Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Community-Wide Day of Service

January 18, 2010 MLK Day

The brisk morning air reminded me that it was early as I made my way to City Hall to volunteer. I entered the building and saw other early risers who were setting up tables, arranging balloons, continental breakfast, volunteer registration tables and shirts for the volunteers that would soon pour through the doors.

The quiet soon disappeared as volunteers began to fill the room and form lines to register for their day of service. Volunteers quickly completed registrations, confirmed their assignments and headed upstairs for breakfast, shirts and instructions for the day.

There were more than 150 volunteers that came through City Hall that day. Young, old, male, female, different faiths, different skin color, but all with a burning desire to do good. There were groups of elementary children, college students, adults, and many who chose to spend their day off from work helping others. Dr. King once posed the question, "What are you doing for others?" and on January 18, 2010 hundreds of area residents answered his question by volunteering.

Some read and played games with children, some spruced up the Douglass Community Association, the Deacons Conference, the NACD, and Residential Opportunities, Inc homes, by cleaning and painting. Others worked to organize supplies stored in the basement of the Ecumenical Senior Center.

Volunteers headed to Girls on the Run offices to do advance preparation for the spring season, and many others shared their skills at the Kalamazoo Public Schools, the Kalamazoo Gospel Mission, Loaves & Fishes, a Taste of Heaven, and many more nonprofit organizations.

The spirit of Martin Luther King, Jr. was alive and well in Kalamazoo that day, and perhaps the greatest thing is that people in greater Kalamazoo demonstrate the spirit of giving back all year long. We're lucky to live in a place where people take care of one another.