The Center for Child Development's Buddy Bench

The staff at the Center for Child Development (CCD) started a fundraising initiative for a new bench in the spring of 2016 with the desire to give back to the community. Fundraising took place in the form of bottle cap donations as over 200 pounds of caps (roughly six 50 gallon drums) are needed for a Buddy Bench.

Initially, the staff didn’t know where they would put the bench but started collecting. The initiative grew to include employees from Rehabilitation Services and Wood County Medical Associates. The bottle cap collecting went a step further where staff had family members start saving caps.

At the end of the collecting, they had caps donated from Florida, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and possibly others. When the CCD team found out a playground would be installed outside the building, they knew it was the perfect place for the Buddy Bench.

Michelle Storch took the lead on storing all of the collected caps and once they had enough, Michelle and her husband took them to Green Tree Plastics in Evansville, Indiana and traded them in for the bench that was placed on the playground. Earlier this month, the installation of the bench was completed and staff are were excited to have the new addition.

“Our goal is to continue to show all of our patients and families that we are here to support them in any way we can and that we have their backs!” – Megan Layfield, LPN, Clinical Coordinator for The Center for Child Development.