a penny in the road outside of Julie Community Center

While strolling on Lombard street, I found a slightly bent and frequently ridden upon penny in the middle of the road outside of the Julie Community Center. Celebrating its 35^th year of service last year, the Julie Community Center’s mission is to serve the poor and low-income families in southeast Baltimore.

Sign outside of Julie Center reads, "As
you journey through life, may you have
the strength to choose wisely at every
crossroads and may you find happiness".

Founded in 1975, its main focus initially was housing and evictions. Its first program, the “People’s Rights Office” was a place that poor and low-income residents could go to seek help and counseling if they were facing eviction or any other housing difficulties. In 1980, the housing focus separated from the Julie Center and became Jubilee Baltimore. This freed up the Julie Center to work on a number of different community service projects including public health needs, GED programs for adults, art projects, recreational programs for teens, and many other projects designed to serve the southeast Baltimore community and engage the lower-income residents.

Some of their cooler projects involve art, literacy, and peace studies. One specific project is Brick Art, where youth and volunteers work to restore the sidewalk around the community center, by adding art within the bricks. Another really great project that they completed in the summer of 2004 was a Comic Book workshop for pre-teens. The kids, assisted by volunteers, created comic book strips with heroes and heroines that all promoted peace.

The Julie Center has year-round volunteer opportunities that include grant-writing, fundraising, visitor/buddy, tutoring, mentoring, program design/evaluation, recreation, and literacy. Located on 100 S. Washington, it is just a stone’s throw away from my house and I hope to one day volunteer there.

Total Change Collected: 91 cents