Contact: Eric Hartsock
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443-858-4437

CSX and City Year Team Up With Ravens and Orioles To Transform Solo Gibbs Park

What: CSX Corporation, City Year, the Alliance for Community Trees, Tree Baltimore, the Baltimore Ravens, the Baltimore Orioles and Sharp-Leadenhall Community will bring together 100 volunteers to transform Solo Gibbs Park, which was established in the late 1700s. The volunteers will build benches and tables, paint murals and renovate the playground areas. The group will improve the park's outdoor spaces by mulching the existing landscape, planting 30 large Eastern Redbud, Hackberry, Red Maple, Willow Oak and Pin Oak trees and digging out larger growing spaces for street trees to encourage faster growth.

Who: CSX Corporation, based in Jacksonville, Fla., is one of the nation's leading transportation companies, connecting customers to ports, distribution centers and markets across the eastern United States. Through grass-roots volunteerism and focused corporate giving, CSX is committed to supporting the communities where it operates. City Year is a nonprofit AmeriCorps national service organization. Alliance for Community Trees and its local affiliates in 41 states and Canada have planted and cared for 14.9 million trees in cities with help from 4.3 million volunteers.

When: 8:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.
Saturday, October 9, 2010

Where: Solo Gibbs Park
1044 Leadenhall Street
Baltimore, Maryland 21230-3648

Why: Since the late 1700s a free African-American community has lived, worked and worshipped near the historic park alongside European descendant Quakers, Methodists, Baptists and Lutherans. Baltimore's African-Americans organized some of their first churches and schools near Solo Gibbs Park on Sharp Street, and this community continues to work to sustain affordable housing for people who can trace their family history to the beginnings of Baltimore City. It is the third time the railway has organized a service day in Baltimore in the last two years.

How: CSX is proud to be a National Leadership Sponsor of City Year, an organization that unites young people of all backgrounds for a year of full-time service, giving them the skills and opportunities to change the world, make a difference in the lives of children and transform schools and neighborhoods throughout the United States.