No more playing around

Upset with the deteriorated condition of a Grovetown park, six Grovetown Middle School pupils took it upon themselves to make a difference.

The sixth-graders each wrote letters addressed to Grovetown Mayor Dennis Trudeau, pleading with him to clean up Goodale Park.

"Before the ink got dry we started working on it," Trudeau said.

The city spent $1,000 replacing swings and seesaws, he said. Officials have purchased a $6,000 merry-go-round and are waiting for its arrival.

Trudeau also committed city workers to clean any graffiti marring the park equipment each morning.

"I feel so much better," said Milton Gaines, a Grovetown Middle sixth-grader who spearheaded the letter-writing campaign, in a released statement from the school.

"My little brother can go on the slide. The graffiti is all gone. The new swings and the new teeter-totter look real nice ... I was very surprised that a kid could make such a difference," he said.

Guided by Grovetown Middle social studies teacher Purlie Page, the pupils drafted the letters in an academic extension class and she hand-delivered them to Trudeau.

"He said that's what he needs is community involvement and that's what they need - community input," Page said.

Milton and fellow letter-writer Corey Barr even attended a Grovetown City Council meeting, at the mayor's request, to voice their concerns about the park.

"My mom took me and my little brother over to the park right after the meeting," Milton said.

Other pupils who wrote letters asking the mayor to fix the park included Jesse Williams, Corey Saturday, Alexis Gaea and Breonna Smith.

"They were impressed," Page said. "They saw that their voice did make a difference."