F.Eighteen year old Patrick Dugan and his friends love to skateboard. During the pandemic, they started to practice more often, but every time they skated in the parking lots and neighborhoods in Thurmont, they got kicked out.

Instead of giving up, the teenagers raised more than $ 6,000 and managed to enlist the city’s mayor and commissioners to create a public skate park.

“That’s what people say to you when they know your skateboard,” said Dugan. “‘You should get a skate park.'”

On April 12th, Dugan presented the skatepark concept to Mayor John Kinnaird and the Board of Commissioners along with a group of teenagers and a petition with more than 150 signatures. The board decided to offer the skate park for a grant from Program Open Space, a Maryland Department of Natural Resources program that provides counties with funding for public space projects.

“I had the feeling that some opinions changed at this meeting,” said Kirsten Dugan, Patrick’s mother. “… seeing these kids doing something positive changed their minds.”

Kinnaird will present the project on June 10th. He will apply for $ 60,000 for the skate park in addition to funding a small park in a development. The county has about $ 300,000 to split among its parishes.

Dugan and his friend Norman Montoya started collecting money for the initiative together with friends and other skaters Maceo Zelenka (15), Alan Chmiel (16) and Adrian Febus (16). Maceo’s mother Stacie Zelenka and Kirsten Dugan guided the boys through the fundraising logistics.

“We kind of sat down and talked to them and said, ‘Look, you have the city’s support now. We have to use the support and the momentum and keep this train going, ‘”said Stacie Zelenka. “So they haven’t stopped working since then.”

The group meets every two weeks in the pavilion behind the Thurmont Senior Center, the planned future location of the skate park. Commissioner Wayne Hooper, who served as the liaison between the Board and the Committee, has been impressed with her work.

To raise the majority of the funds, the team offered companies the opportunity to sponsor the park. Sponsors will have their company name and logo printed on a banner on the premises and on the back of Thurmont Skate Park T-shirts that the group is currently selling at Catoctin High School and the Thurmont Farmers Market.

The boys have won 15 sponsors and also distributed donation boxes to companies in the city. Those who donate $ 5 or more will receive a sticker from Joe Wallace, a skateboarder and Urbana resident who worked at the Urbana skate park.

“People actually talk about it,” said Febus of the enthusiasm in the skate park. “You just didn’t let it blow in the wind.”

The Embark Skate Shop in Frederick has agreed to give the committee a raffle custom made skateboard to raise funds for the park.

While the committee isn’t sure when the park will be ready, it has already secured an appearance from a professional Baltimore skateboarder and Frederick Rock School artists. Even if the schedule is not yet clear, the skaters look forward to having their own place where new skaters can also learn the ropes. You don’t currently have a permanent skate area.

After being turned away from so many shops and neighborhoods, Dugan and his friends gave up on building their own barriers and rails in the Montoyas driveway. Montoya, 16, said that as much fun as they were there, his family was getting tired of the noise.

“First [my mom] was fine with that, ”said Montoya. “She said, ‘It’s cool that you’re building all of this.’ But it’s just a lot of noise. “

Zelenka and Dugan took the boys to various skate parks in the region from Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to Washington, DC for research purposes. They even visited Baltimore’s Charm City Skate Park, a large indoor park that Patrick Dugan described as “intimidating at first.” But when the day was over, Kirsten Dugan said she had to drag the boys out of the park.

Exploring new areas through skateboarding is one of Patrick Dugan’s favorite sports.

“I think our city is really fun touring and then we went to DC and Frederick to explore and find new places to skate,” he said. “It gives you a sense of freedom and exploration.”

Maceo Zelenka said landing tricks like kick flips and toe flips can be addicting. Montoya agreed.

“You can never get too good at it,” he said. “There is always something new to learn.”

But despite the exploration, the guys say their greatest satisfaction is that their efforts are making a difference in their hometown.

“We thought it was going to be swept under the rug, that they were going to say ‘let’s build a skate park’ and then don’t do it,” said Dugan. “But something is actually happening.”

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