The Rio Del Mar Park, or ‘the Blue Park’ as it is fondly known, is the hub of the community at Rio Del Mar Elementary School, Aptos.
It is where families pick up their kids from school, and lifelong friendships are made as kids play; where birthdays are marked, and Kinder promotion is celebrated; where kids meet their buddies for weekly reading sessions; and after school, where dogs chase balls, whilst their owners exercise.
But now, the swings have been removed and the playground caution-taped off because the structure is too dangerous to play on. Instead of kids playing after school, families head straight home, and the school's sense of community is suffering.
Led by the Rio Del Mar Parent Alliance, the Restore Rio Del Mar Park Group is committed to restoring the park for our community. Our mission is to collaborate with PVUSD, Santa Cruz County, community leaders, neighbors, and local businesses to improve and remodel our our park, making it a place for all to enjoy.
Classes use the park for weekly Reading Buddy sessions, where older students help younger grades learn to read.
Each year Kinder holds their promotion party at Rio Del Mar Park.
The park is where kids run off post school energy, families meet, play dates are arranged, and lifelong friendships are made.
Rio Del Mar Park is the pick up spot for a huge number of families.
Younger siblings play in the park and make friends that they will start Kinder with, leading to an easier start to school.
The park is the hub of the Rio community, where people come together to mark special moments.
Students play and learn together at the park.
The park is a space for children to explore, play and adventure.
Since summer 2024 the swings have been removed and the playground caution-taped off because the structure is too dangerous to play on. Instead of kids playing after school and parents catching up, families head straight home.
Not only is the play structure unsafe, there are other issues thaat need addressing:
Under a 1994 Joint Partnership Agreement, Santa Cruz County and PVUSD share responsibility for the park. We have been talking to Superintendent Contreras and Supervisor Zach Friend and are grateful to have their support to restore the park.
The issue now is money!
The cost of replacing the current play structure with the pour-and-play ADA accessible structure (pictured here) will be $250,000.
The district and county are working to find funds to put into replacing the play structure, but we need to raise $150,000 from the community to see it realized..
We hope that we can engage the support of the Rio Del Mar and wider Aptos community to fundraise and come together to create a wonderful park for our school and neighbors to enjoy.
With community involvement we envisage a project that would be completed in three stages.
For the moment we are working with the district and county on a plan of how to proceed, and we hope to soon share information on how people can donate to the project. In the meantime, we would love to hear from any interested parties with ideas for fundraising or offers of help.
Please follow and support our community on our Facebook page.
You can reach out to us with any questions or suggestions you may have.
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