Town of Farmington - Parks and Recreation Department

The Farmington Parks and Recreation Department provides recreational opportunities and special events for the community. The department is made up of 3 full time employees, and 15-20 seasonal staff members. Some of the programs offered by the department include: after school program for grades 1-7, toddler classes, senior bingo and trips, summer camp, vacation camp, karate and many other year round activities. Special events include our annual egg hunt, trick or treat parade, family nights at Fernald park, and Hay Day..

The dynamics of our department changed once again in 2009. Kellie Chase retired after 15 years of service to the Town of Farmington. The current staff includes Rick Conway- Director, Alisha Reinhard- Assistant Director and Carla Smith- Program Supervisor. There are also many part- time seasonal employees as well as a number of volunteers that help make our programs successful.

The Parks and Recreation Department hosted its 28^th Annual Hay Day this year. Hay Day has turned into a weekend long celebration with both adult and children’s entertainment on Friday evening followed by fireworks, an action packed Saturday schedule ending with the annual bed race. You can’t forget the Pancake Breakfast on Sunday morning sponsored by the Farmington Fire Department. Hay Day has turned into a huge summer family event. We look forward to seeing everybody Hay Day weekend August 27^th- 29^th.

Another special event that has become very popular is the Family Nights at Fernald Park. With six weeks of entertainment on every Wednesday during the summer at Fernald Park this FREE program was packed with onlookers and gave families the opportunities to have an evening full of fun activities. We are already planning for 2010 and we hope to see you there.

The 6^th Annual Daddy Daughter Dance was a sell out once again and we would like to thank all the families for attending. Our Fall Festival was a giant success there was a DJ, dancing, games, and food; a great event for the entire family. The trick or treat parade had another great turnout we marched 143 children (dressed in costumes) through town to all of the participating businesses.

The Senior Programs where filled with over 60 trips and many activities including trips to the United States Army Field Band, the National Acrobats of China, deep sea fishing and every Wednesday we host the ever popular BINGO. With senior programs growing, we can look back and see that seniors where busier than ever with no slowing down in sight. Thank you to all the seniors for participating in our programs and you can look forward to more activities to come.

Summer time is by far our busiest time of the year. We have four camps in the summer; the first is Planet Playground. This camp is two days a week for children 3, 4, and 5 years old. It gives parents the opportunity to have a break in the middle of the day and allows the children to be active and learn social skills in a safe environment.

Camp Creation is a five day a week program for children in grades 1-5. This program took two trips per week, and the staff scheduled fun events for the non- trip days. Adventure camp is a four day a week program (Monday- Thursday) for children in grades 5- 10.

This camp attends a trip every day and allows the campers more freedom by using a buddy system with check- in times, as opposed to Camp Creation where the children stay in groups with counselors. The fourth summer program is the Teen Trip program for children grades 5-12. This program gives children the opportunity to sign up for individual trips twice a week without committing to the entire summer. On Tuesdays the Teen Trip accompanied the Adventure Camp on their scheduled trip and on Wednesdays the Teens went on an “adventure” based trips such as outdoor rock climbing and surfing.

The After School Program for children in grades 1-5 continues to be popular with parents and students. This program runs the entire school year and is currently full with 43 children enrolled in the program. Participants are currently picked up at the school by Recreation staff members and brought to the Recreation Department to participate in a variety of games, sports, crafts and special activities. This program is offered every year and registration takes place in May. Starting in 2010 our ASP will begin to take children through the 7^th grade. In addition to the After School Program we run many different activities after school for students in grades K-8. Some of the programs offered in 2009 included arts and crafts, special holiday themed classes, cooking, sewing and many other programs open to students during non-school hours.

In 2009 our building was renovated with a state of the art sprinkler system. This system has made it possible for us to have large events in our building without needing fire personnel on staff. We hope to have another great turnout for Dancing with the Stars; last year we raised over $3,000 that we used towards our senior and summer programs. This year we hope to hold Dancing with the Stars at Farmington High School to better accommodate the people of Farmington.

In closing, the Parks and Recreation Department would like to thank the Board of Selectman, Fire, Police, Public Works and Water Departments for their continued support of our programs, all of our sponsors, the Library, Puddledock Press, Robert Hall, Channel 26 Community Television, the 500 Boys and Girls Club, Farmington School Department and Bus Transportation and to all Farmington Residents and especially to those who sign up for programs.