Athens community gathers for United Way's Day of Caring

Working together like helpful neighbors, about 700 Day of Caring volunteers gave local nonprofits updates such as new flower beds or fresh coats of paint Wednesday.

The United Way of Northeast Georgia hosted its annual Day of Caring to help 26 out of its 29 agencies, said Ralph Johnson, chairman of the event.

On the Day of Caring nonprofits that focus their resources on helping others, such as the Food Bank of Northeast Georgia, Hope Haven and the Athens Community Council on Aging, ask private companies, such as Caterpillar, Georgia Power and Noramco Inc, to maintain and update their facilities.

One volunteer, Kaneelvis Smith, a coil winder at Athens-based Power Partners Inc, spent part of Wednesday lining the walls of bathroom in the Salvation Army men's shelter with tape before giving it a fresh coat of paint.

"If you have the opportunity to give back to someone who doesn't have what you do I think you should do that. This is really important because we're making it look a lot better here for people who are living here, and there's something about taking the time to make it a little nicer that tells them you care," Smith said.

The men who stay at the shelter notice the improvements, said Joseph Bottoms, public relations manager at the Athens Salvation Army.

"We really want to make it feel like it's home. A lot of the time we're bringing people in who don't know what they're going to do with their life. So, we take them in and try to help them learn how to take care of themselves again," Bottoms said.

Other volunteers went to Hope Haven, a program helping people with developmental disabilities, on Newt Bridge Road where there is a walking trail in a wooded area that was overgrown and a detention pond in need of repair. About 15 volunteers from Caterpillar worked to clean up the property, said Amy Moore, director of human resources at Hope Haven.

"They're doing stuff that as a nonprofit we don't have the money to do," Moore said.

At the Athens Community Council on Aging building on Hoyt Street there were remnants of a railroad track embedded in the ground, and the metal tracks were removed with the help of about 30 volunteers from Caterpillar, Noramco Inc, a pharmaceutical company, and Ethicon, a surgery supplies company.

Phillip Wilkerson, a process scientist for Noramco, worked on landscaping around the building digging holes to plant flowers.

"I like seeing the community come together and helping people who can't help themselves," Wilkerson said.

• Check out more photos of voluteers at work all around Athens in our slideshow. 

At the Food Bank of Northeast Georgia volunteers worked to cut down dying trees around the building on Newt Bridge Road, sort and pack food to give away and create a compost area where spoiled food can be repurposed.

A day like Wednesday is refreshing because so much progress is made that the food bank can now focus on its mission to end hunger in the northeast region of the state, said Bill Taylor, volunteer coordinator at the Food Bank of Northeast Georgia.

"These are all things we couldn't do, so we have the University of Georgia, Carrier Transicold, Athens Rotary Club and Caterpillar here to help us with all of those," Taylor said. "This means we don't have to spend that sort of money on things that aren't food."

Follow reporter Hilary Butschek on Twitter @hilarylbutschek or at https://www.facebook.com/hbutschek.