Cleanups mark MLK events
Volunteers contribute on Day of Service
LANCASTER — Volunteers raked leaves, tilled the soil and repaired planter boxes Saturday morning at the Elm Avenue Community Garden near downtown as part of a series of community service events dedicated to preserve the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
‘We volunteer to do pretty much a lot of things out in the community,” said Darleen Gutierrez of the Catalyst Foundation. “Our organization will go out and do things on Saturdays and weekends and just do things for the community.”
Richard Byrd of Boy Scout Troop 391 brought about eight or nine Boys Scouts to the Elm Avenue Community Garden.
“Teaching the Boy Scouts to volunteer in the community and help out whenever,” Byrd said.
About 10 members of the Agents of Change, a local educational leadership and public service organization, also volunteered at the community garden.
‘I’m out here to make my community look better, to make it look clean,” Jasmine
Rodriguez said.
Angelie Zambrano said she likes to help the community.
“I did it last year; it was a lot of fun,” Zambrano said.
Six-year-old volunteer Milena Gruner looked forward to working in the garden.
“I’m going to be a teacher
farmer,” Gruner said.
Analiese Gruner, seven, joined her younger sister and father, Michael Gruner.
“I grew up on a farm and a ranch. I did this full-time every day,” Michael Gruner said. “They don’t really get that in the city. I’d like them to volunteer more for cleanups and maybe other projects around the city before we move.” His family plans to move to Washington state.
Vice Mayor Marvin Crist and councilmen Raj Malhi and Ken Mann, state Sen. Scott Wilk and Assemblyman Tom Lackey joined the volunteers at the Elm Community Garden for the City’s 13th annual event.
“I think it’s great,” Crist said. “I think Martin Luther King said at least everyone can give their time. And that’s one of the great things, look at all the youth. The youth of today, these will be the leaders of tomorrow.”
Approximately 1,000 people signed up to volunteer for the seven community service events spread out across the city for the 2020 MLK Day of Service.
At American Heroes Park, volunteers picked up trash and planted shrubs.
Lancaster High School senior Giovanni Pope volunteered as part of the IMPACT 2020, a student scholarship program through the City of Lancaster, and Lancaster High’s Interact Club.
Other projects also included:
•Antelope Valley Boys & Girls Club: cleaning, painting, and landscape improvements.
• Illegal disposal clean-up at Avenue H-8 and 5th Street East, 15th Street West and Avenue K-8, and 25th Street West and Avenue K-4.
• The BLVD, pick up trash along Lancaster Boulevard
• Lancaster National Soccer Center: Volunteers painted various fencing around the Lancaster National Soccer Center.
• Prime Desert Woodland Preserve: volunteers helped clean up litter from the Preserve trails.