Do you have any project ideas for this year’s Love Ripon?
Now is the time to submit those plans, said Love Ripon event chairman Joseph Laswell.
“We would love to hear your ideas,” he added.
This year’s Love Ripon is scheduled for April 29 beginning at 8 a.m. with a rally in front of the Community Center at the corner of Fourth Street and South Locust Avenue.
Last year’s Love Ripon attracted about 350 volunteers involved in various beautification projects.
This included the Second Street freeway overpass, Ripon Community Garden, Ripon High stadium cleanup, bark spreading in the playgrounds of the city parks, and sprucing up Park View, Ripona, and Ripon elementary schools, to name a few.
Laswell indicated that projects can also include helping families in need to assisting senior citizens. “This could be anything from fixing a fence to helping out with landscaping,” he said.
Love Ripon includes volunteers of all ages.
“We promote within the schools – some of the projects are kid-friendly,” said Laswell, who is seeking project ideas through the end of this month.
From there, the project leaders will meet on several occasions to discuss the layout to each of the plans.
Love Ripon kicked off in 2012 with the painting of the restrooms at the Curt Pernice Skate Park as one of the initial projects.
It came to be from the success of Love Modesto, which started in 2007 with two questions – 1.) Why is our city on the list of the ‘worse cities in America; 2.) If our churches were to suddenly disappear from the Modesto area, would anyone even care or notice?
Two years later, the plan was enacted with 1,200 volunteers showing up to help out the city in practical ways.
Since then, several cities have adopted this model, including Manteca, Escalon, Riverbank, Stockton, Turlock, and Ripon.
To submit project ideas, log on to www.loveripon.com/projectsubmission, e-mail info.loveripon@gmail.com, or call 209.232.6553.