It's Your Park Day 2015
Volunteers from all across Chicago came together at 14 Chicago parks Saturday, June 20th, for It’s Your Park Day. Hundreds of trees were mulched and playgrounds and fields were cleaned up just in time to kick off summer in our parks.
Our wonderful partners at Home Depot provided all the tools as well as volunteers at each park to ensure our parks had a successful clean up day. Skinner Park PAC president, May Toy, commented on how great it was to have Home Depot’s support, saying:
"The donation of tools from Home Depot was very helpful because we don't usually have access to the smaller hand tools and specialized tools like pruners for all the volunteers. It increased productivity because we had the right tools for the job and there were enough tools for all the volunteers. It was also awesome that Home Depot not only donated towards the event but also organized their employees to come and volunteer."
Organized Park Advisory Councils and community members work everyday in our parks to provide safe and clean recreational spaces for all to enjoy. The aim of It’s Your Park Day was to bring together the efforts of some of our largest parks and smallest play spaces to work together for a unified park clean up day. Louise, President of the Jackson Park Advisory council made great strides thanks to the volunteers that came out to Jackson and Midway Park.
“We cleared all the way to the lake at LaRabida, opened up the banks at the Midway for flower planting, moved the abandoned garbage off the Midway, and cleared the paths for our children playing soccer there. It was a win win!”
The impact of It’s Your Park Day reached far beyond cleaning our city parks, as volunteers and the Chicago Parks Foundation Auxiliary Board members shared their day of service in the parks on social media. These efforts expanded the reach of It’s Your Park Day even further, showing people all over Chicago and beyond what it means to be a good steward of your parks.
All of us here at the Chicago Parks Foundation had such a wonderful time getting out to the parks to work with the volunteers that make up the diverse communities of Chicago. Thank you to all of our partners including Chicago Park District, Home Depot, and the Park Advisory Councils for participating in It’s Your Park Day!
Check out photos from It’s Your Park Day and other events around Chicago at our Flickr and Facebook pages!