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For the first time in Loudoun’s history, all future public elementary schools will be built with a playground on campus.

After months of discussion and debate, the Loudoun County School Board voted Tuesday to approve the inclusion of a standard playground as part of all elementary school construction projects, ending the county's historical practice of relying on parent-teacher organizations and private donors to foot the bill for the equipment.

Loudoun was one of only two jurisdictions in Virginia that did not provide playgrounds as part of elementary school construction, a fact that has long frustrated county families — especially those in fast-growing communities who had to raise money for more than one playground after their children were rezoned to a new school.

All other jurisdictions in the immediate Washington area provide public elementary school playgrounds, which typically cost from $50,000 to $75,000, Loudoun school officials said.

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The question of whether Loudoun should do the same was raised last year, after Board of Supervisors Chairman Scott K. York (R-At Large) helped secure a corporate donation of nearly $100,000 from Dallas-based energy company Panda Power Funds to build an adaptive playground at Discovery Elementary in Ashburn. Parents at the school were raising money to pay for equipment that would be accessible to all children.

York approached the school board in September to suggest that it reconsider its long-standing position and use bond money for school construction to pay for playground equipment for elementary schools. After the donation to Discovery Elementary, only four elementary schools in Loudoun remained without playgrounds.

That changed last week with the school board’s vote to use existing capital funds to install playgrounds at Cardinal Ridge Elementary School in South Riding, Frederick Douglass Elementary in Leesburg, Moorefield Station Elementary in Ashburn and Meadowland Elementary in Sterling.

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In communities that want to build adaptive playgrounds with equipment that is accessible to children with disabilities, parent-teacher organizations and private donors can raise the additional funds needed. An adaptive playground costs between $130,000 and $175,000, Loudoun school staff members said.

The possibility of changing the county’s long-held approach to elementary school playgrounds was met with initial concern and skepticism among some members of the school board who said that the change might not be fair to school communities that had paid for their playground equipment through private funds in recent years.

[A debate in Loudoun: should parents have to pay for elementary school playgrounds?]

At a joint meeting of the school board and the county Board of Supervisors in December, school board member Kevin Kuesters said the county needed to focus on future schools rather than concerning itself with past practices.

"I don't think we should be bending over backward to take into account people who complain about how they had to raise funds," he said. "I understand where they're coming from, but we can't change the past. ... We've got to move forward."

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