Warming winters require ingenuity

FRANCONIA — Warming winters require ingenuity. Shifting to new potential locations after the Select Board in early July turned down a potential partnership to revitalize the existing town ice skating rink, the nonprofit Franconia Rink Project (FRP) is advancing plans for a skating rink with refrigerated slabs somewhere else, ideally in the tri-town area of Franconia, Sugar Hill, and Easton. On Thursday at the Franconia Inn, members of the group’s board of directors held their first meeting since being awarded a $475,000 federal grant in late July, and the town rink site was put on hold. “We have a vision,” said Jennifer Opalinksi, treasurer and co-founder of the FRP board. She said Gary Warriner, who runs Rink Services Group and has worked with other nonprofits on refrigerated rinks in communities such as Portland and Portsmouth, has shown FRP the way since joining the effort in 2022.