While a realtor’s mantra is location, location, location, Kathy Guerra is all about community: community services, community improvement, community livelihood. Kathy works for a local non-profit by day and volunteers for a range of community organizations in her spare time. We caught up with her on a brisk San Francisco afternoon, restoring a mural for UCSF’s New Generation Health Center (NGHC). Kathy and the fabulous, vibrant mural are featured in our trailer – third volunteer and location profiled – and her sense of giving back echoes what we’ve heard from so many:
Helping is one thing, but when you’re able to give your time and create something or restore something that is so important to so many different people – for me it’s a wonderful feeling. It makes me feel complete, helping people and in turn, that help helps them.
While this was her first day on the mural, Kathy has volunteered at the Center many times over the years and done the AIDS Walk with them every year. She thrives on working with the youth and teens NGHC provides services for and was thrilled to give her afternoon:
I could’ve been sitting on the couch or getting my nails done or spending useless money versus coming out here and helping … painting taps into creativity of my own. You know it means a lot to me to be a part of something that I’ve driven by for 10 years … and now I’m here painting it.
The mural Kathy’s restoring is a decade-old collaboration between NGHC and inner-city community-based mural arts organization, Precita Eyes. The painting reinforces NGHC’s mission of empowering “youth to make informed, positive decisions about their health and future, particularly related to their reproductive health and planning their families.”
Kathy feels her mural restoration afternoon was a simple, tangible way to give back after all the Center has done for San Francisco’s highest-risk communities. Whether you’re a local or visiting the City by the Bay, stop by the mural, or better yet, give the NGHC a few hours of your time and support Kathy’s community.
