The Voice of Experience: Interview with Natasha Johns,
Bedford Urban Enterprise Assn. (BEAU)

Quick Facts Who: Natasha Johns is a schoolteacher who works part time for BUEA What: Built a universally accessible playground for the Englewood School, Bedford, IN (a school for physically and mentally challenged children) How long it took: November, 2005 to July, 2006 (build day, July 29, 2006) Project Budget: $65,000 Fundraising approaches: benefit concert, “Laurence County Idol”, live auction and ribbon cutting, individual donations, grants Key challenges: Money, volunteers, unexpected limestone  The most important things she did: Create a planning committee and watch a KaBOOM! build day Web site: http://www.kaboom.org/Home/tabid/8456/Default.aspx Quote that summarizes the experience: “Wonderful! Amazing! Goosebumps! Tears shed!”

The first thing that pops into Natasha’s head when I asked her about the challenges she had with the project is having the money on time. It turned out that the equipment manufacturer's preferred payment schedule and the delivery of some of her money didn’t exactly line up. There were some frantic phone calls but, in the end, everything worked out. "You would not believe how much money we've brought in after the build!" She figures there is nearly $15K that will go to adding on to the playground and maybe go toward a physical therapy room in the school.

While prepping the site, Natasha found limestone. While that shouldn’t be too much of a surprise, considering Bedford is known as the “Limestone Capital of the World”, it wasn’t a happy find. I asked her how she got through it. “A great guy named Doug Kellams who owns a construction company and brought out some heavy equipment as soon as I called,” said Natasha. “It is good to have friends.”

Then there were also the volunteers. To Natasha’s eyes, the volunteers started losing interest as the build day got closer and closer. The day before the build, she had 40-50 people signed up to participate. She looked at the boxes of 150 tee shirts she ordered and figured there would just be a lot left. Right before the build day, she called the newspaper and "people just kept showing up". She ran out of tee shirts before she ran out of volunteers.

"The whole thing was amazing."

Natasha remembered one day she was out shopping when she ran into an acquaintance who told her “I drove by and it looked like a bunch of ants. I drove by again and it was a playground... with new fencing... and new landscaping...” Natasha laughed. “The community is still talking about it. There are still ‘thank you’ letters in the newspaper.”

“It was great for the community. It brought a lot of people together.”

Flush with her success with the Englewood playground, Natasha has been hired to help coordinate the build of larger playground for another school (on top of her normal teaching duties).  Her advice to others? “A planning committee,” she said. “Definitely have a planning committee.” She also got to two separate KaBOOM! builds by attending the We Play! and UPlay! conferences. “Go watch a build day! It really helps!”