Project Description
Community Volunteers for the Win: Restoring COA’s Kadish Park Soccer Field
COA’s Kadish Park may be covered in snow today, but in a few short months, the field will come back to life, welcoming Milwaukee youth for the return of another incredible season of soccer with the Milwaukee Simba Soccer Club.
In preparation for the next soccer season, The Milwaukee Simba Soccer Club, MKE’s Small Business Coach, COA Youth & Family Centers, and community volunteers kicked off their day the best way possible: by coming together to help restore COA’s soccer field at Kilbourne-Kadish Park.
Brent Halfwassen, Entrepreneur Coach and Founder of MKE’s Small Business Coach, helped make the field restoration a reality by leading on the coordination of the project and joining community volunteers to repair the field.
Together, volunteers spread 10 cubic yards of topsoil and worked together to reseed two major bare sections on the soccer field in preparation for spring germination.
When reflecting on why restoring the field was important to COA, Simba Soccer, and the surrounding community, Brent shared,
“For us, this is our nearest community park with a soccer field. While the area is blessed with a lot of green space, there are more basketball and baseball fields than soccer fields. Besides, who wouldn’t enjoy the view from the park overlooking the downtown skyline? A little TLC now will pay huge dividends down the road and give the field years more life for neighbors to enjoy!”
Brent’s family has been involved with COA since his kids were just three months old, playing on the soccer field during COA programming, and later playing with Milwaukee Simba Soccer Club.
Founded in 1996, the Milwaukee Simbas Soccer Club is a nonprofit, city-based soccer club, which works in Milwaukee’s central city, focusing on the development of young athletes as good citizens and excellent soccer players.
COA’s Youth Development Program at Riverwest partners with Simba Soccer Club to help ensure more Milwaukee youth have opportunities to participate in soccer and life skills development programming.
A huge appreciation to MKE’s Small Business Coach and Milwaukee Simba Soccer Club for helping us make this project happen, along with the amazing volunteers who helped with the restoration!
When it comes to community partners like ours? They’re keepers.
About the Milwaukee Simba Soccer Club: THE MILWAUKEE SIMBA SOCCER CLUB (MSSC) utilizes soccer as an organizing tool to channel urban, minority, and low-income youth into organized activities that are designed to promote soccer as part of a healthy lifestyle, including better nutrition and academic achievement. MSSC also affords members an opportunity to play and compete at the highest levels their soccer skills will allow. Learn more, here.
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