By George F. Lee, Star-Bulletin
Makiki 6-year-olds Vivian Nguyen, top, and Pamela
Phan had some fun yesterday evening playing on the
new child-safe jungle gym installed by the city Parks
Department at Cartwright Field.
City to spend
$3 million for new
playground gear
Mayor Harris says the equipment
By Gordon Y.K. Pang
goes to 31 parks, many near schools
Star-Bulletin
The state Board of Education may have cut back dramatically on the purchase of playground equipment for schools, but that's not the case with the city and its parks, Mayor Jeremy Harris said.
The city is seeking someone to install new playground equipment at 31 Oahu park sites at a cost of $3 million for fiscal years 1998-99 and 1999-2000, Harris told reporters yesterday.
The city hopes to obtain a single contract for the equipment in the coming weeks and to have the apparatus in place in the next five months, the mayor said.
Putting equipment in each park costs about $100,000. It might include soft, padded resilient surfaces and plastic, replaceable slides, platforms, swings and hanging bars.
Going with one equipment supplier "will provide us some consistency with the playground equipment so when components break, we'll have inventory and they'll be interchangeable," Harris said. "And we'll be able to replace broken equipment but we won't end up with unique, custom-made equipment we can't use anywhere else."
Buying all the equipment from one supplier may also mean lower costs, he said.
"We can't have whole generations of children growing up without having access to playground equipment," Harris said. "Families simply need a place where their children can play and get exercise."
Work at some 24 parks has already been contracted out and is either complete or under construction, under a separate $2 million appropriation, Harris said.
The mayor noted that many of the playground sites scheduled for new equipment are either adjacent to or associated with state public schools.
Last week, the Board of Education reduced a proposed allocation of $3 million for playground equipment for schools to $1 million for fiscal year 2000-2001 to provide safety surfacing of playgrounds and provide accessibility for students with disabilities.
