CHESTERVILLE — The porches on the Chesterville Village Office building received a fresh coat of paint this summer, thanks to a Keep Ohio Beautiful Paint Grant. Five paint grants are awarded across Ohio each year to Keep Ohio Beautiful affiliates, to renew a community building in their area.
Keep Morrow County Beautiful became an affiliate in 2016. Exterior paint is provided by Sherwin Williams and the job was completed by volunteers.
“It has been my dream for years to paint the Victorian trim on our Village Office,” Joelyn Lanning shared.
“I have lived in Chesterville 28 years and always been fascinated with the town’s history. We lost several Victorian houses in our town due to fires years ago. The Village Office porches have such beautiful Victorian trim but it looked shabby covered with green, peeling paint.”
As a member of Keep Morrow County Beautiful, Joelyn worked with Chesterville’s Mayor, Paula Bowman and Lindsey Grimm, Program Director of Keep Morrow County Beautiful/ Morrow County Recycling to apply for the paint grant this year.
“Paula and I were determined to paint the porch this summer, one way or another, so we started scraping and prepping the trim in April. On July 15, we met with Lindsey Grimm and Tony Davey, of Sherwin Williams, and found out the village office had been awarded a paint grant,” Lanning said.
Volunteers worked throughout the summer. Damaged porch spindles were replaced and loose trim secured. All trim and railings received several coats of white, Sherwin Williams paint. Then the top porch rail, all upright posts and 2 horizontal rails in the upper trim were painted with “Bluebell.”
The job was completed in time to show it off during the 44th Annual Heritage Day Festival on Sept. 11.
“It’s clean and simple and really shows off the Victorian trim. Now the village office is something we can be proud of and it demonstrates how a coat of paint can really change a building and influence the town.”
