East Bay Parks to Host Multicultural Event

The East Bay Regional Park District will host its Multicultural Volunteer Trail Work Day on July 12th at Garin Regional Park in Hayward. The park district has held fun trail maintenance events since 1996 to encourage the community to be good stewards of the trails. Projects include pruning invasive plants and installing trail structures such as retaining walls and steps. For the past three years, the park district has actively brought together the varied ethnic communities of the Bay Area. Volunteers ranging from 15 to 70 years of age from the Latino, South Asian, Korean, Chinese and African American communities worked together in celebration of diversity, hard work, public service, and good fun.

“It’s not often that you see leaders from the Korean, Latino, and South Asian communities work side-by-side on an outdoor maintenance project,” said Trails Development Program Manager Jim Townsend. “We hope our event will inspire others in the trail community to get into their neighborhoods and get to know the interesting and diverse communities that call California home.”

At the trail volunteer day last year, more than 60 participants constructed log steps, rerouted a failed section of trail, and installed several drainage features along a trail in Roberts Regional Recreation Area, Oakland.

Celina Rodriguez, host of the program “Buenas Tardes con Celina” on KZSF 1370 AM, was one of the community leaders who participated in last year’s event. "It was a very unique experience,” she said. “I never imagined all of the work that is involved to keep the parks so beautiful for visitors! We had the opportunity to do the work ourselves, guided by park staff. We cut branches that were on the trails, leveled the paths… it was a lot of good work! Working together with members of other communities and making new friends was the best part of all.”

Dong Kim, Publisher of Hyundae Korean News USA, brought members of his hiking club to the event for two years. “The District does a fabulous job of outreach to the multi-cultural community,” said Kim.

Registration is required for the event. Register online: http://www.ebparks.org/getinvolved/volunteer/trail

The East Bay Regional Park District is a system of beautiful public parks and trails in Alameda and Contra Costa counties east of San Francisco Bay. The system comprises 114,000 acres in 65 parks including over 1,200 miles of trails for hiking, biking, horseback riding and nature learning. Find out more at www.ebparks.org.