Grafton Street School Holds Playground Ribbon Cutting Ceremony

GRAFTON, MA - Please join Superintendent Maureen Binienda and WPS staff as they celebrate the new Grafton Street School playground in a ribbon cutting ceremony at 311 Grafton Street on Monday, June 13th at 9:00 a.m.

The CSX mitigation fund provided the City of Worcester a sum of 2 million Dollars. This money was and is to be used for projects in the immediate areas surrounding the CSX yard. The CSX mitigation dollars are designated for economic and community development purposes. The City Manager, at that time, created an Ad Hoc committee composed of community stakeholders from the surrounding areas, which include the Grafton Hill, Canal District, and the Brown Square- Shrewsbury St. areas. The members of this committee along with neighborhood input, met to identify and recommend uses of projects for the 2 million dollars. Since then, the neighborhood improvement committee has identified a number of capital improvement projects in the afore mentioned target areas. This includes the Grafton St. schoolyard playground improvement project. Under the leadership of Jackson Restrepo, city of Worcester staff, former State Representative Vincent Padone, and former City Council member Paul Clancey (co-chairs), Gordon P. Hargrove, Walter Thomas, Joanna Cackett (former Principal of Grafton St. School) and the current Principal Tina Schirner, a portion of the school yard was set aside for modern playground equipment. The CSX funds for the first time, have provided Grafton St. School, the oldest school in the district, with modern playground equipment. This equipment will not only be used by the students of the school but neighborhood residents as well.