Holloman helps beautify city one tree at a time

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Jamal Sutter
  • 49th Fighter Wing Public Affairs
ALAMOGORDO, N.M. --  With the departure of the F-117A and the arrival of the F-22A yet to come, the 49th Maintenance Group has found itself with an unusual amount of downtime, allowing them to partake in opportunities normally not available.

These opportunities include learning new skills at the workplace, pursuing higher education or even becoming more involved in the community.

In partnership with the Keep Alamogordo Beautiful program, members of 49 MXG recently volunteered to plant trees and shrubs at Tierra De Suenos Park in Alamogordo, N.M.

Planted were 34 Chitalpa trees, 17 Afghan pine trees, 42 Lombardy polar trees and about 150 Oleander shrubs, said Cindy Pierpoint, Keep Alamogordo Beautiful director.

"MXG has a huge volunteer spirit and what we've done is create an avenue where we can put everybody's volunteer effort into one project," said Tech. Sgt. Robin Walker, Keep Alamogordo Beautiful Holloman volunteers project manager.

The volunteer work is a part of a 49 MXG initiative called the Personnel Improvement Program (PIP), which is a project designed to keep maintenance personnel constructive in between aircrafts, said Col. Robert L. Stephenson, 49 MXG deputy commander.

"A lot of times in maintenance, because we're tied to a flying schedule, we don't have opportunities to study our Career Development Courses as well as we want, take off duty classes or even volunteer to be involved in the community," Colonel Stephenson said.

The idea came about when the maintenance group found out that Alamogordo had $70,000 to spend on city beautification but didn't have the manpower to complete the work, said Ms. Peirpoint. Since this fell right in place with the group's PIP project, it was inevitable for Holloman and the Keep Alamogordo Beautiful program to link.

The group has over 120 volunteers, which are broken into 15-person teams. One team will work two consecutive days and on the third day, another team takes over and the process is repeated.

"We've given our volunteers a way to get a lot done this summer," Sergeant Walker said. "It'll have a really big impact on the community through high visibility projects."

Though the project is still in it's infant state, people have already begun to take notice to the work being done.

"We just got started but yesterday we had people stopping by asking who we were, what we were doing and why we were doing it, so it's already reflecting in the community," Sergeant Walker said.

Some future projects the group will be taking part in are helping beautify the White Sands Blvd median with decorative rocks and building a rocket launching pad for the air and space history museum, said Master Sgt. Michael Parkison, 49 MXG executive officer.

Volunteering and helping beautify the city is a major accomplishment but there is more to it than meets the eye according to Sergeant Walker.

"I've lived here in Alamogordo for eight years," he said. "For me Alamogordo is home and, basically, we're trying to set the example for the community. If you take a little time to volunteer, we can make big things like this happen."