PANAMA CITY — The two Americorps volunteers started by scraping old white paint off the porch ceiling of the Glenwood cottage on Friday. On the docket was painting the exterior baby blue, at the behest of home owner Lucille Green.
Green’s home, at 530 East Seventh Court, is the first of seven in Glenwood that Americorps is planning to provide exterior rehabilitation.
Green has lived in that house since it was built in 1962, raising two children. She volunteers at the Glenwood Community Center, serving local seniors lunch. She already said the work the group completed around the Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday, when they scraped and painted the front porch railing and power washed the siding, has had a transformative effect on the property.
“When you don’t have income, that’s a blessing from the Lord,” Green said.
Green signed up for the program, which is a collaborative effort among Goodwill, Americorps, Glenwood Working Partnership and Panama City Community Redevelopment Agency. The CRA provides a $900 paint voucher, Home Depot provided tools, Glenwood Working Partnership provided some connections in the community and Americorps and Goodwill provides the labor. Goodwill and Americorps are linked in Bay County with Goodwill acting as the funnel for $225,000 of national Americorps funding.
Onna Crose and Brenda Carroll normally work at Americorps office in Chipley as education coordinator and resource manager respectively, but were the ones scraping the porch ceiling. Typically, the education coordinator organizes courses such as money sense for budgeting, resume building and QuickBooks. The resource manager directs people in need to the proper resources.
“Americorps position came open and has helped me give back,” Carroll said.
Goodwill Director John Shaffer was willing to get his hands dirty on Friday. He has been the program director for two and half years with Goodwill and Americorps. His wife Jo is a volunteer. Like Shaffer, Beverly Neild is a full-time employee, volunteer coordinator in Panama City and was also helping with the house.
The group also recruited five Americorps volunteers from Tallahassee — Jessica Jones, Jazmine Hudson, Nickee Taylor, Marisa Thomas and Cammia Dawson.