Avon Skate Coalition receives $25,000 grant to begin planning process

Efforts to bring a skate park to Avon started in 2021 when Mark Beresniewicz formed the Avon Skate Coalition Facebook page and a petition to garner community support. And this August, the coalition received a $25,000 planning grant from the Colorado Health Foundation — enabling it to jump into its next phase of planning and preparation.

“It’s very exciting to have this opportunity and what’s even better is we’ve been able to work well — with the town, with students and with everyone in our community — we’ve all been working really well together. It’s just very exciting when a project seems to align the way this one has,” said Amy Lewis, the grant administrator for the Education Foundation of Eagle County.

Beresniewicz originally tapped Lewis as his long-time colleague and community member to help with the Avon Skate Coalition early on, and now the Education Foundation of Eagle County is serving as the fiscal agent for the group. As the fiscal agent, the organization will help apply for and hold grant funding for the project as the coalition continues to make progress.

The grant from the Colorado Health Foundation is specifically granted to projects for “equity-centered community design.”

“When you’re building equity into a skate park design and a community design, you have to have an understanding of or feedback or engagement from several different demographics — including disabled people, elderly people, BIPOC, LGBTQ, educators and more,” Lewis said. “They want us to engage all these different segments of our community and have them give us feedback on the design and what would work for them and that’s where the equity comes in.”

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The $25,000 can be used for support with meeting space, stipends for community members, administrative costs, materials and more.

Plus, in receiving this grant, the coalition will have an opportunity for a second round of funding — between $250,000 to $700,000 — from the Colorado Health Foundation.

“If we follow this equitable process that they’re giving us funding to follow in planning, then we have an opportunity to apply for construction grants, which is phase two of this funding to actually build the park,” Lewis said. “So, this is only phase one of this funding opportunity from the Colorado Health Foundation.”

However, there’s one big hurdle that the coalition will need to clear before it can start this community engagement and planning process: finding the right location for the skate park.

According to Lewis, the group has been working closely with the town’s planners and recreation department to identify potential parcels of land and understand what is needed to make the skate park a reality.

Jena Skinner, Avon’s senior planner, said that thus far, the community development team at the town has been “lending understanding to the group regarding the development process and in looking at their planning of development materials.”

Plus, Skinner added, the group “may be approaching council to do a presentation as a member of the public, at some point this fall,” something that Lewis confirmed the group hopes to do this month.

Overall, Lewis said that the coalition has had a lot of great support for the project.

“I think it’s widely accepted because it’s an outdoor recreation, it’s very up and coming right now and there’s a lot of people in general — not just kids, but a lot of people — who are interested in skating and learning skating, especially if you have a good learning progressing park that has anything for anybody,” she said.

Through its involvement with the Avon Skate Coalition, the Education Foundation of Eagle County has also become involved with another skate park project in the county. Downvalley, in an effort led by a Red Canyon High School class and students, Gypsum committed $40,000 in funding toward a new (or re-designed) skate park in the town.   

In this effort — as with the Avon one — the foundation will serve as the fiscal agent, offering an opportunity for the Gypsum group to bring in additional grants and funding.

Overall, Lewis said that the foundation’s involvement in these efforts is because they align well with the mission of the Education Foundation of Eagle County, not only with its goals of bettering students’ behavioral and mental health but also because it’s something young people and students have been asking for.

“It feels great that we’re answering a request for young people — and our community — in a thoughtful way,” she said.