Good fences make good safety for kids

The Putnam County Youth Soccer Association is in the process of installing a fence between the soccer fields and the parking area at Big Walnut Sports Park. Chris Anderson, left, a senior at DePauw, Troy Scott, the assistant director of the Greencastle Parks and Recreation Department and Ed Neuman with the city of Greencastle work together to drill a fence-post hole.

On Tuesday and again today, volunteers with the Putnam County Youth Soccer Association (PCYSA), along with city employees worked to install a fence to separate the soccer fields at Big Walnut Sports Park from the parking area.

Pedar Foss, the president of PCYSA, said, "we're putting up the fence for safety reasons."

"It's something that just makes sense for us and this was the time for us to actually go and do it," Foss said.

He said the board hoped to commemorate the people involved in making the fence a reality.

"We're looking to have the names of businesses on the rails of the fence," Foss said.

He said the fence is part of an overall effort to improve the soccer area.

"When the paving of the parking lots was completed last summer one, one of the things we wanted to continue to do was develop that portion of the sports park -- developments that will eventually lead to bathrooms on that side of the road so that kids won't have to walk across. That's something we're dealing with by using temporary toilets during the season," Foss said.

"We want to develop it as one of the best facilities for soccer in the western part of Indiana," he said.

He said one of the goals for the developments is to clearly mark the space of the fields.

"We want to mark out the space of the soccer field so that it clearly states the fields are in this place. It would look a little nicer," he said.

Foss wants the fence to help clearly delineate the separation between parking and field.

"It should really help create a visual and physical boundary between the field and the parking area," Foss said.

He said the PCYSA wanted to thank people in the community for all of the hard work and help with fundraising, as well as the people who developed the park in the 1980s.

The group will be working on the fence over the next two weeks or so, including today from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Anyone interested in helping with the fence can contact Pedar Foss at pfoss@depauw.edu.