A new area in Gary is a little bit cleaner, thanks to the efforts of area Catholic youths.
Teens from the Diocese of Gary joined the city’s Gary 4 Life 5 x 5 x 5 efforts Saturday on the city’s east side. The heat and humidity might have been unbearable, but the kids were a joy to work with, Constituent Services Director LaShawn Brooks said.
“The kids didn’t even complain,” Brooks said. “They were excited to come out and help us.”
The nearly 200 students were broken up into groups of 10 and put on the blocks in the area of 47th to 51st avenues and Ohio Court and Georgia Street. Along with general cleanup, the city’s Code Enforcement tagged 85 properties for illegal parking and boarded up other properties, bringing the 6th District’s number of houses slated for demolition to 100, officials said.
The city, through the Police Department’s GPS system, chooses the areas for cleanup. When they target those areas, they see a decrease in crime, Brooks said.
“Once we get the area clean, we start holding the property owners responsible and look to the community to maintain it,” she said. “By the end of the program, the cleaned communities are the way we want them.
After the cleanup, the kids were taken to Hudson-Campbell Fitness Center to clean up before heading to Marquette Park for a Catholic Youth Experience picnic. A group tossed a ball around in the lobby while others hit the showers.
Jack Furdeck and Matt Woodbury, of Kouts; Josh “Sticks” Becerra, of East Chicago; Bernardo Muniz, and Derrick Rollins Jr., of Gary; Antonio Magallanes, of Hammond; and Nick Serena, of Lowell, waited patiently for their fellow Catholics to get done so they could go to picnic. They said they were a little surprised at the scope of the work.
“We like helping the community,” Rollins said. “It’s really spiritually rewarding.”
Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.