Buckeye’s popular Spring Celebration will be held from 9 a.m. to noon on Saturday, March 27, at Earl Edgar Recreational Facility, 500 S. Miller Rd.

The 12th annual celebration includes an egg hunt, an opportunity to meet Mr. and Mrs. Bunny at the Bunny Photo Patch, a petting zoo, egg decorating, the Business Meet and Greet area.

There will be food available for purchase down “Bunny Brunch Boulevard,” and carnival games down “Cottontail Lane.” Don’t forget to bring your Easter baskets.

Despite cold and rainy weather last year, more than 1,000 west Valley residents and their families turned out for the festivities. As the event’s popularity grows, employees in the town’s Community Services Department, which sponsors the annual event, expect even greater attendance this year.

For more information, call Guinn or contact Lindsay Yanko at 623-349-6602 or lyanko@buckeyeaz.gov.

“Bulldog Saves the Day” will be featured during the 43rd Annual Melodrama at 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday, March 26 - 27.

The performance by members of the Buckeye Actors Guild will be held in the Buckeye Union High School Performing Arts Center, 902 E. Eason Ave. The melodrama delivers a villain, a hero, a sign girl and lots of laughs.

The intermission will include Olio acts, and refreshments will be available. Tickets are $5 for adults and $3 for children ages 12 and under. Tickets can be purchased at the event, or in advance at the Buckeye Pubic Library, 310 N. Sixth St.

For more information, contact Lindsay Yanko, 623-349-6602, or by email at lyanko@buckeyeaz.gov.

The Town of Buckeye has received a grant of almost $165,000 from the Arizona Department of Commerce to perform an energy audit and efficiency upgrades of town facilities.

Dave Nigh, the town’s risk and safety manager who wrote the Energy Efficiency Community Block Grant (EECBG), said the grant dollars will be used by the town in two phases – the first phase will be to hire a professionally-certified energy services company to complete an energy audit of many town buildings.

“The audit will identify the improvements needed in the energy efficiencies of our buildings and pinpoint the most cost-effective energy efficiency measures to be taken,” Nigh said.

“The consulting firm will formulate an energy plan, which will consist of an analysis of the Town of Buckeye’s current carbon footprint, assessments of current energy costs, projections for savings and suggested implementation actions.”

Baseline data will be collected to measure existing building performance as well as determining post-project measurement to make sure energy savings targets have been complete, Nigh said.

After the audit is finalized, the town will hire an energy services company to perform as many of the recommended actions as possible.

“Our goal is to save as many BTUs as possible,” Nigh said.

“We will then address the retrofits in the following order: Electrical/lighting upgrades, mechanical systems and then building insulation/energy-efficient windows.”

Nigh said he will begin accepting proposals for the energy audit in about two weeks.

A poster contest for youth ages five to 15 and two basketball competitions will be part of the excitement during a Family Fun Recreation Expo in an El Mirage park Saturday, April 24.

The Town of Buckeye, in partnership with the Luke-West Valley Recreation Committee, will host the event which will be held from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. in El Mirage Gateway Park, 10100 N. El Mirage Rd.

The committee is asking youth to show off their artistic talents by drawing a picture or series of pictures depicting what “Healthy Kids, Family Fun” means to them. Drawings may be in color or black and white.

Entries should be turned in to the classroom teacher or the local Recreation Department. There will be one winner for each of two groups, ages 5 to 9 and 10 to 15.

Entrants are asked to put their name, age and phone number on the back of the picture. The deadline to submit entries is Monday, April 12. Winners will be announced at the expo April 24.

The basketball competitions include 2Ball, in which teams of two players have 60 seconds to shoot from six marked spots on the floor to score as many points as possible, and 3-Point Shootout, which will measure how many shots competitors can hit from behind the three-point line.

There will be two divisions – Youth, for participants under the age of 16, and Adult, age 16 and older. Check-in at the park will begin at 11 a.m., with both competitions starting at 11:30 a.m.

Registration forms can be downloaded by going to www.buckeyeaz.gov and selecting Recreation. Bring the registration forms to both events; parents must sign the forms for participants under the age of 18.

For more information about the basketball competitions, contact Deanna at 623-930-2842. For additional information about the poster contest, call Sonny Culbreth at 623-935-9040.