Registration closes for cleanup event
Advance registration ends today for civic organizations, church groups, businesses, families and individuals to volunteer for this year’s Great North Little Rock Cleanup on Saturday.
The annual cleanup event allows teams of volunteers to pick up litter along city streets, neighborhood parks or playgrounds.
There is no fee to register. More information and registration are available at the Keep North Little Rock Beautiful website, knlrb.org, or by emailing green@knlrb.org.
The cleanup will be 8 a.m.-11 a.m. Saturday. Team leaders will select sites where their groups will work.
A lunch for volunteers will be 11:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. at the Shelby Smith Pavilion at Burns Park, including pizza, music, prizes and recognition T-shirts.
Recreation agency to open playground
The city’s Parks and Recreation Department has accepted the delivery of equipment for the planned handicapped-accessible One Heart Playground in Burns Park, set to open by mid-May.
A more definite opening date should be known by today, Special Projects Director Jeff Caplinger said.
This will be the first public, “all-inclusive” playground in North Little Rock, according to Parks Director Terry Hartwick. The idea came about last year, Hartwick has said, after he met with Kenny and Jerilyn Wasson and their daughter Emma, who has a congenital heart defect and Turner’s syndrome.
The playground will allow special-needs children to play on rides and equipment they aren’t able to use on existing playgrounds, Hartwick said.
The North Little Rock Parks Commission approved the playground name in February.
St. Joseph Center to host fundraiser
St. Joseph Center will sponsor its second annual Lettuce Grow fundraiser 6 p.m.-9 p.m. May 12 on the center grounds, 6800 Camp Robinson Road.
The event will include hors d’oeuvres prepared by Chef Matt Bell of South on Main, an art show, silent auction, live music, a book signing by Janet Carson and the opening of the St. Joseph Farm Stand. Tours of the building will also be available.
Tickets are $50 each in advance or $65 at the door. They can be purchased by visiting centralarkansastickets.com/ events and clicking on the St. Joseph Lettuce Grow Spring Event.
Proceeds will go toward preserving historic buildings and toward the nonprofit center’s programs.
The St. Joseph Center, part of the National Historic Register, is a former orphanage built in 1910. The 56,000-squarefoot building on 63 acres has been farmed for more than a century, helping to sustain the center and the local community through outreach programs, according to center history.