Taking a potty break while playing at Kids Kingdom in Seymour Lake Township Park will be a lot easier and safer next year.
Construction began Monday on a 1,088-square-foot building containing four separate restroom facilities located on the playground’s south side.
‘We’ll have them open next spring,? said Oxford Township Parks and Rec. Director Ron Davis.
Two of the restrooms, male and female, will have entrances/exits located in the playground area. They will only be accessible to those inside the fenced in area.
Two other restrooms, male and female, on the opposite side of the building will have entrances/exits located outside the playground area. These facilities will be physically separated from those inside the playground area.
‘You don’t have to worry about your kids leaving without seeing them or other people coming in,? Davis said. ‘That’s why we did that.?
All of the labor and some of the materials for these new facilities are being donated by three companies.
Silverado Custom Homes, Inc., owned by Bob Tedesco, is constructing the restrooms. Locally, the company has built the Shores of Willow Lake and the Hills of Willow Lake subdivisions along Lakeville and N. Oxford roads.
Bob Turner, of Lake Orion, has agreed to do all the plumbing, while Dennis Hartwick, of the Oxford-based Hartwick Electric, will be doing all the electrical work.
The Oxford-based Pioneer Door is selling Parks & Rec. doors for the new facility at a discounted price and has offered to install them free of charge.
Nathan Grove, who owns a lumber yard in South Lyon, sold all the siding, roof trusses and roofing materials to Parks & Rec. at a discount, while Ray Vantine, owner of Vantine Well Drilling, is donating the labor to hook up the well he drilled for the playground free of charge four years ago.
‘They’ve all stepped up to the plate because they knew this was going to enhance not only the park, but the quality of life for our residents,? Davis said. ‘If it wasn’t for their generosity there’s no way we could have done it.?
Normally, this project probably would have cost between $40,000 and $50,000.
‘Right now, we’ve got roughly $13,000 into it,? Davis said.
A vast majority of the money being spent on the restrooms comes from funds raised by the Dream Developers golf outing held every year at Devil’s Ridge Golf Club.
Davis said this project will ‘pretty much exhaust? existing Dream Developers funds. ‘We have to put a septic field out there,? he said. ‘That will probably eat up quite a bit of it.?
All the fixtures for this new restroom facility came from the former Oxford Middle School when they were converting it into the present high school.
‘When they were demo-ing all the bathrooms, we went up there and got all the bathroom fixtures that were supposed to be thrown away,? Davis explained. ‘We took toilets, mirrors, sinks, partitions, hand-dryers. That will all be recycled.?
‘All that stuff is another big savings for the taxpayers,? he noted.