Eight months after a boy drowned in Lake Elkhorn after wandering from the nearby playground, Columbia parents are still waiting for the Columbia Association to install a fence to protect their children.
“I was taken aback by how much trouble we have had to get them to provide one,” said Jennifer Terrasa, a parent who organized a group to lobby the association.
The Maryland chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics is working with the parents to get the fence.
“Lake Elkhorn certainly has some of the elements that put children at risk,” said Dr. Richard Lichenstein, Maryland chapter president.
“It?s a tot lot that puts children in relatively close proximity to a lake and a busy street.”
The tot lot is in Owen Brown off Cradlerock Way, which is a heavy residential area near a village center.
The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, which sets safety standards for playgrounds, has no requirement involving fencing.
Lichenstein recommended that the fence be installed before summer.
“Water by its very nature is a sort of magnet for young active kids,” he said.
The association recently said that it will make a presentation about the request at one of its May meetings.
“We anticipate some kind of presentation … [that] will address the concerns of some type of buffer for the Lake Elkhorn tot lot,” said Karen Hawkins, the association?s general manager for communications.
On Sept. 2, 2005
» 23-month-old Alex Ferrera, of Laurel, was in the care of a daycare provider at the Lake Elkhorn tot lot when he wandered off and drowned in the lake. The playground in Owen Brown is about 160 feet from Lake Elkhorn.
What happens next
» The Columbia Association will meet at 7:30 p.m. May 11 and 25 at the CA headquarters on Wincopin Circle in Columbia.
