This past Saturday, Dustin's Adventureland and community officials came together to celebrate years of work and break ground on construction of Schuylkill County's First All-Inclusive Playground.
Back in January 2020, a group of volunteers officially formed a 501c3 non profit called Dustin's Adventureland to build the playground adjacent to the Minersville Lions Club Pavilion.
The group wanted to build a playground that any child, including those with special needs would be able to play on and participate.
Several areas of land were considered but fate took them to Minersville.
Since 2020, the group has been raising funds to build the playground and as of Saturday, they were less than $50,000 from their goal.
A hurdle they didn't expect was a need for a sufficient pathway to the park, but thanks to borough officials and their partners in construction a plan was developed and what led to Saturday's event.
Saturday kicked off Phase 1 of construction, which is the pathway, and once that is complete, Phase 2 can begin.
The groundbreaking featured Minersville's Mayor Sean Palmer, Minersville Borough Manager Bobby Mahalchick, Schuylkill Chamber of Commerce President Robert Carl, and Pennsylvania State Senator David Argall, who all had helped Dustin's Adventureland in some way in terms of constructions, grants, or other funding.
Dustin's Adventureland Board Members President Jim Womer, Vice President Jeffrey Dunkel, and Amy Freed, mother of Dustin who helped inspire the project, all spoke and thanked everyone that got them to today on the project.
When it came time, Bob Carl, Amy Freed, Jim Womer, Jeffrey Dunkel, Mayor Sean Palmer, and Senator Dave Argall took a shovel and with the help of a child dug the first holes for the project.
Nearly 100 people attended the event which also included pizza and characters that met with the children in attendence.
