Helping Special Olympics Kids

Story and Photos By Amy Boreman, VENTRAC by Venture Products, Inc.

Ryan Steiner, Ventac's Director of Engineering resurfaces the baseball diamond. The field is an important part of the sports program at Ida Sue/Nick Amster and the field is also used for Special Olympics games.

Ventrac gives back to the community by putting their equipment and employee-volunteers to work at both the Ida Sue School/Nick Amster Workshop and the Christian Children's Home of Ohio.

At Ventrac, in Orrville, Ohio, giving back to the community has always been an important part of the company philosophy. So, the management team set plans in motion for a service project to assist the Ida Sue School/Nick Amster Workshop and the Christian Children's Home of Ohio organizations in Wooster with some needed outdoor maintenance projects and improvements.

On the day of the project, Ventrac took seven of their tractors, more than 10 attachments and 12 of the company managers for a day of labor-intensive work and giving back to the community. The President, Director of Engineering, CFO, Production Manager were among the personnel who came out to run the tractors, pull overgrown shrubs, rake, till, seed, mulch and do general cleanup.

Volunteers completed several large landscaping cleanup projects at the Ida Sue School/Nick Amster Workshop, including resurfacing the ball diamond. Ventrac volunteers cut back the sod edges on the diamond and raked the top layer with a fresh layer of sand. The ball diamond is an important part of the sports program at Ida Sue/Nick Amster and since the field is also used for Special Olympics games, they welcomed the site of a newly resurfaced field.

Don Rammel, coach for the Special Olympics and Nick Amster Workshop's recreation coach said, ''This is coming at a perfect time. We just won the state championship over the weekend and it's just perfect timing.'' A newly groomed field is always a nice treat, but for these special players, it means even more. The school and workshop no longer receives help for the upkeep of the ball diamond, so they greatly appreciated the help from volunteers.

Donna Casto, Accounting Coordinator, Dallas Steiner, CEO/President (On Tractor) and Jim Casto, Production Manager took time away from the office to refurbish two projects.

The Christian Children's Home of Ohio needed to revamp their outdoor volleyball court and ball diamond. Ventrac stepped in and reshaped and groomed the ball diamond and added a new layer of sand with the help of their arsenal of equipment. The diamond was then polished off using the Ventrac ballpark groomer. The volleyball court was filled and groomed with a layer of fresh sand.

At the end of the day, the landscape beds were cleaned, a fresh layer of mulch was laid, the ball diamonds were groomed and a new grass seeding was set. The work was hard, but evoked a deep feeling of satisfaction that Ventrac was able to lend a hand and make a beneficial contribution for a greater cause to these organizations that provide nurturing support to individuals on a daily basis.