Volunteers Rebuild Playscape for Hartley Park

The Playscape was damaged after the July 21 wind storm.

On July 21 Duluth saw aggressive winds that knocked out power and knocked over trees. Hartley park was not immune to this, their Playscape area was littered with down trees. Now, those trees are being used to rebuild.

“We’re adding in some big balance logs to this area here, logs that fell down in the storm, that the loggers brought in for us to take the bark off and use in our play area,” said Kaitlin Erpestad, the Preschool Director at Hartley Park.

Preschool parents volunteered on Monday, doing everything from planting trees to mulching paths, all to reach one big goal.

“We want this space safe to play in and ready to go for the start of our preschool year which is the Tuesday after labor day,” said Erpestad.

A classroom that was damaged during the storm will take longer to rebuild but the staff at Hartley Park is confident in the Playscape will return and be great even if it is different.

Hartley park is holding a fundraiser Wednesday for the general public to see the damage and also to see how far they’ve come.