Thanks to a great group of teens, parents and seniors, along with principal Jillian Jordy, Serve Santa Maria painted the United States map and colored the playground at Taylor Elementary School.  What fun it was to see a playground transform from black & white to color. Now students, when they return to campus someday, will have a colorful environment to play and recreate.  We still have a few more schools to go.  If you have not had a chance to color a playground, perhaps you can be a part of doing so next year.

Another group of volunteers weeded and put a fresh layer of bark around the grounds of the Santa Maria Foursquare Church.  It looks fabulous.  But what is even more awesome is what goes on inside.  God's Word is declared.  People are loved and cared for.  The outside can be a message of what goes on inside.

Serve Santa Maria - September 26, 2020

We performed landscaping and general cleanup to the exterior of the Edwards Theaters at 1521 South Bradley Road. COVID-19 led to maintenance reductions at the theater. To beautify this high-profile business, Serve Santa Maria volunteers stepped up. Thank you the fantastic cooperative efforts of each of 39 volunteers, the City of Santa Maria for the 20 trash cans so we could work with physical distancing, Portable John’s for the bathrooms/wash stations, Red Lobster which provided lunches for the volunteers, United Rentals for the street sweeper and river who swept the parking lot, and to KSBY-TV and the Santa Maria Times for the media coverage to inform the community what we did.

Serve Santa Maria 18 - August 24th, 2019

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This semi-annual event, organized by Bethel Lutheran Church’s Pastor Carl Nielsen, brings community members together to work on beautification projects throughout Santa Maria and the surrounding areas.

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Hundreds of volunteers will gather together on August 24th to provide amazing acts of kindness to homeowners, businesses, schools, and even our city to clean up and beautify properties that need a bit of tender loving care.  There may be projects that need trash removal, yard clean up, trees to be trimmed or planted, bark to be spread, graffiti to be removed, maps to be painted on playgrounds, fences to mend, and there may even be structures to paint in honor of the 18th Serve Santa Maria.

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Since the inception of Serve Santa Maria in 2010, Pastor Nielsen has viewed these events like the old-time acts of "barn raising".  He states "This is a thing of the past where all these people come together and do amazing things in one day. We need hundreds of people to pull these projects off — and miraculously they seem to come together every time.”

Serve Santa Maria generally draws between 250 and 500 volunteers.  Will you join us?  

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SSM APRIL 14TH PROJECTS

Serve Santa Maria - April 2018

Thank you to all who joined us in blessing our community last Spring!

In particular, we want to express our appreciation to the many people and organizations who helped make this event a success.   Running the risk of missing someone unintentionally, we are grateful to the following:

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• ALL THE VOLUNTEERS representing many local churches, businesses, organizations, and families - Without you we can do nothing!

• City of Santa Maria - For use of the Maldonado Center and helping us identify needed projects

• Santa Maria All-America City Committee - For coffee, juice & donuts 

• Santa Maria Recreation and Park Department - For project support

• Salvation Army - For lunches

• Pepsi Distributors - For Water

• Bedford Enterprises - For 6 roll-off dumpsters

• Portable Johns - For the use of portable restrooms

• La Nueva Radio Vision 88.9 FM for event promotion

• City of Santa Maria - For use of the landfill

• Home Depot - For discount on paint supplies

• Mick Robinson and Norris Bentivegna with the Tanglewood neighborhood association

• Joan Hartman - County Supervisor for help in Tanglewood

• Alma Hernandez - Assistant to Counlty Supervisor Hartman for help coordinating resources

• Santa Maria Times and KSBY for media coverage

• Serve Santa Maria Leadership Team for planning and implementation of the event

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Past Event Highlights