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Extreme Makeover Crew Lands in Putnam County
Ty Pennington, Michael Moloney, Tanya McQueen, Alure Home Improvement and the support team for the ABC hit reality show Extreme Makeover: Home Edition arrived in Putnam County recently to help two not-for-profit organizations that "do good things for kids."
The Emmy-award winning show is in town to construct a new, 1000 square-foot recreation center at Clearpool, a camp founded more than a century ago as a respite for disadvantaged children from New York City and the site of an annual camp program operated by Heartland, an organization based in Rochester, MN whose mission is to assist children with HIV and their families.
Up to 400 volunteer workers were on site each day during the five-day construction project. Among the volunteers was Gina Arena, who had a home built for her family by the Extreme Makeover team last season, and who cooked for the team on the site in Carmel.
"The crew actually demolished one of our original cabins constructed back in the 1950s," said Chrissy Word, Director of Development for Clearpool. The building, which has had a variety of uses during the last 60 years, was most recently being used for storage. Now, it has been transformed into a dramatic building with recreation and classroom space that will be used by thousands of children each year. Natural outdoor decks will complement the country setting and overlook a swamp, maximizing the educational value for children who can view nature from a new vantage point.
How did Extreme Makeover find its way to Clearpool? Debbie Oatman and her adopted sons, D.J., Brian and Kevin, said that they wanted to "give back" to Heartland because the organization has done so much for them. The family has attended Heartland's camp at Clearpool and the Heartland folks felt Clearpool Education Center would be the perfect match for Extreme Home Makeover: Home Edition. Clearpool is, after all, Heartland's New York home.
The new recreational center will be used year-round so all disadvantaged children we work with will benefit from this. "We're thrilled to have the Extreme Makeover team at Clearpool working on this wonderful recreation center," said Director of Education, Stephanie Bergman. "We serve over 7,000 kids per year, so the new recreation center will provide a wonderful, educational venue for so many underprivileged youth. We want to thank the Oatman family and ABC for this wonderful opportunity."
Clearpool was founded in 1901 as a respite in the country for impoverished New York City youth. In 1992, Clearpool Camp became Clearpool Education Center and began serving underserved New York City school children year round.
Annually, more than 7,000 third through twelfth grade students benefit from the Clearpool Education Center's unique model extending their learning beyond the traditional four walls of classroom instruction. In the summer, Clearpool is camp. Children with HIV and other terminal illnesses get a full camp experience from boating and swimming to soccer, basketball and good old-fashioned campfires with s'mores. The Clearpool campus occupies 338-acres of unspoiled land in the Croton Watershed, part of the New York City reservoir system.
Clearpool has historically provided a hiatus in a beautiful rural setting for disadvantaged students coming from New York City and still does. Clearpool was also one of the first educational organizations in the country to design a curriculum consisting of residential retreats conducted in a rural setting and coordinated with students' classroom studies.
Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, which has won backto back Emmy Awards as Best Reality Program (non-competitive), is in its 4th season on ABC. The show airs on Sundays from 8-9pm. Network. It is not known yet when this episode will be aired.
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