Over 250 ‘Play Packs’ given to families in West Seneca
Friday June 26 – Town of West Seneca, NY
Victory Sports worked with long-term partners Project Play WNY and Ralph C. Wilson Jr Foundation in supporting the Town of West Seneca Youth & Recreation Department in giving out over 250 Play Packs this past Friday. Each Play Pack contained a jump rope, playground ball, sidewalk chalk, tennis balls and Project Play WNY free play activity cards.
West Seneca Youth & Recreation is, like much of the country, dealing with the fall-out from having to cancel or close almost all of their summer activities and facilities such as the swimming pool, playground, football field, baseball leagues and others due to the pandemic. Many of those facilities are on-site at the town HQ where we were on Friday. The sight of all these wonderful facilities on a beautiful sunny day with zero kids playing really brought home the reality of the situation. Victory Sports and Project Play WNY are working tirelessly to get equipment and ideas for free play into the hands of kids across WNY and working with local recreation departments is a great way to coordinate large numbers of residents to receive our equipment.
With the giveaway due to start at 2pm and run until 4pm or whenever the packs ran out, it quickly became apparent it would be the latter of those as we had a queue of 50 cars by 1.30pm! Thank you to those who waited patiently until 2pm for us to start giving away the Play Packs through car windows, with everyone involved wearing masks to make sure everyone stayed safe. In a show of support for their constituents, several West Seneca council members helped to hand the Play Packs to visitors and the queue of vehicles backed all the way round to Union Road so the support of West Seneca Police Department was much appreciated.
Despite some youth sports beginning to restart come July 6th, there are many kids who won’t be able to participate for one reason or another; families have been hit hard financially by the pandemic, many sports aren’t on that list of those allowed to restart, most camps have limited numbers. Victory Sports will be scaling up the distribution of these Play Packs across Erie and surrounding counties to make sure every child in need has some equipment and inspiration for ways to play and be active. Reintroducing free play is one of the “Eight Plays” set out by Project Play because the stimulation that comes from creative free play is so powerful for a child’s social and emotional development. We don’t want kids to miss out on that this summer!
You can help us reach more families across WNY by donating here or via the link below. $25 allows us to help 2 families enjoy some play time! We truly appreciate your help and cherish your support of the community.
Check out the news coverage from WIVB Channel 4 by clicking here or on the logo below!
