Kings Park volunteers beautify boulevard
Belize City will never be mistaken for the Garden of Eden, but if a small group of public spirited citizens has its way, one of Kings Park’s newly refurbished streets will soon be as beautiful as it is smooth. Patrick Jones reports.
The idea of landscaping the newly constructed St. Thomas Street Boulevard is the brainchild of a group of neighborhood women, headed by Geraldine Sosa and Vicky Pelayo. It was a decision taken last April to convert the otherwise drab thoroughfare into the envy of the city.
Victoria Pelayo, Beautification Committee
“They are very strong trees and I think once a week, getting them properly wet along with the rain, that should be sufficient. Every now and again we come out and give them some fertilizer. But all we are asking is for residence to continue to wet them and for the public to take care of the trees.”
Oleander was their first choice but majority consensus settled on palms instead. After securing approval from City Hall, it was time to don the gloves and break out the gardening tools.
Geraldine Sosa, Beautification Committee
“We went about, we asked the different people in the neighborhood and we asked them if they could help us by purchasing the plants. We went to the businesses and they assisted us.”
Patrick Jones
“The result of that effort was a collection of seventy one plants, all of which have been laid down along almost the entire length of St. Thomas Street.”
Geraldine Sosa
“Oh, they will grow to maybe about thirty, forty feet. They will give some shade because the canopy will expand; they will give us shade and they will make our street beautiful. You know we travel abroad and we see these things and we admire them and so we think Belize is also beautiful and we can also do these things to help beautify Belize.”
Patrick Jones
“The actual planting of the trees started in June of this year and when the plants took root and began to flourish, the women were fountains of pride in the fruits of their labor. But disappointment soon set in when last week, vandalism reared its ugly head.”
Geraldine Sosa
“Yeah well, we discovered on Monday that one of the trees were rooted up and we are left here with just this empty space now and because of that we are worried that starting with one, we don’t know where it will end up.”
Sosa, and the other women believe that someone might just be after the plants for a quick buck and are wasting no time in mobilizing themselves to nip the problem, literally, in the bud.
Victoria Pelayo
“What we’re finding is that the people, some residents or somebody is using the divider to cross over instead of going to the round about and turning around. For what reason they might just be lazy or don’t want to go all the way up there, but we’re finding that they are crossing over the divider and the other day a dump truck was filling a yard behind us and instead of going all the way up, they just crossed over the divider and left a big hole, of course knocking down one of the palm trees. And I think we have evidence that the owner of a vehicle on St. Thomas Street is still using the divider to cross the road and we’re appealing to him or her, whoever it is to please stop it because the person will continue to damage the soil.”
Pelayo’s appeal also extends to classrooms in the area as the action of kids on their way to school can also put the trees under stress.
Victoria Pelayo
“Before schools reopen they were growing so very beautiful and now they are just being destroyed. I’m appealing to the principals of all the primary schools in this area to speak to their children, to speak to them about appreciation.”
And while the community appreciates the project, residents should know that it didn’t get done without hard work.
Geraldine Sosa
“Yeah, we got up about five o’clock every morning, you know a group of us in the neighborhood, we got up about five o’clock in the morning and we did our planting. There was Miss Pelayo; there was my son. We had Mr. Nuñez; we had Mr. Gladden; we had a lady, Mrs. Herrera. She had arthritis but she came out. She helped us with the digging. You would be surprised to see that lady came out and she helped us with the digging and up to now, everyday, her grandchildren is there watering the plants them.”
But while they’re proud of the early results, the women realize that they can’t be landscapers to the entire city.
Geraldine Sosa
“A few ladies had asked us if we would be willing to help with Princess Margaret Drive. While we are encouraged by it and feel proud of what we did, we would think that we’ll be able to give them some advice as how we went about it right.”
Victoria Pelayo
“The physical work, for them to feel the pride. The people, the residence of Princess Margaret Drive will have to get down and do their own digging.”
Patrick Jones for News Five.
Smaller varieties of shrubs will soon be planted in the narrow median strip nearest to Freetown Road.
