K.I. Sawyer Community Sign Project

It is hard to get the news out about community events and happenings. Not everyone has social media and mailing news letters is expensive. I do post fliers around the area at local stores and such but still not everyone sees them. So I have been building community billboard signs at the three routes in and out of the neighborhood. The changeable letter signs help to reach some of those we haven’t been able to. This sign is 2 of 3. I am still working on getting permissions for the third and final sign. I try to incorporate as many kids and adults as possible in each project. I find that including the community in the design and construction of these projects gives them a sense of fulfilment and ownership.

First I got permission from the township to take over the old brick wall that used to be used as a welcome sign in the past but was left to basically rot. Then I raised the donations needed to fund the project. Thank you to Kids-R-Us and a silent donor for their monetary contribution. Also thank you to Hailey Van Dinter, Adda Lamon, Josh Jacobs, Cheyenne Williams, Craig Wilson, Gordon Hendrickson, and Issac Serna for their help in the prep work clearing and cleaning the area and for helping in the construction of this project.

I purchased most of the materials from Lowes and managed to come in under budget. The letter tracks and lettering was ordered from Amazon. We are waiting on the solar lighting to arrive next week.

Once the area was prepped we then began building the letter box. It is approximately 3ft by 6ft. The side swings open so the plexiglass window can slide out giving access to change the letters.

Everything was going great during the build however when it came to attaching the sign board to the brick wall we had a problem. The Tapcon screws kept snapping the heads off despite predrilling and clearing the holes. Turned out we had got the wrong size drill bit. It was 1/16th of an inch to small. Once we got the correct size bit all went well with attaching it.