Prairie Catholic pavilion, playground move is next week
Employees of various local contractors were working near the new pavilion site at St. Gabriel’s School Tuesday morning.
By Ted Pennekamp
Prairie Catholic School of Prairie du Chien, 515 N. Beaumont Rd., is in the process of moving their pavilion and playground. The pavilion and playground had to be relocated because of the construction of the new gymnasium, day care and office building, part of which remains under construction.
The pavilion has been set up in its new location south of the school, but work is still being done under and around it by various local contractors, said Father James Weighner.
Weighner also said that the relatively new playground equipment that the school owns will be reinstalled south of the school near the pavilion.
“We’re hoping that work on the new playground will begin next week,” said Weighner, who noted that Gerber Leisure of Mount Horeb will be constructing the new Austin and Justin Memorial Playground. Gerber Leisure constructed the original Austin and Justin Memorial Playground and is familiar with the equipment and the site, Weighner said.
The former playground was removed in April of 2015. In July of 2015, the old gym and day care were torn down to make room for the new facilities.
The moving of the pavilion and the playground will cost approximately $12,000, said Weighner. As of Tuesday, just over $7,000 had been raised through donations toward the project. To provide further donations, contact the school or Carrie Nolan, the Nolan brothers’ mom.
The gym in the new building at Prairie Catholic will be a middle school-sized gym with seating for 100. The new building, along with landscaping and the new pavilion and playground, will be the culmination of two projects, the first of which was the construction of the 7,000-square-foot Fellowship Hall next to St. John’s Catholic Church in the 700 block of S. Wacouta Avenue. The Fellowship Hall seats about 280. It has a kitchen, handicapped accessible restrooms attached to the church, a storage area and the hall area. The Fellowship Hall was completed in the fall of 2015.
The merger of St. John’s and St. Gabriel’s in 2012 into Holy Family Parish helped with fundraising and administration for the two projects. The projects are part of the capital campaign that began in 2012.
