Lisa Blanchard of The Grateful Garment Project was featured on NBC Bay Area Proud on Thursday night, as I reported earlier this week. Congratulations, Lisa!
Put Your Sweater On and Help Someone, it’s ‘Won’t You Be My Neighbor?’ Day
March 20, 2013 By
It’s “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?” Day, a.k.a Mister Rogers’ birthday. America’s favorite neighbor would have been 85 today. Over the last 10 
years since his death, March 20 has grown in popularity as a special day to promote volunteerism and all-around neighborliness. Plus wearing sweaters.
When “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” premiered on PBS in 1968, the gentle children’s show always started with the song, “Won’t You Be My Neighbor”, along with Mister Rogers putting on a signature cardigan sweater (usually zip-up, and always knitted by his mother) and a pair of lace-up tennis shoes. The show encouraged the qualities of creativity, kindness, tolerance, and altruism.
In Fred Rogers’ hometown of Pittsburgh, PA., city groups celebrate this day with volunteer service projects, and everyone is encouraged to don a cardigan sweater. In fact, collection drives for sweaters, shoes, and other clothes, along with diapers, food, books, and more, are popular events. [Read more…]
The Grateful Garment Project Continuing to Expand, Looking for Special Hosts
March 19, 2013 By
Lisa Blanchard. Photo by The Grateful Garment Project.
I caught up with Lisa Blanchard of The Grateful Garment Project last week. She’s the San Jose woman who created an all-volunteer organization from a college project to provide clothing and other items to victims of sexual assault at Sexual Assault Response Team (SART) facilities around the state.
Thanks to Blanchard and her volunteers, victims who previously left SART centers in nothing more than paper hospital gowns may now leave fully clothed, with perhaps a shred of dignity. The group also provides toiletries and other items, as well as funds to create more comforting surroundings.
I first wrote about Blanchard and the project in July 2012. On Thursday she’s being featured on a Bay Area Proud segment by the local NBC News affiliate.
The group is doing well, she tells me, and is currently recruiting people to host parties for friends to educate them about the need for the services, as well as collect donations of clothing and money.
“We’re always on the lookout for people who want to have a party,” she said. “We need some help.” [Read more…]
Crab Feeds Snapping Up Funds for Bay Area Organizations, Growing in Popularity
March 18, 2013 By
Courtesy Fremont Union High School District Foundation
Who knew the crab—that red crustacean with the big, pinching claws and beady eyes—would provide such tasty, and lucrative, fundraising and community-building events for Bay Area organizations?
The delectable white meat provided by California Dungeness crabs packs in thousands of people to a growing number of charity crab feeds this time of year, which are turning into one of the top ways for groups like school support organizations, youth sports leagues, police and fire organizations, churches, among others, to raise much-needed funds.
The events also serve as a way to bring communities together as beloved annual traditions. Despite ticket prices of $50 or more per person, the feeds are flourishing during the economic downturn.
“It’s always been a fundraiser, it’s always been a money maker, but really it’s to get people together,” said Justin Greene, who’s been in the business of crab feeds since the mid 1970s. Justin’s Crab Company provides fresh, ready-to-eat Dungeness crab to hundreds of charity feeds, mostly January through March.
In Cupertino, the Fremont Union High School District Foundation (FUHSDF) is expecting 600 to 700 people to consume about 1,900 pounds of crab provided by Greene’s company, from 5:30 p.m. to 9 p.m., on April 5, in the De Anza College Gym. [Read more…]
Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter Coming to Bay Area for Habitat Project
March 14, 2013 By
President Jimmy Carter and his wife Rosalynn are coming to the San Francisco Bay Area for two days in October as part of the 30th anniversary Carter Work Project (CWP) service event for Habitat for Humanity. It is the first time the annual project is happening in the region.
This year’s CWP runs from Sunday, Oct. 6, to Friday, Oct. 11, with building activities, community projects, and special events taking place in San Jose, Oakland, Denver, and New York. The Carters will start in the Bay Area on Sunday, and leave on Tuesday, Oct. 8, traveling east until they reach New York, the site of the first CWP in 1984. [Read more…]
Super Volunteer Awarded ‘Woman of the Year’; Send Us Your ‘Person of the Year’
March 13, 2013 By
From left to right: Cupertino Mayor Orrin Mahoney, Bev Lenihan, Assemblymember Paul Fong.
I knew Bev Lenihan was a busy volunteer, but I didn’t know just how busy until she was awarded—and rightfully so—”Woman of the Year” for the City of Cupertino by Assemblyman Paul Fong last week.
