NORTHFIELD — Children attending the Northfield Elementary school will have a new basketball court by the time school starts because of the work of the Harrington Foundation, the Northfield Highway Department and Snow and Sons Landscaping.
The Highway Department recently started the work, which also includes a new parking lot. The job involves paving the lot and basketball court and building drainage ditches with gravel around the building, where drainage has been a problem for at least a few years, said Highway Superintendent Tom Walker.
The project is being funded partly by an appropriation approved at Town Meeting in May, and partly by the Harrington Foundation, a Brattleboro group that supports children’s activities in sports, arts, academics and other pursuits.
Recreation Commission Director Bridget Hammond contacted the Harrington Foundation about two years ago about helping with this project, she said. About five years ago, the Harrington Foundation did a similar renovation of the Bernardston Elementary School’s basketball court, which was what led Hammond to the group.
The Harrington Foundation was started by the family of Bernardston native Jill Harrington, who died in childbirth in 2010. The foundation’s ties to the area influenced the decision to support this renovation project, said Kevin Harrington, the director of the Harrington Foundation.
“We used to play on that court as kids,” he said. “It was near and dear to our hearts.”
It was also a chance to make something that would affect “thousands of kids over the years,” Harrington said.
The Harrington Foundation supports projects like this one through regular fundraising events, like a golf tournament in Vermont and basketball classics in Northampton and at Pioneer Valley Regional School. The goal is to be able to do something like this every five years.
The Highway Department became involved “to do what we could to save everybody money,” Walker said. This way, he said, the town won’t have to put the project out for bid, and can use many of the materials that the Highway Department already has.
Last week, Walker said, the Highway Department began digging the drainage ditches around the building and did prep work for the new basketball court. Walker said that paving work will be finished within two weeks.