Effort is afoot for skate park to honor two teens
Concert at Eisenhower was held to support new skate park fund
BY CLARE MARIE CELANO Staff Writer

FREEHOLD TOWNSHIP - Community members have started to join an effort to raise money for the establishment of a second skate park in Freehold Township that would provide a safe, protected environment for youths to ride their skateboards.

The initiative comes in response to an incident that occurred on Feb. 27 on Bar Harbor Road in the Juniper Farms residential development.

Two youngsters, Graeme Preston, 12, and Kevin Clawson, 13, were struck by a minivan and died of injuries they sustained. Police have not said if the boys were riding skateboards at the time they were struck. No motor vehicle charges have been filed against the driver of the minivan.

Graeme and Kevin were avid skateboarders and the Clawson-Preston Memorial Skate Park Fund, a nonprofit fund, has been established to build a skate park.

Freehold Township presently operates a skateboard facility at Michael J. Tighe Park, Georgia Road.

Recently, administrators at the Eisenhower Middle School, Burlington Road, where both boys were students, held a concert to help raise funds for the skate park.

Jesse Ryan, the music teacher who planned the "Back in Black N' Gold Showcase," said the benefit was held at the school on April 9 and featured the music of his two performance classes, a group of seventh-graders and a group of former Eisenhower students.

According to Ryan, the performances featured a modern song selection with a blend of many types of rock, pop and hiphop music.

Ryan said his music performance classes are patterned after the movie "School of Rock" and enable pupils to play contemporary music with guitars, drums and keyboards, as opposed to traditional band instruments.

According to Ryan, about 750 people attended the concert. He said the concert provided the performers and the audience members with a venue in which they could express their feelings about the tragic loss of Graeme and Kevin. Many of the children had never had to cope with that type of tragedy, he said.

"There was a lot of inspiration for all of us there that night," Ryan said. "It was natural for this kind of concert to be a fundraiser and I am really proud of all of these kids for their talent and their strength."

Posters and T-shirts with the school logo, as well as T-shirts with "Freehold's Angels" printed on them in honor of the two boys dominated the scene.."Music fills a role," Ryan said. "This concert allowed the kids to give of themselves."

The concert raised about $2,300 to benefit the Graeme Preston Foundation and the Clawson-Preston Memorial Skate Park Fund.

According to the fund's Internet Web site, the ideal location for a second skate park in Freehold Township would be in the Wynnfield Park residential subdivision off Willowbrook Road. There is a municipal park within the development.

The Web site states that although there is a skate park at Michael J. Tighe Park, "a very large subset of our young people would need to cross Route 9 and travel other dangerous roads for several miles in order to reach it."

The goals of the project - which is still in its infancy, according to the Web site - include providing information about the status of the fund, offering a convenient way to make donations electronically and providing a forum for suggestions from the skate community.

The tragedy that took the lives of the Freehold Township boys has also deeply affected Freehold Borough, which is surrounded by the township.

Freehold Borough officials are also discussing the idea of finding a location for skateboarders to ride safely. Councilman Kevin Kane recently raised the issue of building a skateboard park in the borough. He said he had been in touch with members of the Preston family.

Kane said he wants to explore the idea for such a facility. He added that since Freehold Borough is centrally located, such a facility would serve the needs of many area youngsters.

The councilman said he contacted a company that sells playground equipment. Designers there came up with a plan for a 75-by-110-foot parcel of land that would cost about $120,000 to develop as a skate park.

Kane said paying for the project with borough funds is not an option. He said fundraisers would have to be explored and a site would have to be discussed.

At the same time the discussion was beginning, according to Kane, Justin Borkowski, 17, a student in the Freehold High School adult program, appeared at Borough Hall to present a petition to officials which contained almost 400 signatures from people asking for a skate park to be built in the borough.

In a letter accompanying his petition, Borkowski referred to the recent tragedy and said there is a "continuous battle between skateboarding and traffic."

"In a society in which children are no longer persuaded to play outside," he wrote, "skateboarders are often left in the dust of traffic, abandoned playgrounds and unused parking lots."

He referred to the skate park at Michael J. Tighe Park in Freehold Township, but said it is too far away for Freehold Borough skaters to travel to. He also said that park closes at 5 p.m. and is closed during the winter. Many teens skateboard all year long, according to Borkowski.

He wrote, "We need to take action before more innocent lives are taken and lawsuits are filed" and asked for the support of the borough in regard to the skateboard park.

Kane said the idea for a skate park is in its earliest stages. He said members of the Freehold Borough Recreation Commission will discuss the idea and make recommendations on how to proceed.

"We are going to touch base with as many people as we can and try to make this happen," Kane said.