Walnut Hills to host teens for community beautification

This Saturday, the Easter Seals Work Resource Center will host over 100 volunteers from Give Back High and UGIVE Cincinnati for a day of projects that will bring new energy to the Walnut Hills community.

Between 8:30 AM and 3 PM, teens will join with Easter Seals staff and participants to paint areas of the Work Resource Center building, distribute flower boxes to local businesses, complete several neighborhood landscaping projects and raise awareness of an initiative to save ash trees from the Emerald Ash Borer.

Teresa Murphy is a member of the all-volunteer committee for Give Back High, a new group formed to incite leadership in Tri-State youth through community service.

"This will be our first event and it is a partnership with UGIVE Cincinnati," she says.  "Through projects such as this one, we hope to demonstrate the rippling effects of being engaged to a diverse group of teens and motivate them to continue serving the community," she says.

Murphy says that the new group plans to make a significant local impact in years to come.

"When it's all said and done, we hope to have worked hard and made a visual impact on the Easter Seals Work Resource Center and the surrounding Walnut Hills community," she says.  "We hope to plan several events each year, some on a similar scope as this project and some larger."

Registration for the event is open for youth entering grades 9-12 from any Greater Cincinnati or Northern Kentucky school.

Sponsors include the Duke Energy Foundation, Keep Cincinnati Beautiful, Alpine Valley Water and 94.9 The Sound.

Writer: Kevin LeMaster
Source: Teresa Murphy, Give Back High
Photography by Scott Beseler