The 6^th annual HandsOn Twin Cities Week (April 11-22) was a huge success! With nearly 1,000 volunteers joining together to give back to their community, more than 50 organizations benefited from all their hard work. Coinciding with HOTC Week was National Volunteer Week and the 41^st anniversary of Earth Day, therefore many of the corporate volunteers & community members got their hands dirty during some great environmentally focused service projects!

Below are pictures and quotes taken from HOTC Board Members who were out participating in projects, as well as feedback from several organizations annotating the positive impact left from a hard days’ work!

“The volunteers were awesome! They were enthusiastic, and everyone pitched in to help spruce up the Sculpture Garden and gardens in Loring Park. It’s so wonderful to have corporations that care about our community and are willing to pitch in with both volunteers and financial support.”- Soren Jensen, HOTC Board Member

It never ceases to amaze me what wonderful organizations and people there are in the Twin Cities! Tucked behind Cherokee Heights Elementary School is a small garden and greenhouse which was full of plants ready to go into the just-thawed ground.  We spent the afternoon waking up the soil, tilling and turning it until it was ready to plant the tiny shoots.  Those plants will provide food for the community, purpose and programming for kids this summer, and a way for all of us to get down to the business of community – which is connecting us one at a time to issues that really matter. I am grateful for the opportunity to see the community in action.”- Judy Lykins, HOTC Board Member

“I went to grad school directly in that neighborhood but had not really spent any time with that community. It was nice to see and interact with members of the community in a different way.” – Sarah Tennessen, HOTC Board Member

At the 4/14 Gibbs Museum project, volunteers erected a tipi, cleaned the gardens, built 5 picnic tables, made a pig pen and moved the donkey house.“Theprojects that were accomplished today would simply mostly go undone at a small site like this, what an impact!”– Gibbs project site Coordinator

  Flowerbeds, gardens, shrub areas,windows, and the parking lots were cleaned by volunteers at the 4/12 EMERGE Community Development project. According to the site contact, “Our organization only employs one part-time maintenance person, so the volunteers were able to do (in a few hours) what it would take our staff a few weeks to accomplish”.

Representatives from the Patchwork Quilt  said that this volunteer project “exposed our organization to volunteers, increased visibility.” “It was delightful, I hope this continues on a regular basis. [the project] far exceeded our expectations &  was a great success from our vantage point”.

HandsOn Twin Cities would like to thank the corporate sponsors, volunteers, community members, and participating organizations in making this year’s projects a wonderful success! Thanks so much for being the change!