Playground Burning is No Accident

By John Collett

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The Word of Faith Center in Kennewick was shocked to see their playground burned down again. What is even more shocking is

Story Published: Sep 3, 2010 at 11:47 PM PST

KENNEWICK – Fire lit up the night sky in Kennewick Thursday night as the playground at The Word of Faith Center was engulfed in flames. Firefighters showed up, but were too late to save the structure.

Surveillance cameras captured the event on tape, and after police examined them, they declared this fire was no accident. Police are saying this is a case of arson and are currently looking for a suspect.

For church pastor Ryan Graves, he’s still surprised that it happened. “Obviously people are going to do bad stuff, and to have the guts to do it on a church is beyond me.”

Estimates say there is close to $70,000 worth of damage done to the playground.

Sadly, this is not the first time a playground at the church has been burned down. A similar event happened less than four years ago. When they reconstructed the playground, they specifically put it into a new location to keep it safe. That plan obviously didn’t work.

On the outside, the playground may just appear to be pieces of wood, but for this community it symbolized much more. "This is a neighborhood kind of like sanctuary for some of the kids this is a safe place for them,” says neighbor Lupe Salazar-Upton. “Now, they don't have a safe place to go, so where are they going to go now?"

For now, they may not have a place to go, but hopefully they soon will. The church plans to reconstruct the playground, but no time table is set.