When Flint City Councilwoman Tonya Burns hears from residents, one of the most common issues they ask for help with has a simple solution – if you have the equipment to do it.
A newly unveiled resource, the Mott Park “Going Green” Toolshed, will help solve both of those problems. The toolshed includes rakes, shovels, wheelbarrows, mowers, trimmers, leaf blowers, hand tools, and other items that residents can borrow to complete yard work or projects if they don’t have their own equipment.
“It’s emotional, because the number one complaint I get is about people’s lawns, and this is how we solve issues with lawns,” Burns said. “And not just that, it also helps with young teenagers who want to maybe shovel some snow. Come get a shovel, make a little extra money. Rake some yards. So it allows them to, if you want to make a little extra money, we got the tools to do it. And what it does is bring the community together. So we can’t say we don’t have the tools, all we need is the people power.”
Burns collaborated with the Mott Park Neighborhood Association to create the space, which is located in the basement below the Mott Park Clubhouse on Nolen Drive. Right now, the space is entirely run by volunteers. Residents can request a piece of equipment through a form online at tiny.cc/mottparktoolshed and, if it is available, a neighborhood volunteer will meet the resident to check it out and check it back in when they’re done using it.
The concept is similar to the Community Toolshed run by the Neighborhood Engagement Hub, but the biggest difference is NEH has employees who can handle a larger volume of requests. Mott Park’s toolshed is also technically available to citywide residents, but it is most heavily focused on serving residents in the Mott Park and Glendale Hills Neighborhoods at the moment.
“We hope this is the starting point,” said Chad Schlosser from the Mott Park Neighborhood Association. “I hope a day does come where we can hire some neighborhood kids to operate it on a Saturday for four hours. Or, maybe we could get staffing from the Neighborhood Engagement Hub or from AmeriCorps or some kind of similar program. So we hope to see this grow and continue to be helpful to more and more of our neighbors. It’s been crazy to see the interest in it right from day one. I’m meeting people here almost daily to check things out, so it’s really meeting a need in our community.”
Another unique aspect of the equipment available is that all of it is battery powered – hence the “Going Green” in the title. Schlosser said that, so far, the battery life has worked well for residents who have checked out the mowers and trimmers.
“At first I was kind of unsure about it, but as we looked into these EGO tools, their batteries are really good and last a long time,” Schlosser said. “We’re finding most of our neighbors can mow their whole lawn with one battery. So that was a key piece for me. It’s not somebody dragging an extension cord behind them mowing a lawn. They’re really safe, really easy to use.”
Schlosser noted that Burns championed the all-electric aspect of the project.
“We talk (with residents) a lot about keeping our environment clean, making sure our air is clean, and how we can not leave our imprint on the environment,” Burns said. “And so Going Green, I was like, ‘Yes, let’s do this.’ It is something to be excited about, not only are we helping our community stay beautiful, we’re also helping to keep our environment clean and safe too.”
Burns funded the toolshed project through some of the $30,000 in federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding that she had been allocated to spend on projects in her ward. Burns is currently running for mayor and not seeking re-election to her council seat, so for her, the project also represented the opportunity to make a lasting impact on constituents in her ward.
“This is a great way to use ARPA funds on something that we will see (benefit the community) again and again,” Burns said. “These tools will be here long after I’ll be in my council seat, and that’s what I wanted to do. It’s a burden you don’t have to worry about. ‘I gotta cut my grass.’ Okay, well go to the Going Green Tool Shed, and it’s here. You don’t have to go outside your community to get what you need to make your home beautiful. This is not a big monetary amount, but it makes the biggest impact when you drive up and down your street and the lawns look manicured, that’s what people want. When your community looks good, you feel good.”
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