Mentor Parks & Rec Wins Community Wellness Award

The Mentor Parks and Recreation won a community wellness award for its .

The carnival featured kid-friendly information about home fire safety, good hand-washing techniques, healthy eating and more. For the older crowd, information about poison prevention, seat belt and car seat safety, vaccination recommendations, nutrition, sunscreen and skin cancer prevention was available.

Hundreds of kids -- with parents and grandparents in tow -- attended the carnival in March.

Consequently, the Ohio Parks & Recreation Assocation recognized it as the second best Community Wellness program in the state this year.

Almost 100 projects were nominated for awards this year and only 20 agencies across the state received them.

"These award winners represent the best of the best in parks and recreation in Ohio," said OPRA Executive Director Woody Woodward. "These programs and projects are changing the lives of people around the state and building better communities in Ohio."

Mentor Parks and the other award winners will be recognized at a banquet hosted by OPRA on February 7 at the Kalahari Resort and Conference Center in Sandusky. It will feature keynote speaker, Jack Hanna, the director emeritus of the Columbus Zoo.