‘Genius idea’: Here’s what will happen to Lee’s Summit Paradise Park after its sale

Melissa Burgess started going to Paradise Park in fifth grade. In high school and college the Lee’s Summit native worked there as a tractor driver, Cinderella impersonator, receptionist and more. She envisioned bringing her 1-year-old daughter to the park someday.

So Burgess was sad to hear that Paradise Park will no longer exist.

The Lee’s Summit school district announced on June 17 it plans to purchase Paradise Park and convert it into an early childhood center, bringing an end to the amusement park and family fun center founded by Jon and Juli Ellis three decades ago.

On a recent day, a sign in the lobby advertised a 2020 spring break buy-one-get-one souvenir cup deal. Post-it notes on doors listed completed chores with dates from March of that year.

Paradise Park, once filled with young kids pretend-shopping in the miniature Hy-Vee and playing on the Foam Factory indoor playground, has stood empty since St. Patrick’s Day last year because of the pandemic. It will not reopen.

“I know some people are sad, but I think the park is going through a kind of a transition to be able to be a bigger, better venue for even more people,” Jon Ellis said.

The sale

Before COVID-19, the park had grown so large, the couple weren’t sure they could maintain it.

“With the ongoing increased labor cost and consistent growth of operating expenses, it made it very difficult to justify a solid future for the park without some kind of major change,” Ellis said. “The events of this last year made that whole decision more urgent.”

Ellis planned to sell the 15-acre park, at 1021 N.E. Colbern Road, to his four business partners. But when the pandemic hit, his partners ran out of funding and handed the reins back to him.

“COVID changed our track because we thought we had a plan in place for a transition, even if it would take a while for it to happen,” he said. “It was a slap in a face.”

Around the same time, the Lee’s Summit school district was looking for more space for its pre-K programs. The district’s early education center has struggled with extensive wait lists for years. The school district’s stakeholders identified a second center as a priority for their 2020 bond issue.

“Originally we thought we were going to build that second early education center at the site of one of our largest elementary schools, which is Prairie View Elementary,” said district spokeswoman Katy Bergen. “When we realized we would have the opportunity to purchase Paradise Park, we decided we are now going to locate our second early education center in the park instead.”

The district sent its architects to inspect the property earlier this year. The park fit preschoolers’ needs because it already contained features like cubby shelves and a kitchen with low counters and sinks.

“Lots of spaces are already built for little learners, like little chairs, little benches. Spaces that our littlest learners would be able to easily move around in,” Bergen said.

Many attractions, like the cooking, crafts and learning rooms in the Discovery Play center, were also geared toward kids ages 3 to 7.

“They started seeing the potential there for the outdoor garden and the mature nature and the outdoor classroom potential and the pavilion and all those group gathering spaces that would be so ideal for what they could use,” Ellis said. “Not only in their early childhood but potentially for throughout the district as far as being a gathering venue for a lot of different things.”

The school board voted unanimously to approve a letter of intent to purchase the property for $6 million. The property was appraised for $8.9 million in May. The sale will be finalized in August, and the district anticipates the center will open in August 2023.

The park’s future

Emily Crawford, a Lee’s Summit native, worked at the park from her sophomore year of high school to sophomore year of college. She remembers it fondly, particularly the time when Ellis asked her to pluck worms off the locust trees. As a mother of three kids, two of whom are 2 and 4, she looks forward to the new early childhood center.

“I thought it was a great opportunity for the school district to be able to take that building and do more with it as far as education is concerned. Jon and Juli were always so focused on education and they called it ‘edutainment,’” she said. “They built out that entire section so that little learners could play, have fun, and also learn at the same time. And I thought it was a genius idea.”

Most of the indoor attractions, such as the bumper cars, game room, Foam Factory indoor playground, escape rooms, rock climbing wall and laser tag will be repurposed. The district plans to keep some of the outdoor attractions for now, such as the go-karts and batting cages, but hasn’t confirmed how they will be used.

“It’s very exciting for the district to imagine what we will be able to do with this space,” Bergen said.

Currently, the district’s Great Beginnings Early Education Center occupies a building in Lee’s Summit’s Legacy Park as well as seven satellite classrooms in elementary schools that have extra space. The district hopes to convert the park’s indoor space into at least 10 classrooms instead.

What’s next for the Ellises

Both Jon and Juli Ellis started their careers in education — Jon as an agricultural instructor in a technical school and Juli as a speech pathologist.

“Juli and I became very big advocates for early childhood and parents as teachers, just watching how that was such an important role with our children and our family’s children and all,” Jon Ellis said. “We felt like that was just a great place for us to be helping.”

Ellis serves on the board of Lee’s Summit Parks & Recreation. He has volunteered for the Lee’s Summit Optimist Club, which helps kids, and DECA, the nonprofit career and technical student organization. The park helped the couple stay involved in the community.

“Jon was on every board, every commission,” Crawford said. “He had a huge role. And they would also give out scholarships, sponsor citizen of the month. They would go even to the Independence and Blue Springs districts to present awards monthly to the kids.”

After the sale, Ellis will pursue other business ventures in family-friendly entertainment that are not finalized yet. He is keeping some of the play equipment the district can’t use and has offered to help the district during the renovations.

“Our thought on all of this transition is that with the partnership of the school, we’re helping the school make it an even greater public destination,” Ellis said. “The school has no intention of going and bulldozing down the whole thing.”

Ellis hopes the school district will continue adding to the park and open areas to the public when they are not being used by the district.

“Converting the property to a public space opens so many doors for the future,” Ellis said. “That’s why we see this as a great opportunity for the district and community … and we want to continue to help that mission.”

This story was originally published June 26, 2021 at 5:00 AM.