Viacom Volunteers Help at Greenburgh Nature Center

Hundreds of Viacom employees worked with local charitable organizations in the greater New York City region on May 20 for Viacommunity Day, an annual tradition in which Viacom employees give back to the communities in which they work and live.

One of their destinations was Green Chimneys in Brewster. They helped young people at the special needs center by mulching the ropes course elements, painting fences and setting up for an event.

It’s always a pleasure to have Viacom join us for their Viacommunity day as they have for the past 9 years," said Diane Guilfol, Director of Volunteer Services, in a written statement. "We consider them part of our Green Chimneys family and they help us to beautify our campus as well as help us with mulching our ropes courses. This year, they are helping to paint our paddock area as well as carve out an area in the woods for a BMX track that our kids will enjoy riding their bikes over. The track area looks amazing and the painted fence really makes the farm area look wonderful for our upcoming Birds of Prey event on June 5th. We are so grateful for our Viacom partners and we look forward to having them join us each year!"

They also volunteered at the Greenburgh Nature Center.

We put our masonry skills to work as we leveled the brick floor in our greenhouse, framed out a flower bed, mulched over some exposed tree roots, wood chipped several paths, drained and cleaned a fish pool, a lot of weeding and watering, drove posts into the group to mark foot paths to help keep folks from trampling the flowers in our native wildflower meadow, and more," said Travis Brady, Director of Education & Living Collections. "Of course we took a few minutes at the end to meet the goats, sheep etc."

At the New Rochelle Boys & Girls Club, they repainted the entire gymnasium.

It was a festive group of individuals from many different departments of the Viacom community, said Nate Adams, Regional Director.

"It wasn't a matter of me asking, many of the participants jumped right in and fulfilled any task that was needed of them," Adams said. "Over lunch we were able to discuss the challenges that the Boys and Girls Club of New Rochelle face in after-school care, and some of the hurdles that many of our kids are facing in everyday life. To know that a company like Viacom encourages their employees to go out and serve the way they did, makes me know that the great people of Viacom care. The final product was overwhelmingly positive and the kids appreciated the efforts of the Viacommunity participants. We look forward to forging this partnership with Viacom in many other ventures and are excited to know that we have a friend at Viacom."