Anaheim : Volunteers to Spend Day Painting Homes

More than 500 volunteers will splash more than 1,000 gallons of paint on 28 homes today as part of the first Paint-Your-Heart-Out day, a nationwide program that picked Anaheim for its first Orange County venture.

The volunteers, who will spend the day helping Anaheim residents improve the appearance of their homes, come from a range of schools, churches, clubs and companies throughout Anaheim and the county. “It’s really been a community effort by a lot of people,” said Carolyn Griebe, a consultant who brought the project to Anaheim.

With $25,000 in federal funds and donated paint and labor, the eclectic group will make up to $5,000 worth of improvements to each house.

The homes are mostly in central and western Anaheim, in the city’s four target neighborhoods that are eligible for federal community-development funds. The homeowners are either disabled or elderly. Many of their houses have not been painted in decades.

The project also involves repairing worn driveways and landscaping aged yards.