The town is seeking a $300,000 state grant to help fund the widely anticipated new playground at Waveny.
As it is, there’s no playground in New Canaan’s largest and most-visited park. For years, the siblings of those playing sports on the fields there used an all-abilities adult fitness area as though it were a playground.
Now, the town has replaced the fitness equipment in that area, and an accessible new playground is on the horizon, with a Poured-In-Place rubberized surface. A nonprofit group, the Friends of Waveny Playground, is fundraising for the project.
On Tuesday, the Board of Selectmen voted 3-0 to allow the town to apply for a Small Town Economic Assistance Program or “STEAP” grant, administered by the state Office of Policy and Management.
STEAP grants are designed for “municipalities that are not urban centers and designated as ‘distressed’ or ‘public investment communities,’ so that’s good,” town Grant Writer Greg Reilly told the selectmen during their regular meeting, held at Town Hall and via videoconference.
He added: “STEAP favors ‘shovel-ready’ projects and this qualifies. It favors grant programs where the match is larger than it has to be and where funds have been secured. We meet all of those qualifications. They expressly find as priorities recreational facility projects and projects that support children and families. So again, this is a good fit. And the story is more than us filling a gap in our facilities at Waveny, which doesn’t have a playground. But it brings together children with and without special needs and that’s really a huge value… The benefit is bringing the kids together, so they learn from this equipment and they learn from being together.”
First Selectman Dionna Carlson and Selectmen Steve Karl and Amy Murphy Carroll voted 3-0 to authorize the STEAP grant application. Reilly said the total project cost is about $775,000.
The town has authorized $325,000 for the project already, he said, and the Friends group is seeking to raise another $150,000.
The selectmen asked what was the original project cost ($455,000 for both the playground and fitness area), when that estimate was made (2021) and how much of the higher cost has been driven by the cost of a poured-in-place surface as opposed to woodchips (part of it).
Murphy Carroll said, “So has the playground morphed from what we thought we were going to put in to what the goal is now? This is not just all inflation, right? This is an expanded objective in what we’re putting in.”
Superintendent of Parks Ryan Restivo noted that the town didn’t want to downsize the fitness area.
Carlson noted that once the larger playground needs to be replaced, the town will be responsible for the cost.
“We all have to remember a bigger playground—once it needs to be replaced, it’s ours,” she said. “It’s ours. Maybe we put in the record that if they [Friends group] want to do this, this is going to be another have to be a public-private partnership because you’ve put in a big asset that wasn’t probably what we were going to put in if they end up raising and we get this grant, you are now committing the town when it needs to be redone to a much bigger asset to replace then maybe what was originally [planned].”
Murphy Carroll said the approximately $900,000 total for both the fitness area and playground ($117,000 and $775,000, respectively) is about two times the original estimate.
“I guess that’s the scope change,” she said. “We made it nicer.”
Parks & Recreation Director John Howe said that’s mainly “the all-inclusive extra features.”
“That’s where the scope has really changed,” he said. “The prices have gone through the roof on both the Poured-In-Place and the equipment itself, too.”
Carlson said that the project also evolved to include fencing.
“There’ve been a lot of modifications to this project since the original approval,” she said.
Karl noted that, because the playground is brand-new, there are costs in clearing land and installing a foundation that will not be re-incurred in the future when, for example, replacement equipment is needed.
“The next time we do this, we wouldn’t have that kind of expense,” he said.
Karl commended the Friends of Waveny Playground for informing the public as to its fundraising and plans.
“I think the committee did a nice job at least letting the public know that this is going on and it’s a continuing conversation,” he said. “As Greg said, our job is to be enthusiastic about it, which I think we all are.”
The Friends of Waveny Playground’s co-chairs are Monica Capella, Lauren Connolly Nussbaum and Hilary Ormond.
Carlson said that the funds the town is hoping to obtained through the STEAP grant “will drive” the playground’s design.
Public Works Director Tiger Mann said, “That’s the problem. We have the area. We know exactly where it’s going to be. We know what it’s going to look like in the surroundings but until we know the monies that are available, you can’t design the actual [playground]. You can have various areas. Ryan’s done a fantastic job of trying to scale them for small to large, but we don’t know exactly where we’re going to fall yet.”
[Note: Information on the planned ‘Donor Legacy Walkway’ at the new Waveny Playground can be found here. A family or business considering a featured placement on the Waveny Playground Welcome Sign, prominently displayed at the playground entrance, can contact the Friends group for more information at ncwavenyplayground@gmail.com.]