentative deal she has with town departments to locate a skate park on the Fairfield Hills campus. She intends to raise money for the park’s construction before turning the facility over to the town.

She estimates a more than $50,000 price tag for the park, and with a recent fundraising day and skate competition included, the campaign is roughly one-fifth of the way to its goal. Will the town toss funds into the project? Possibly. As a show of support, the recreation commission had put money into its budget proposal last year, which was later lost to rounds of budget cuts.

This week new Parks and Recreation Director Amy Mangold reintroduced Ms Capozziello to the authority.

Arguing her case, Ms Capozziello first explained the support she has found in town. “There are events planned, a distributions list [for contributors], a new website. More people are involved and helping me get to the goal.” The website DonateToSkate.com explains the fundraising efforts, and the need to provide a safe place to skate.

The last year saw a successful fundraiser that brought a crowd to Dickinson Park, and a number of skaters displaying their ramps and jumps at the recent Labor Day Parade. Ms Capozziello also marched, wearing a Donate to Skate T-shirt.

Approaching board members Tuesday, she took photos from an envelope. “This is my son skating at Stop & Shop,” she explained, emphasizing that skaters have no place to practice their sport, unlike football or soccer, for example. Parks and Recreation Commission Chair Ed Marks noted that he would rather see the park located at Fairfield Hills rather than elsewhere. “We’d rather it stay in the area of trails [and other recreational areas] rather than put them where they are isolated,” he explained.

Adding levity to the often-tense Fairfield Hills negotiations, authority Vice Chair Andrew Willie smiled, saying, “It seems like everything else at Fairfield Hills is taking a long time, why should you be different?”

Concerned about locating the park at the former hospital campus, authority member Walt Motyka offered his observations. Skating, popular with middle-school-aged students, would force skaters to walk along Queen Street to reach the proposed park site. “There are no sidewalks,” he argued. Was this safe? The middle school is located near the Big Y shopping center and roughly a mile from Fairfield Hills via Queen Street, a well-traveled route.

Mr Marks replied, “We don’t have sidewalks to the teen center, Treadwell, or Dickinson.” The Teen Center on Church Hill finds students walking there from the middle school, he noted.

Ms Dent, recalling that the recreation members were preparing an evaluation of Dickinson for future uses, asked, “In other words, is [Dickinson] a better location?”

Mr Marks answered, “We can’t say with certainty it’s the best place.” He described the run-off, waterways through the fields, and “other issues,” concluding, “We don’t know with certainty if it’s viable.” To the contrary, he said, “We do think it is here at Fairfield Hills.”

Adding his conclusions, authority member John Reed stated, “I think it’s up to Parks and Rec to advocate recreation needs.” With the first hint of this week’s decision, he said, “I motion to approve with the understanding that Fairfield Hills has a lot of land…” He implied that the location may change, but Mr Marks said that the Cochran House area did not interfere with plans for other ball fields.