Celebrating Service Day – Citizens’ Ecological Coalition

Observance of the Day of Service

Last week, we encouraged you to add environmental improvement to your list of resolutions, be it a donation of money or time. This week, with National Day of Service coming up on Monday, we will focus on the time aspect of giving.

Martin Luther King Jr. Day is Monday, January 16th. In 1994, the King’s Holidays and Service Act was passed by Congress, making the day a day of service and calling it a “holiday, not a public holiday”. This is in line with many of Dr. King’s quotes that “everything that affects one fate influences Everybody indirectly.”

And one way to influence every destiny lies in working on the environment. AskHRgreen.org encourages people to pick up trash in a park or along a river, clean up trash and keep it out of storm drains, join a community garden, or volunteer with groups that take kids outside and into nature. NOAA’s Office of Response and Recovery invites you to learn more about the land you live on and the historic stewards of that land, plant native plants, take part in a community cleanup alone or in a small group, and more on this day.

If you’re looking for local opportunities this year, the CEC Calendar is filled with great ideas for your friends and family to join. The Woods Project — a local nonprofit that partners with low-income Houston high schools to create wildlife education and study — is gearing up for an annual inventory of gear and pitching tents. If planting trees is your thing, Big Ticket National Preserve is looking for volunteers to help restore native plants in the Big Sandy Creek area.

And there are plenty of opportunities to get involved throughout the week, not just on Monday. On Saturday, January 14, the Houston Audubon Hotel will be hosting a High Island Volunteer Day to help decorate one of their hideouts. You can join SPLASh to help clean up the Surfside Wetlands, or volunteer with the Houston Parks and Recreation Department to help plant trees at Blackhawk Park.

If you have time on Tuesday, January 17, head to UHCL to take part in the Houston Environment Institute’s Habitat Workdays. On Wednesday, January 18, volunteer with Exploration Green to help plant the wetlands. These are just a few of the many opportunities for friends and family to get involved.

And if you represent an organization planning upcoming events, please contact us at [email protected]. We will be happy to present your event. If you are unable to host any events, but would still like to help the environment, your donation to CEC Houston can further advance community environmental awareness.

Yes, National Day of Service is one day, but we hope that people who volunteer their time to improve the environment continue to do so. Anything that affects one of us affects all of us.