In a cooperative effort by the Howard Mohr Community Center, the Park District of Forest Park and the Forest Park Public Schools, our first health fair for children was held on July 1 at The Park. Resources for Our Community’s Kids – ROCK – was well-received, with medical and dental services given to many Forest Park children. We are encouraged by the turnout and plan to expand the list of services offered and vendors participating for next summer.
Many thanks to Karen Dylewski and her staff (Nikki Petrey, Rich Barger, Brenda Powers, Diana Dylewski and Lisa Richards). They played games with the kids and served up yummy yogurt parfaits – this is a group of people from the village who always give 110 percent! Larry Piekarz, Vicki Stisevic, Chris Richards, Erin Parchert, Denny Crotty and the park district staff are the best around. They provided us the space, and a yoga class and a booth teaching “Don’t Drown.” We are grateful to the park’s maintenance staff, who always take such good care of us and give us such a beautiful park. Our local Kiwanis Club pitched right in with us to decorate the park gate and booths with balloons and signs aud run the beanbag toss with pretzel rewards. Veronica Gerst and Jerry Lordan represented the Kiwanis and stayed throughout the festivities – thank you!
The Ronald McDonald Mobile Clinic, directed by Susan Finn, and driven by nurse Linda Rush, has been coming to serve us for many years, offering free physicals and immunization to our children. For the first time this year, we engaged Smile Illinois for the first two of our Ronald McDonald dates and their dentists took care of our kids in their portable dental office inside of the park building. We thank them all for the work they do in our community and in many neighboring towns. Our own Brenda Ali manned the Health Services & Resources booth.
Our local Wal-Mart manager, Mark Dennison, donated two bikes for our bike raffle and our police department donated the services of Officer Lane, who was on board to register bicycles. The All Kids insurance program was represented by the State of Illinois to inform and enroll our residents in this program. We look forward to coming together again next summer to continue to promote and support the health and fitness of our children. Remember, we have one more Thursdays with the Ronald McDonald Mobile Clinic: July 15, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Diane Dormeyer
Health Services Coordinator
District 91
