Local efforts to get Colorado kids outside more often will get a $25 million boost from Great Outdoors Colorado over the next five years.
The agency funded by state lottery revenues is offering grants to communities to create their own nature spaces close to where kids live and play. Since 2012, Great Outdoors has spent about $3 million on projects like a new nature park along the South Platte River in Denver.
"At the minimum they will have a close-to-home nature space, which could be a revamped school playground, a local park [or] a nature center," says Executive Director Lise Aangeenbrug.
The program will also pair communities with groups like the Boys and Girls Clubs, which take kids on farther-away outings to state or national parks.
