*** Prosser skaters raising money for park ***

Prosser, Washington --
( This story was published 3/11/2002 - Tri-City Herald )

Stay off the stairs and sidewalks and out of the streets and
parking lots.

That's the message skateboarders generally get when trying to
find a place to practice their sport. It's getting harder and harder
to find a place to ride.

In towns such as Prosser, ordinances prohibit skateboarding.

"The skateboarders ride up and down the sidewalks and get in
the way of pedestrians," said Police Chief Win Taylor.

Even the school districts have banned skating on school grounds.
The kids have to work hard to find a smooth surface to skate.

"We have a place in Whitstran," said Jake Blasdel, 15, a
freshman at Prosser High School. "It's the foundation of a
burned-down house."

But Blasdel and his buddies hope the situation is only temporary.
They are helping raise money to build a skate park in Prosser.

The city has donated a corner of E. J. Miller Park across from
Keene-Riverview Elementary School, but the 100-member skate
park committee still needs to raise about $100,000 to build the
dream park.

So far they have about $1,700, scraped together by selling
T-shirts and sponsoring a dunk tank for the city's police
department during a city festival last summer.

The group needs $25,000 to be able to pour the
80-foot-by-100-foot concrete slab base.

Later, as money allows, the group can add stairs, ramps, fly
boxes and quarter-pipe sweeps so the boarders can practice
tricks and free-style moves.

The park effort also is a lesson in responsibility, Blasdel said,
because the kids will have to take care of it.

This already is providing small benefits for the city. The police are
getting fewer complaints about skateboarders, Taylor said.

"Since the skate board park effort started, the kids have made a
sincere effort to police themselves and garner community
support," Taylor said.

Prosser isn't the only community with kids willing to chip in and
help raise money to build a skate park. Efforts also are being
made in Benton City and in the Sunnyside/Grandview area.

Tom Byers, Sunnyside Parks and Recreation director, said
Grandview and Sunnyside are working with the county to build a
12,500-square-foot park between the two cities in Sunnyview
Park.

Byers said up to 60 kids from the communities have pitched in to
help raise more than $20,000 for the project, which will cost
$300,000.

The cities are trying to get grants to complete the project, he said.

Benton City organizers are also hoping they can collect grant
money to build a park, which will cost about $125,000.

Councilwoman Kim Baldwin said she and a small group of kids
and parents have raised about $3,000 so far and are selling
engraved bricks as a fund-raiser.

"The bricks cost $30 each and will be used for the walkway to the
skate park, which will be built behind the tennis courts in the
center of town," she said.

Some people may think the sport is just a fad, but it's a growing
fad bringing in $1 billion annually in sales.

Jim Fitzpatrick, executive director of the International Association
of Skateboard Companies, said the number of skateboarders
across the country has risen from 6 million in 1996 to 16 million.

And there are more than 800 skate parks across the country.
More than 50 are in Washington.

But for Blasdel and other Lower Valley youths, the nearest parks
are in Yakima and Kennewick, out of reach for kids whose only
wheels are attached to an oval fiberglass board.

"We just want a place to skate," Blasdel said.

CC - http://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/2002/0311/story4.html

ACC - http://www.genesbmx.com/Eastern-Washington-Skate-Parks.html

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