COLORADO SPRINGS — Nearly 2,000 volunteers across the Pikes Peak area took part in COSIloveyou's Fall City Serve this weekend. There are 113 projects from pulling weeds and painting to picking up trash, making cards of encouragement, and more.
About a dozen volunteers organized and cleaned storage units for refugee and immigrant families.
"I'm forever grateful for them to come and help 'cause we don't have all the hands to do what we do," said the program director Floyd Preston.
Lutheran Family Services said the program helps hundreds of families, with more to come. Most are from Afghanistan, Cuba, and Ukraine.
The storage units hold some of the first belongings of refugee families coming to the city.
"[Volunteers] help us able to organize so when families come, we can better serve them," said Preston.
Kimi Baylor said she and her daughter are happy to help.
"To make other people's lives easier, so it's definitely fun, it's exciting, it's fun to meet new people and to learn more about different organizations in the city," said Baylor.
Nonprofit COSIloveyoy organizes two city service days every year.
"The idea is try to get people who need help with people who want to help," said executive director Stu Davis.
Davis said there are nearly 2,000 volunteers working on more than 100 projects across El Paso County this weekend. "And that just makes a huge difference, we're talking about 15,000 hours worth of volunteer contribution."
The Fall City Serve will make an impact of around $170,000 to nonprofits and organizations that need it most, said Davis.
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