Volunteers brave excessive heat for community service
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) – When the temperature in the shade approaches 90 degrees, a wheelbarrow filled with tree pruners and bottles of water can be a college intern’s nightmare.
The weeds growing through the pavement on Franklin Road nor the scrub trees in a vacant lot stood a chance against the shovels, brooms and youthful enthusiasm of this army of interns and volunteers organized by Keep Indianapolis Beautiful and the Community Alliance of the Far Eastside.
Many of the interns from Eli Lilly & Co., Roche Diagnostics, OneAmerica Financial Partners, IU Health and the Heritage Group worked alongside a dozen high school volunteers attending summer camp at the community alliance. They did work at a number of locations as the city endured an Excessive Heat Warning, the first in seven years.
“So, some of the locations are Newbury Park, Bellamy Park. There’s also 42nd Street between Post and Mitthoeffer (roads). There’s a little cleanup and brush removal, and then litter cleanup of brush, clean up over along 38th Street as well. And then there is a mural installation happening at the underpass of (Interstate) 465 and Pendleton Pike,” said Cheria Caldwell of the Community Alliance of the Far Eastside.
A lucky few interns and volunteers spent the day inside an air-conditioned gym building “blessing boxes” to be placed around the east side. Caldwell said the boxes are “where people can get nonperishable items or books or other types of items that they … toiletries or anything like that … that could be just donated and left in the box, and people can come and take them as they please.”
Other interns who worked outdoors in the heat took breaks in air-conditioned buses, and there was enough bottled water to fill a pool.
One look at Ethan Olson of Keep Indianapolis Beautiful Inc. showed who did the heavy lifting. “You know, there’s only so much that you can even really do other than just drink water. Try and stay in the shade or go inside. But, yeah, these these guys have been working hard and kicking butt,” Olson said.
By noon Thursday, the group of volunteers and interns has almost finished the paint on the mural and chopped down weeds along several city streets.
“Know what? I need to go swimming today and I’m dehydrated right now. So, I got some water in the car” said Terrinna Johnson, a community alliance volunteer.