Groups unite to clean city

By: Kyle Hansen

Posted: 4/19/07

More than 900 San Jose State University students, staff and faculty members have signed up to spend their Friday painting houses, picking up trash and cleaning creek beds.

The students will be participating in these and other projects as part of the first San Jose State University Day of Service tomorrow.

"The goal is to help the community surrounding San Jose State," said Justine Pelina, a senior majoring in public relations who is helping to organize the event, "to get students, faculty, and staff together as one to help others."

The project is a joint effort between SJSU, the city of San Jose, CommUniverCity San Jose and other non-profit and neighborhood groups.

"I think that it is a good idea for the university to put on an event that all students can attend," said Lizette Lorenzo, a senior majoring in international business who works at the student involvement office and plans on attending the event.

"It's a good idea because it has all the clubs, the Greeks, different departments, A.S., and student involvement," she said. "Every single aspect of SJSU is contributing to this event."

CommUniverCity, a joint project between SJSU, the city and neighborhood groups, is acting as the project manger for the day, said Leif Christiansen, an AmeriCorps VISTA member working for the program. CommUniverCity has been coordinating the various groups that had project ideas to make the actual service come together.

"CommUniverCity's whole goal is to being the community, university and city together," Christiansen said. "So really this service day is trying to bring all these groups together to work on a common goal.

"We are trying to bring everyone together for a common cause and to build up the community," he said.

The projects include a wide variety of service in different areas, including trimming bushes at parks, cleaning up school campuses and painting murals, Christiansen said.

"It was really a lot of the partnering non-profits that helped put this together," Christiansen said.

Other groups involved include the A.S. Cesar E. Chavez Community Action Center, City Year Silicon Valley, Friends of Coyote Creek, the Health Trust, Neighborhood Housing Services Silicon Valley, Olinder Neighborhood Association, Rebuilding Together Silicon Valley and the Volunteer Center of Silicon Valley.

The day's events begin with registration and welcoming at 8 a.m. at the Student Union. Volunteers will then be shuttled to 25 different locations in the downtown and Five Wounds/Brookwood Terrace neighborhoods for the various projects. The event will conclude with a barbecue back at the Student Union, where San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed will address the crowd.

"The purpose of the day is really to talk about the need for the university and the surrounding community to work together," said Cathy Busalacchi, the associate vice president for campus life. "It is our partnership with the community."

Students and community members were asked to pre-register so that the organizers would know how many volunteers to expect, Pelina said. However, if students that did not register want to help, they might be able to come to the Student Union to help with registration and the barbecue.