COVID-19 doesn't stop 2020 Hoover City Dad Brigade back-to-school cleanup
Several hundred people turned out at Hoover public schools Saturday for the sixth annual Hoover City Dad Brigade back-to-school cleanup effort.
This year’s effort was different because most of the cleanup jobs were restricted to outside work due to concerns over the COVID-19 outbreak. Also, this year’s Hoover City Dad Brigade was labeled the “Family edition,” with women and girls eighth grade and older invited to join the men and boys.
Lead organizer Derrick Murphy said organizers thought they would open it up more this year because so many people have been isolating themselves at home and were eager to get out and help get schools ready for the Aug. 20 start date.
There were 302 volunteers who signed up ahead of time, indicating they planned to come, but there were no official counts taken this year because lunch was not served, Murphy said. It is safe to say there were more than 300 volunteers, he said.
Murphy said he heard a lot of good reports from the team leaders at 16 schools that the cleanup went well.
“I know the principals were excited to see people they hadn’t seen in quite some time,” Murphy said, noting that schools have been largely vacant since March.
This year, some of the principals requested that extra attention be paid to cleaning up outdoor classrooms, courtyards and gardens because they expect students will be spending more time learning outdoors due to COVID-19, Murphy said.
About 15 to 20 volunteers helped at Green Valley Elementary, doing tasks such s trimming hedges and trees, putting out pine straw, removing poison ivy and rejuvenating the courtyard.
Several of the volunteers did not have children at Green Valley. Rob Tatum said his children are homeschooled, and Joe McCarty doesn’t have kids yet. Both said they came at the invitation of one of the team leaders, Rob Shaw, and because they wanted to give back to the community.
Ellen Kerns has a son who attended Bluff Park Elementary and is now at Hoover High, but she came to help at Green Valley because they now live in the Green Valley community and “I just want to help in my own neighborhood,” she said.
About a dozen people came to help clean up at Brock’s Gap Intermediate School. They trimmed crepe myrtles, put out pine straw and mulch, cut back brush, pulled vines, picked weeds, pressure washed concrete areas, cleaned windows and replaced exit stickers on doors. They even did a little bit of painting inside, team leader Orunda Bryant said.
Across town, Spain Park High School had a higher volunteer turnout than expected, with 20 to 30 men and boys showing up, team leader Mike Fowler said. Their focus was on spreading pine straw, he said.
“Spain Park’s a big campus with a lot of trees and shrubs, so there’s a lot of territory to cover at Spain Park,” Fowler said.
They started out with 250 bales of pine straw but ran out, so the operations crew for Hoover City Schools brought 80 more bales, he said.
Jason Gentry of Gentry Surface Restoration donated his time and equipment throughout the previous week to pressure wash sidewalks around the Spain Park campus, Fowler said. It was a big task, and he took time after his paying jobs to complete it, Fowler said. “It looks really nice.”
Other partners providing supplies and financial support for this year’s event included Home Depot, Chick-fil-A, Zaxby’s, Anthony’s Car Wash, Legends Barber Shop, Hoover City Council President Gene Smith, Pete’s Printing and the Hoover City Schools Foundation.