01/15/2025
So I'm trying to start a nonprofit, a long time dream of mine and I don't know where to start. I have a social services degree, one of the courses I took was community organization but it's been so many years, the information has kind of left my brain so to speak lol. The name of the non-profit is called roadside remembrance and the purpose/goal is to plant self-sustaining native flowers shrubs bushes trees cacti succulents you name it anything that is low maintenance and self-sustaining in this desert climate and I'd like to plant these at all of the memorial sites that you see all over town on the side of the road you know all those crosses representing someone's loved one who has perished either in a vehicle pedestrian fatality or bicyclist killed by the vehicle or any type of fatality on the road. It's hard for a lot of these families to keep up these memorials because they put flowers that don't last very long and die in the desert climate not to mention in order to keep live flowers living they would have to constantly be watering them and the time just isn't there for these families and loved ones and I think there's nothing more beautiful and representative of the memory of a loved one who has passed then beautiful blooming perennials. I've had the idea for quite some time and then recently while riding my bicycle I came across a memorial cross on the corner of speedway and alvernon for a 7-year-old boy who was killed there and some type of automobile fatality and I just so happened to have a lantana that I was transporting in my bicycle basket to take home and plant but right then and there they urge was so great that I just dropped to my knees and literally with my bare hands dug into the hard desert soil chipping my nails and cutting my hands to dig deep enough to plant it.
