Leadership Butler County adding all-season building at Moraine State Park
This past weekend, Leadership Butler County embarked on its newest community service project: an all-season educational pavilion on the North Shore of Moraine State Park.
This is one of the annual service projects carried out each year by the class going through Leadership Butler County, a nine-month civic education and leadership training course, which embarks on at least one such project per year.
Nonprofit organizations in Butler County submit their project proposals each year to the Butler County Chamber of Commerce for consideration. Last year, Moraine State Park was one of those organizations.
“Moraine State Park submitted their project proposal to us, asking, ‘This is the project we need done. Would you be able to raise the funds to do it?’” said Leadership Butler County board member Mackenzie Hindman. “And so the class of 2023 took on that project.”
According to 2022-23 class member Dawn Halle, the new building will be in the North Shore area of the park, near the McDanel’s boat launch.
The new building will serve as an all-season educational pavilion that will allow park educators to host large groups of students all year long. The interior of the building will feature a vaulted ceiling, heating, revamped lighting and a projection screen. There will still be an outdoor pavilion with seating for summer events.
“The enclosed part is going to have a nice projector screen that comes down that has technology accessibility,” Halle said. “It’ll have some seating and accessible tables that will allow for individuals to come in for learning or meetings.”
On Saturday, Sept. 30, Leadership Butler County began to remake Pavilion No. 7, the building which is currently standing on the site.
Once the new pavilion is finished, Halle foresees that every school district in Butler County, as well as home-schooling groups, will find a use for it.
“I think a lot of the local school districts are going to be a big utilizer of this when they're doing field trips or they're in science classes,” Halle said. “A lot of the home-school groups, I think, will use this as well. It provides them the opportunity to actually be out in the community when they're doing their home-school learning.”
This will mark the third project undertaken by the 2022-23 Leadership Butler County class. Previously, no LBC class had ever undertaken more than one. The class also donated a cache of supplies and bus passes to the women’s veterans shelter Robin’s Home and hosted a supply drive for the nonprofit Inspired Hearts and Hands.
It is the responsibility of each class to secure the money for their projects. According to Hindman, the project has secured all of the necessary funding. Much of it has come in the way of donations from organizations, while other funds came from LBC’s annual murder mystery dinner in April.
The class of 2024 has just started accepting applications from local nonprofits for its class project. Any nonprofit in need of extra funding or extra help for its project is encouraged to apply through the Butler County Chamber of Commerce. The deadline for applications is Oct. 20.
