Care Force Chronicle-Baltimore, MD

by Aundrea Dean

Partner: CSX

Volunteers: 130

Service Partner: Solo Gibbs Park

Where: Baltimore, MD

When: Saturday, October 9, 2010

TCF: Aundrea Dean, Emily Kean, Dylan Morrill, Phillip St. Clair

Reserves: Eric Hopkins, City Year New Hampshire Program Manager for Civic Engagement & Peter Lucke, City Year New Hampshire Senior Corps Member for Civic Engagement

Tuesday, October 5th started off as any normal day in the office for Emily, Dylan, Phillip and me. It was full of printing project descriptions, making color copies, and finishing project coordinator information packets. However, right at noon we left the office with bags in hand, headed to Logan Airport.

Care Force Project Manager,
Huw McDonald and CYNH
Senior Corps member, 
Peter Lucke at Opening
Ceremony.

After a morning of office work, followed by a trip to the airport and on a plane; we arrived in Baltimore, Maryland. And by coincidence, we ran into the Care Force Reserves for the trip: City Year New Hampshire’s Eric Hopkins and Peter Lucke, near the escalators at baggage claim. We all grabbed our bags, jumped on the bus to the car rental terminal, and finally piled into two black mini-vans ready for another great CSX project in a new city!

 
Bright and early, Wednesday morning, the team drove to Solo Gibbs Park in Baltimore’s Sharp-Leadenhall Historic Community to get started on preparing for Saturday’s big event. Upon arrival, it was clear to see that the park is located directly across from the Baltimore Ravens stadium, yet seems to have fallen on harder times. When we arrived we were greeted by Betty Brand Thomas, the President of Solo Gibbs Park. She informed us that the Sharp-Leadenhall neighborhood was one of the oldest African American communities in Baltimore.

She discussed its history, current state, and the plans for Solo Gibbs future. Ms. Thomas described how the community has tried to help the park by donating their own garbage cans, and does their own mini-service projects to enhance the park. Finally, she explained that the city once considered turning the park into a parking lot for the Baltimore Ravens stadium. Betty made it clear that this collaboration with CSX to refurbish this park was very important in helping bring some positive attention and awareness to Solo Gibbs Park.

CSX Volunteer adds
handprint to  Historic
Sharp-Leadenhall mural.

After the discussion with Ms. Thomas, Care Force 1, our intermodal tool container, arrived and the prep team was ready to get started. The entire team unloaded the wood from the Home Depot order, then divided up the tasks and began. Emily and Dylan cut and measured all of the wood, Peter marked spots in that park that needed to be landscaped, while Huw, Eric, and I walked through the park strategically deciding which benches needed to be repaired the most. Wednesday was a short prep day ending around 5 p.m. Thursday we arrived at the site bright and early once again and immediately began working. Emily and Dylan constructed one of the backed benches that she would be leading her volunteers through. Eric, Phil and I began taking apart one of the benches that I would be leading my volunteers through reconstructing. We figured out how many pieces of wood, nails, nuts and bolts it would take to rebuild the benches reusing the old metal frames currently in place. It all sounds easy but working with rusted nails, nuts and bolts made it a lot more difficult!

On the final day of prep, we arrived and a reporter from the local newspaper was on site ready to take pictures of the day of service. Even though he was a day early he allowed Emily to have a photo shoot with her bench. Then, the entire team worked on scrapping the paint off of the tennis court wall preparing for it to be sketched that night. The team ran a few errands, practiced for our opening ceremony, and again called it an early evening. Although it was an early evening we returned that night to sketch the murals on the tennis court walls.

Saturday, October 9, 2010, the Care Force team arrived at Solo Gibbs Park at 6 a.m. finishing up all the last preparation for the service event. Around 7:30a.m. the park began filling up with CSX volunteers, students from the U.S. Naval Academy, neighborhood adults and children, and volunteers from the Baltimore Ravens. Physical training, also know as P.T. kicked off opening ceremony. Once everyone was wide awake from P.T., service began. Emily led her team through the successful completion of building and staining seven benches and four picnic tables. Dylan and Peter guided their teams through landscaping and tree planting projects across the park. Phil directed his team in completing two large wall murals and Eric assisted his team in reconstructing the baseball field. Finally, my team was able to successfully refurbish eight of the original metal benches throughout the park. Overall the team was able to complete all of the tasks that we set out to be accomplished. Betty Brand Thomas was happy, the community members were excited, and most importantly the CSX workers enjoyed their day of volunteering.