She was surprised by Fong at the Cupertino Quinlan Community Center with a bouquet of roses and the news that he had chosen her for the honor, thanks to a nomination by Mayor Orrin Mahoney.
You can read all about Lenihan and the amazing number of community groups she is helping in this great story on Cupertino Patch (just scroll down past the subscription form).
One group Lenihan serves as a board member for is the Faith in Action Silicon Valley Rotating Shelter, which I profiled on Good Neighbor Stories last year.
Congratulations, Bev!
Send Us Your Woman/Man/Volunteer of the Year News
I am always interested in featuring news of outstanding citizens, so if your group or community is honoring someone for their service, please send me the information, along with photos, if possible.
And if you know of anyone who receives such an honor, and you’d like to see them get noticed on this site, please send along any links and contact information. Thank you!
‘Optimistic Explorer’ Leads Service Trips to Make the World a Better Place
March 12, 2013 By
Alisa Matsuzaki with a rainbow created by children at the Hogar Cristiano Orphanage in Costa Rica. Photo by Matthew Borror.
Alisa Kumiko Matsuzaki is a world explorer searching for more than just exotic destinations. She’s searching for hope, optimism, and new ways to make the world a better place. And everyone is invited to join her.
The San Jose freelance web designer is pursuing her passions of volunteer service, cultural exchange, and travel, through organizing service trips to foreign countries, as well as here in the U.S.
Although a number of her trips are done in conjunction with larger nonprofits—she’s leading a trip in April to volunteer with an organization in New Orleans—she recently returned from a Costa Rican service trip she organized with the help of friends. [Read more…]
‘It’s Up to Us’: More Ways We Can Help Our Community
March 7, 2013 By
Yesterday I shared the list from last fall’s Santa Clara County Assessment Project. It has excellent suggestions for how we can all improve our neighborhoods. Today’s list casts the net a little wider to the community.
I love the very first suggestion to “experience our rich cultural diversity”. That’s the reason I feature cultural festivals in my “Five Ways to be a Good Neighbor” column at the start of each month. The more we know about our neighbors and their backgrounds, the more appreciative of each other and closer-knit we become.
Another favorite of mine suggests attending a school board meeting or city council meeting. This I think everyone should do at least once, and maybe even once a year minimum. Not only is it a good education for you as a citizen, giving you a better understanding how your local government works, but it also serves to keep public officials in check. [Read more…]
‘It’s Up to Us’: How We Can All Make a Difference
March 6, 2013 By
If real and lasting change is going to happen for Silicon Valley residents, it’s going to have to come from them. That was one of the conclusions drawn from the 2012 Santa Clara County Assessment Project.
One of the phrases interviewers heard from residents surveyed last fall was, “It’s up to us.” The residents knew that in order to create a more cohesive community where those who are struggling are helped, the residents themselves were going to have to be more involved. They are no longer looking to government and institutions to do the job for them.
Yesterday I applauded United Way Silicon Valley President and CEO Carole Leigh Hutton for outlining in the Mercury News how her organization is going to change its focus toward fostering more community involvement.
Today I’m sharing the first part of the excellent action list that was included in the executive summary of the assessment. Tomorrow I’ll share the second part. To see the full list, including what institutions and policy makers can do, go to the United Way website page about the project, and click on the picture of the report.
What You Can Do
Around Your Home
- Interact with your neighbors. Share fruits, vegetables or baked goods from your home. Make a point to welcome new residents. Invite your neighbors to join you in a walking group.
- Say “hello” to young people in your neighborhood. Get to know them by name. Ask them for help with yard work or bringing in trash cans when you’re away. For very young children, keep chalk handy near your front yard and offer it for sidewalk art.
- Keep your front yard tidy. A clean appearance is inviting to neighbors and promotes community pride. [Read more…]
‘It’s Up to Us’ to Create Postive Change in Silicon Valley
March 5, 2013 By
Three cheers to Carole Leigh Hutton, president and CEO of United Way Silicon Valley, for the new focus of her organization on helping community members “actively engage in improving their lives.”
In a commentary published in Monday’s print edition of the Mercury News, Hutton outlined results from the 2012 Santa Clara County Community Assessment, which concluded in part that positive change in the lives of county residents must come from the residents themselves.
“There is little trust in institutions—government, nonprofits, faith-based—to solve community challenges. There is a strong sense that only residents themselves can create change,” she wrote.
In an executive summary of the report, one phrase heard from residents stood out: “It’s up to us.” [Read more…]