Catholic Heart Work Camp: Youths paint, trim at public housing
By W. WINSTON SKINNER
winston@newnan.com
Dozens of Catholic young people gave some of the their summer time to help make life better for residents of the Housing Authority of Newnan.
The volunteers – more than 80 of them – spent a couple of days in Newnan earlier this summer. The trip was arranged through the Catholic Heart Workcamp program.
Dozens fanned across the city to paint, trim and do other work at housing units in Newnan. In the evenings, they bunked at Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Fairburn.
While several CHWC groups worked in Newnan, another set did a project at Clothes Less Traveled in Peachtree City. “We work with Clothes Less Traveled,” Hardy said, noting the connections between the groups that received a hand from the teams of Catholic youths.
“They’re actually working – beautifying the community,” Hardy said. Residents joined in with the CHWC volunteers to help “beautify where they live,” Hardy said.
HAN distributed fliers to residents a week ahead of the CHWC visit. Eight teams painted porches, pruned shrubbery and did some decorative planting.
Participants said they spend their summer vacation with CHWC because they want to make a difference, they like doing something productive with their summer break and – simply because they like helping others.
Brian Lennox from Houston, Texas, led a team that spent some time painting porches and railings at apartments on Spence Avenue. The teams in Newnan represented “13 different churches and schools in nine different states,” Lennox said.
“This is my fourth time,” Lennox said. CHWC has 29 different teams this summer. Housing authorities, homeless shelters and hospitals are among the groups benefiting from CHWC’s outreach
CHWC was founded by two youth ministers at a Catholic parish in Florida in 1993. The program’s impact in Coweta County is visible to HAN residents and passersby.
Labor of the CHWC groups made “a big difference in how it looks,” Hardy said.
