Sonoma County, Santa Rosa employees spruce up parks, schools

Under a bright blue sky, volunteers cleared weeds, dead leaves, cigarette butts and an old oak tree stump from Martin Luther King Jr. Park in southeast Santa Rosa on Wednesday.

'In my normal day-to-day job I feel very involved in this community, but this is doing just a little bit extra,' said Michelle Bond-Phillips, office assistant at the Sonoma County Human Services Department.

Bond-Phillips was one of about 300 city and county employees working on 30 projects around Sonoma County for its 18th annual Day of Caring. The voluntary community work involved maintenance and cleanup at a variety of sites, including homes for the elderly and disabled, a food bank, animal sanctuaries, fire barriers, parks and schools.

'I like the interaction with different teammates, getting to know people in other departments, meeting people from the city,' said Kara Mack, who works for the county's general services department and joined about a dozen volunteers sprucing up the park Wednesday. 'I think we all kind of have the best interest at heart so it's nice to work with people that are willing to do that and give back to the community.'

Neighbors noticed the park — adjacent to two Head Start buildings, where about 40 children under age 5 from low-income homes come to learn and play — needed some tender loving care.

David Magallon, who grew up in the neighborhood close to the Sonoma County Fairgrounds and lives a block from the park, noticed the fence on one side of the park had gotten marked with gang graffiti in the past couple of weeks.

'I'll come home afternoon time, there'll be gang graffiti on it. If I walk by again it'll be tagged over again with opposite gangs. Things got really bad with tagging around here,' said Magallon, who joined the county and city worker volunteers cleaning the park before heading to work at the Child Parent Institute. 'That's not helpful for our children to be around that.'

The park has benches with graffiti and tables with chipped paint, a couple of barbecue pits, an expansive open space and a playground.

'It's the kind of place where the community comes together, where families come together, they have parties,' said volunteer Vince Harper, director of community engagement at the Community Action Partnership of Sonoma County, the nonprofit that runs the Head Start program next to the park.

Nearly a dozen people live in a homeless encampment on an edge of the park. Chairs, a wagon, bags, bikes and other miscellaneous items remained, but the homeless left for the day. Harper said Wednesday was the first time he saw no homeless people in the park, although no one had asked them to leave.

Magallon and Harper, who have known each other since 1991 when they met at the youth center that used to be where Head Start now stands, agreed cleaning the park had positive psychological effects for the surrounding community.

'I think ... the community benefits so much in terms of all the work that gets done, and it adds to that pride and that hopefulness, particularly in a neighborhood like this. We have a lot of challenges,' Harper said. 'If people show they care about it, more people will care about it.'

He said such a cleanup helps local residents who enjoy the park and brings volunteers together, too.

'One of the amazing things about Day of Caring, or any volunteer event, is getting to see how much a group of people can accomplish. What would be overwhelming for one or two is small work for a group,' said Charlotte Vrobel, accounts clerk for Sonoma County Regional Parks, who has participated in the annual community event for three years.

In addition to pulling weeds, the volunteers, with rakes and shovels in hand, also worked on adding mulch in areas of the park.

'I think the mulch is probably the hardest part,' Mack said. 'It doesn't move very well. It gets stuck.'

Nonetheless, Mack enjoyed it.

'It's my way to say thanks,' she said.

You can reach Staff Writer Susan Minichiello at 707‑521-5216 or susan.minichiello@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter@susanmini.