St. Albert Partners in Parks program organizers need more volunteers to help with neighbourhood clean up and beautification programs.
“The number of partners in the program fluctuates every year and we currently have about 240 households that participate, but because the partners come and go and move, we always need more,” said community recreation coordinator Erin Gluck.
To explain the program and how volunteers can take on the tasks of making their own streets prettier, an information session will be held at the Enjoy Centre on Thursday, May 2 from 6:30 to 9 p.m.
The Partners in Parks program formalizes the volunteer process, Gluck said.
“We know a lot of people unofficially clean up litter in their neighbourhoods and in the ravines,” Gluck said, adding that in some areas of the city unregistered volunteers tidy and mow the green spaces near their yards, without formal recognition.
“We appreciate what they do, but the Partners in Parks program recognizes and thanks the volunteers in a more formal way for the work they do,” she said.
The range of work done by the partners varies considerably. Some make a commitment to pick up the garbage along a roadway or ravine while others agree to plant flowers and then to maintain and water the flowerbeds throughout the summer.
Last year for the first time the city added pots complete with soil, so that Partners in Parks volunteers could fill them with flowers. The flowerpots enhanced the entire street and were there throughout the summer for everyone to enjoy.
“We set out three new planters in different St. Albert neighbourhoods. It was an experiment and it was very successful,” Gluck said, adding that the pots were placed on a suitable surface so that they could be removed at the end of the season if the Partners in Parks volunteers no longer wished to maintain them.
The pots are in addition to the 22 flowerbeds maintained by the Partners in Park volunteers. Sometimes the flowerbeds become communal projects and maintenance tasks are shared among several neighbours.
“The flowers in the island on Glenhaven Crescent are maintained by eight or 10 households and those neighbours were among the first to join the Partners in Parks program almost 20 years ago. Similarly neighbours in Afton Crescent work together to look after their flowerbeds,” Gluck said.
Some volunteers donate bedding plants as well as labour to maintain the flowerbeds or planters on their street.
If the park was part of the original developer’s plan, and would normally be maintained by city work crews, the city gives the bedding plants to the volunteer partners. But the volunteers pay for any extra bedding plants used in the pots because they are there in addition to what the public works staff would normally maintain.
For more information about the Partners in Parks program visit www.stalbert.ca/PIP.
