MLK volunteers at Planned Parenthood

On Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service, I joined a dozen other Planned Parenthood volunteers in picking up trash and debris near the health center in Chapel Hill along 15-501. I’m interning with Planned Parenthood this semester, and it was awesome to see our volunteers come out energized and excited about doing work on our day off. This event has become an annual tradition (2 years in a row!) and it was great to see a diverse group of community volunteers come out to help. We were joined by a group of Young Democrats from UNC Chapel Hill, graduate students, health clinic employees, along with some long time volunteers who just care about this work.

 Picking up trash was a new experience for many of our volunteers. Usually when we volunteer we are marching, holding signs on the side of a major street, or phone-banking to identify pro-choice advocates. I chatted with Michelle Pakonis, a volunteer and student from UNC. She commented that at first she wasn’t really sure why she was here. “I came because I thought we were going to clean around the health center, so that when patients came they would feel respected by the space. However I finished that pretty quickly and wound up working a lot near the highway. At first I didn’t see a lot of trash, but the more time I spent near the road, the more trash I realized there was. I was not doing this just for the patients of Planned Parenthood, but for the larger community that I live in.”

We found quite a variety of trash on our pick-up. Memorable pieces that were collected include a large metal rusty pipe, an advertisement for a Kung Fu center in Durham, a giant orange traffic cone, and of course the typical spare tire. Much was accomplished, and a great time was had by all!-

 Lee Storrow, UNC Student

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