Charities, volunteering see boom after Sept. 11
By Tanya Bricking
Advertiser Staff Writer
After Sept. 11, Make A Difference Day became more of a mantra than a single event for many Americans.
Ala Wai Watershed Association
For Laurie Hirohata, a social sciences lecturer at Kapi'olani Community College, the terrorist attacks sparked an urge to promote peace. She turned her idea into a class project, and peace chain messages multiplied when other schools joined in the undertaking.
The Ala Wai Watershed Association's cleanup along Manoa-Palolo Stream yielded 135 bags of trash, bed frames, engines, shopping carts and tires along a four-block stretch.
For Sam Labason, office manager at the Hilo U.S. Veterans' Center on the Big Island, a team effort to "give something back in honor of the veterans who died" resulted in an effort to keep the Veterans' Memorial downtown Hilo free of graffiti.
For McCully grandmother Jackie Hayashi, who used Make A Difference Day as a starting point for teaching 3-year-old Aaron Kawika Wong how to share, it represents a desire to do small gestures to make the world a better place.
"You know, we're not rich," Hayashi said. "And I'm not, like, the governor's wife. But each of us can do a little bit."
Today's USA Weekend magazine, in partnership with the Points of Light Foundation, spotlights some of those small moments that brought people together nationwide just a month after the Sept. 11 attacks. The 11th Annual Make A Difference Day award recipients are being honored to coincide with National Volunteer Week, which begins today.
Make A Difference Day is a national celebration of neighbors helping neighbors. Created in 1992 by USA Weekend magazine and sponsored by 580 newspapers, including The Ho-nolulu Advertiser, Make A Difference Day is an annual event held the fourth Saturday of every October. The next event is Oct. 26. Participating newspapers spotlight honorees each year, and actor Paul Newman supports the program by donating $10,000 each to 10 selected projects. For details, see www.makeadifferenceday.com.
In Hawai'i, thousands of volunteers turned out on a rainy Saturday in October to participate in public-service projects. They cleaned streams and beaches, painted school buildings and parking lots, collected food and gifts for shelters, and performed good deeds for a day.
How to help:
O'ahu's top honorees are 70 volunteers from seven environmental and community groups who collected 135 bags of trash, bed frames, engines, shopping carts and tires in the Ala Wai Watershed Association's cleanup along Manoa-Palolo Stream, in the four-block stretch from the Date Street Bridge to the confluence of Manoa and Palolo streams off Old Wai'alae Road.
Other groups that joined in the cleanup included Ameron, Chaminade University, Kaimuki High School, Protect the Planet, Schofield Barracks and Washington Intermediate School.
The national honor has only served as inspiration for more than 100 volunteers, who got together again this weekend for an Earth Day stream cleanup triple the size of last October's Make A Difference event, said Karen Ah Mai, executive director of the Ala Wai Watershed Association.
"The minute you finish, the trash and debris builds up again," she said.
Other Hawai'i honorees include:
• Malama o Puna's 16 members of a grassroots environmental group in Pahoa, on the Big Island, who collected three tons of garbage from rural Puna roads. The haul included large appliances, car parts and furniture.
• The Sweethearts 4-H Club in Kailua, Kona, on the Big Island, who wanted to do something to help children in New York City after Sept. 11. Ten teenage girls in the club grabbed aloha print fabric, sewed 150 "Aloha Animals" and sent them to a New York fire station for distribution.
• Kilauea Point National Wildlife Refuge volunteers on the Garden Isle, who organized a community work day at Kilauea School's environmental education site. They cleared trails, harvested native plants, planted bulbs and collected compost.
The next Make A Difference Day isn't until Oct. 26. But it's not too soon to get ideas for projects at www.makeadifferenceday.com to see how others have contributed. Everyone who participates and sends in an entry form is eligible for a national or local award and a cash donation to a charitable cause.
Reach Tanya Bricking at 525-8026 or tbricking@honoluluadvertiser.com.
