By Rebecca Goldfine,Staff Writer

PARIS – New Balance will finance a new $30,000 playground at Moore Park in honor of the company’s 100th birthday.

Town Manager Sharon Jackson told selectmen Monday night that a New Balance representative approached her last summer and said the sporting goods company was seeking to fund a local recreational project for its 2006 centennial celebration. The company wanted to know what Paris would like to do.

Jackson and Dana Chandler, who is Paris’ recreational committee chairman, showed New Balance representatives two potential sites, Moore Park and the ball field at Oxford Street, for new playgrounds. They also presented them with copies of professional blueprints.

Jackson said one of the things she stressed to them was the nostalgia of Market Square.

“We have that quaintness to Market Square, and the buildings and park,” she said.

But the company said it was analyzing several other projects in nearby towns as well.

Jackson said she received a call Monday from New Balance with the news that it would like to fund a playground at Moore Park, which is a visible, open and grassy park along Route 26.

At this point, all plans are preliminary, and there is little information on what the playground will look like, its size, or whether there will be barriers around it to protect children from the nearby busy street.

Selectmen voted to accept the donation. They discussed the lack of playgrounds in Paris.

“There will be plenty of opportunities, more than once, to say thank you to New Balance,” Chairman Raymond Glover said.

New Balance is in the process of relocating its outlet store to Oxford from downtown Norway. It has had a sneaker manufacturing plant in Norway since 1997.