Partnering to Promote Healthy Habits
OSF HealthCare joins Belvidere community to create fitness court
Your doctor will tell you exercise and an active lifestyle can add healthy years to your life.
However, finding the time - and in some cases - the money to develop a fitness routine is often hard to attain.
Making exercise accessible and affordable is the idea behind a fitness court recently opened in Belvidere, IL. The idea began with the city's Mayor almost a year ago. Then the Belvidere Park District came on board to provide the space and earmark funds for its construction.
Finally, Mayor Mike Chamberlain reached out to the OSF HealthCare Foundation for a donation to bring it all together. Chamberlain says this is a prime example of the public/private partnerships needed to get these kind of projects done.
"It's going to be a great asset to the community at large", says Belvidere Mayor Mike Chamberlain. "And, again, we can't stress enough how appreciative we are of OSF's participation in this and of us being able to work with the park district and the city to get this done."
National Fitness Campaign (NFC), invented the Fitness Court®, a state-of-the-art outdoor gym facility - with 30 individual pieces of equipment, a shock-resistant sports flooring, and exercise stations that allow for up to 28 individuals to workout at the same time. There's also a free Fitness Court® App that can be downloaded and used to track training progress, learn new routines, or compete in fitness challenges.
"There's a lot of outdoor fitness equipment that you can find, but a lot of them are stationary and sometime they do them on pads or trail systems or their own with kind of like moving parts," says Mark Penecost, Executive Director of the Belvidere Park District. "But with this being the system that it is, with the app supporting it and kind of having the national fitness campaign backing it, it seem to be one of those things that's unique in that fashion."
Jarid Funderburg, OSF Strategic Philanthropy Officer, says, “We know not everyone has access to this type of equipment and instruction – that’s why we’re pleased to partner with the park district on such a worthwhile opportunity for the residents of Belvidere.”
Mayor Chamberlain adds, "OSF has been a great partner with the Belvidere community for a lot of years."