George Rincon is seventeen years old and a scout here on Long Island. The community project he is doing at The Let All The Children Play Playground – Field 4 at Eisenhower Park will bring smiles to those who visit the park. The scout project he is doing will be a great addition and have a positive impact on the children who visit the park.

George told us, “I am not an Eagle Scout yet. The project I will by doing is one of the steps scouts need to do to become an Eagle Scout. I first saw the playground when my friends and I would go to the Eisenhower park to hangout and play board games.  Then one day in my BOCES class I heard what the playground was all about and I decided I wanted to help by doing my Eagle Project to benefit LATCP.   I contacted Michelle, we met, we talked and we decided on several projects.  The first will be painting the buddy bench, the second will be to remove the temporary fence in the back of the playground that’s around the drainage mound with 200ft of permanent chain link fence, and the third will be fours gardens two around the two sign at the entrance and the other two around the two signs inside the park.
The project will be done in stages throughout the late spring and summer.  I will start with having fundraisers to buy all the materials needed and then we will start the builds. I am looking forward to the next several months and the work we will be doing for the LATCP.”

Do you know about the buddy bench? “A buddy bench is a designated seating area where students feeling lonely or upset can seek camaraderie. The area is customarily painted in bright, inviting colors.”

This past weekend Michelle Licata, Director of Operations at LATCP met with George and his family to see the beginning stages of the new buddy bench that they have created. The buddy bench is green and purple to represent the colors of the LATCP logo.

Michelle Licata of LATCP said, “George Rincon and his wonderful ‪‎‬ family turned one of our benches into a buddy bench. The buddy bench is located near our musical chimes All of us at LATCP are so grateful for all their hard work, and love how bright‬ and cheerful the bench turned out in our colors! And this is just the beginning of his scout ‬ project, thank you so much George! Michelle also wants to give a special thanks to the Home Depot‬ of Jericho for generously donating the paint‬ and supplies to make this possible.”

George has aspirations of becoming an Eagle Scout and we know he will make a great one. He is a great role model to others and we are sure his project will inspire others to INCLUDE any child who comes to the park to play. The buddy bench that George has created is a great symbol of the mission LATCP believes in and that is ALL children know matter their abilities deserves the right to feel included and accepted.

THANK YOU George, YOU SHINE!

George has done a fantastic job so far and we can not wait to see the completed project.

Join is this Sunday and make new friends at our Let ALL The Children Play in May event from 11am to 4pm. George along with our other Shining Children will be recognized and given an award at 1pm during the event. We hope you can join us.

Meet all of our Shining Children —> here

Learn more about the event —> here