16980 Kercheval Pl • McCourt Building • Grosse Pointe, MI 48230 • 313.882.6900 • Office Hours: Monday-Friday 9am-5pm<br>Sean Cotton, Owner • Anne Gryzenia, Publisher • Jody McVeigh, Editor-In-Chief • Meg Leonard, Assistant Editor
Thursday, January 12, 2023
Sean Cotton, Owner • Anne Gryzenia, Publisher • Jody McVeigh, Editor In Chief • Meg Leonard, Associate Editor
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The gym will be formally dedicated to Grosse Pointe Park Foundation Past President Allene “Lena” Carlile, who passed away before the project’s completion.
GROSSE POINTE PARK — The revamped gym at public safety headquarters is less than two months old and getting a workout.
Officers use it all the time.
“Usually, once per shift I’ll go in there for about 30 minutes,” PSO Tim Evans said. “You have to stay on top of your physical fitness so you don’t get injuries.”
Officers aren’t required to use the gym to stay strong. They do it anyway to guard against physical injury and because they don’t want to let their squad mates down.
“The guys who work out and take care of themselves appreciate it when the other guys do it, too,” Detective Sgt. Jeremy Pittman said. “You’re better for the department and you’re better for yourself.”
The gym and its state-of-the-art exercise equipment opened in November 2021, the result of a $50,000 donation from the Grosse Pointe Park Foundation.
“Our public safety officers are all pretty ripped. Their biceps are huge,” Foundation Treasurer Barb Detwiler said.
“In many cases, society doesn’t allow us to lose,” Jarrell said. “We can’t walk into a bar brawl, look at the guy causing problems and say, ‘I think I’ll take a pass.’ We need every advantage we can (including) physical fitness-wise.”
The gym is to be dedicated 4 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 19, in memory of the late Allene “Lena” Carlile.
“She was president of the foundation almost two years ago when it approved funds for the public safety gym,” Detwiler said. “She spearheaded it.”
The campaign began shortly after the Park hired new Public Safety Director Bryan Jarrell.
“Barb Detwiler asked what I thought of everything so far,” Jarrell said. “I said I love everything. The people are great. The department’s great. The only thing I’m disappointed in is the status of the fitness center.”
The old gym was a wreck.
“It was dangerous,” Pittman said. “The equipment was worn and beaten down. On the cable crossover machine, you’d pull on it and both ends would start to fall in.”
“It was abysmal,” Detwiler said. “I can’t imagine anybody working out in the gym they had. There was a hodgepodge of old, donated treadmills. They guys would use their own money to come up with equipment that was needed.”
Photos by Renee Landuyt
Park public safety officers are making good use of the revamped gym.
Detwiler introduced Jarrell to Carlile.
“The next thing I know, she’s leading the charge to get us a new fitness center,” Jarrell said. “We were asking for $35,000. Allene took pictures for the foundation. They said, no they don’t need $35,000. They need $50,000. They really stepped forward for us and made all of this happen.”
“I thought it was wonderful that public safety named it in Allene’s honor,” Detwiler said. “That was really, really nice.”
A commemorative plaque with Carlile’s image hangs next to the gym door, located off the fire truck garage.
“It’s such a good likeness of her,” Detwiler said.
Part of the inscription reads, “This endeavor would not have been possible without Lena’s vision and understanding of the importance for first responders to be healthy, both physically and mentally.”
Detwiler said, “We couldn’t be more pleased with the way it turned out and that we actually were able to fund this, which is great for our community because it supports our public safety department, which is so needed for our community.”
Officers have choices between free weights, weight machines, a step machine, treadmill and more.
“Everything we do is physically labor intensive, especially on a fire scene,” Pittman said. “I was a policeman for 12 years before I went to the fire academy. I’ve been in good shape all my life. I worked that fire and it liked to kill me. I knew I had to be better, to keep myself in peak physical condition. You can really hurt yourself at a fire if you’re not in shape.”
“Especially when you have homes 100 years old with narrow staircases, winding turns and two-family flats,” Jarrell said. “Carrying a stretcher up and down — and some of the people you’re carrying are not lightweights. It’s taxing on these guys to carry something like that downstairs.”
A Park officer currently is recuperating from an injury suffered during a medical run.
“The gurney started to go down the stairs the wrong way,” Jarrell said. “He reached to grab it and tore his shoulder.”
It is unusual for the foundation to fund something that isn’t open to the public.
Although the tax-exempt, charitable group donated $130,000 to the city last August to buy key components of a sewer relief valve to protect residents from basement flooding during heavy rains, most of the foundation’s projects benefit the public directly, such as the Patterson Park boardwalk and putting green, theater at Windmill Pointe Park and beautification enhancements throughout town.
“All of our projects have been for everybody within the community,” Detwiler said. “But, public safety benefits all residents of the Park, so this certainly was a good use of foundation money. The Grosse Pointe Park Foundation is proud to have expanded the scope of our projects, investing in novel collaborations between public and private philanthropy by building a modern fitness facility for our public safety officers, helping improve our municipal storm sewer facilities and our latest project, to update our playscape at Patterson Park.”
Each year around 500 people donate to the foundation, according to Detwiler.
“It’s not always the same people,” she said. “(Foundation President) Shery Cotton and I were sort of in charge of fundraising. Shery decided to send fundraising (appeals) to every single resident in the community. I’m really very pleased that we’re receiving $50 and $100 donations from residents because they want to be actively and integrally involved in the Park Foundation.
“We reached out to all residents in the Park community and were overwhelmed with the response.”
Cotton is the mother of Grosse Pointe News owner, Sean Cotton.
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Foundation public safety gym being dedicated to Lena Carlile – Grosse Pointe News (subscription)
