Six months ago, Major League Baseball partnered with America 250 and the Shane Victorino Nicetown Boys and Girls Club to contribute to the MLB’s 250,000 volunteer hours leaguewide pledge.
On Saturday, former major leaguers C.C. Sabathia, Chris Young, Jason Kendall, Michael Bourn, Nick Swisher, Dellin Betances, and Kenny Lofton, along with nearly 100 volunteers from more than seven different organizations, joined Victorino to add two hours to that effort.
“To have 100-plus volunteers here today digging in the dirt and pulling weeds and making this boys and girls club look that much prettier, it means a lot,” Victorino said.
The Phillies and the rest of MLB have added $5,500,000 into the nationwide effort of trying to reach the goal of 250,000 volunteer hours in honor of the 250th anniversary of America. And now a portion of that has been dedicated to serving children in North Philadelphia.
Nearly two months from the Boys and Girls Club’s 15-year anniversary, Victorino and the community came together to give the club a much-needed refresh. From 10 a.m. to noon, volunteers split into groups working on planting flowers and weeding, painting and refurnishing the teen room, raking new dirt dumped on the baseball field across the street, and picking up trash around the area.
This comes after the announcement on Thursday of the renovation and expansion project at Tree House Books. This project will also be a part of MLB’s legacy initiative and includes an expanded children’s library named after Victorino’s former teammate Ryan Howard and his wife, Christine Howard.
It was MLB’s and the Boys and Girls club’s goal to hit four main points upon the completion of Saturday’s event. These included getting the community partners to help provide a refresh to the club, making sure the environment was given care, committing hours to reach 250,000 hours of service, and to unveil the PHS mobile garden unit, which is another legacy project.
“I really think the community residents are going to see that love is important,” said April Brown, MLB’s senior vice president of social responsibility. “We’re beautifying the outdoor space and enriching the experience for the youth every day.”
And it isn’t just the presentation that made this project special to the volunteers.
“It means a lot,” said volunteer Paige Giunta. “Not only from an attractive standpoint, but also people coming together to do something special for the community.”
Giunta volunteered through Comcast, one of several organizations that partnered with MLB and the Phillies to bring more help to the cause.
“Everybody thinks with the All-Star Game, you’re thinking of the game,” said Michele DeVicaris, the Phillies director of community events and fundraising. “They don’t always know that all these things are also going on. So it’s amazing to bring attention to something like the Boys and Girls Club, like a community event like this, have volunteers come out and be a part of this project.”
The Club opened in September 2011 in Nicetown-Tioga, after a $1 million commitment from the Shane Victorino Foundation. Now almost 15 years later, the former two-time All-Star and World Series champion still cares deeply for the city that once embraced him.
“I love this place,” Victorino said. “It’ll always be my second home, and I will always hopefully have a little love for the city as it does for me.”
Playing Fields, not Killing Fields is an Inquirer collaboration with the Claire Smith Center for Sports Media and The Logan Center for Urban Investigative Reporting, to produce a series examining the current state of Philadelphia’s youth recreation infrastructure and programs. The project will explore the challenges and solutions to sports serving as a viable response to gun violence and an engine to revitalize city neighborhoods.
