Kewanee kids will be able to cool off on a hot summer day in a splash pad, thanks to a $600,000 state grant awarded to the Kewanee Park District.
Director of Parks Andrew Dwyer learned that the park district had received the Open Space Land Acquisition and Development (OSLAD) grant in a news release sent Tuesday from Gov. JB Pritzker’s office. The Kewanee grant is part of nearly $55 million that will go to 111 local park projects throughout Illinois.
Toulon is also to receive $600,000 for a splash pad and upgrading park basketball courts.
The splash pad in Liberty Park is one of several improvements at the park at the north end of West Park. The OSLAD funds will also pay for restrooms in the park, and the park district installed new playground equipment there last fall.
“I’m ecstatic,” Dwyer said Tuesday after receiving the news.
He said the exact schedule for building the new park facilities isn’t known yet. It will depend on when the state releases the funds, and how long it takes to get bids from contractors for the work.
The cost of the project will determine how water will be used by the splash pad. Current plans call for installing a recirculator, which would keep the same purified water running through the splash pad.
A recirculator would add greatly to the cost of the project, and Dwyer said it could be “more financially friendly to have water go straight to waste” instead of being recirculated.
Dwyer said the Bi-State Regional Commission, at the suggestion of City Manager Gary Bradley, helped the park district file for the OSLAD grant.
