Soldiers work for a cleaner, greener community

ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. -- 20th CBRNE Soldiers not only protect the nation from the full range of chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear and explosive threats; they also ensure their communities are clean and safe for their fellow neighbors.

Soldiers of Team 2, 25th Chemical Company, 22nd Chemical Battalion (TE), conducted a community service project to pick up trash and plant gardens in an east Baltimore, Md. neighborhood Friday.

The project also served as a team building exercise for the Soldiers and an opportunity to help improve areas of the city.

Assistant Team Sergeant and project coordinator, Sgt. 1st Class Ryan Somerlot, said that team building days are a common practice for his Soldiers, but it was time for something different.

"We were all so excited about it," Somerlot said. "We thought team day, community service project would be a good change of pace for everybody."

Somerlot coordinated with friends and members of Banner Neighborhoods, a Baltimore-based nonprofit organization that supports residents in their efforts to enhance the quality of life in their communities, to get the project underway.

"I've worked with Banner side-by-side before," he said. "We worked with them to get the tools (shovels and rakes) and to find space on our training schedules."

Somerlot has been in charge of putting together team building events for his company for two years, and he looks forward to the challenge of maintaining the space that they work so hard to create.

"The hard part's done and there was a lot of pride in it," he said. "I'm sure my team would love to come back down and plant more flowers, and make more improvements … something to make it better than it was. Today, we got it back up to par to the way it was when it was first built."

According to Banner Community Engagement Director, Beth Meyers-Edwards, the east Baltimore community where Somerlot and his team worked has the most number of vacant lots in Baltimore City.

One of the goals is to take the vacant spaces that are used as trash havens and mini landfills and turn them into something productive.

"Some of them are spaces for community gardens," Meyer-Edwards said. "This space is to serve as a place for serenity."

Meyers-Edwards said that Banner has worked with service members in the past, and having people that can come down and provide extra assistance is a big help.

"Having Soldiers help out is unique, because it's nice to have people who already give so much," she said. "It's nice to think that people that give us so much still want to come back and give more somehow."

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