Community groups connect and collaborate on Enhance La Jolla Day

Representatives of several La Jolla community groups got together on a sunny morning April 23 for Enhance La Jolla Day on the Art Park outdoor space of the newly reopened Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego.

The second edition of the event — planned by Enhance La Jolla, which administers the Maintenance Assessment District for The Village — looked different from last year’s inaugural Enhance La Jolla Day, which was held on the rainy first day of spring in March on Girard Avenue with volunteers revamping tree wells.

Declan Renfree (foreground) and younger brother Brooks participate in a flower art collage project sponsored by the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego during Enhance La Jolla Day.

(Elisabeth Frausto)

The 2022 installment off Prospect Street included a family-friendly art project organized by Museum of Contemporary Art staff, a milkweed plant giveaway to promote the local butterfly population and a demonstration by Urban Corps of its eco-friendly pressure-washing equipment used weekly in the La Jolla MAD.

Members of the La Jolla Community Recreation Group’s Visioning Committee, Friends of Coast Walk Trail, Rotary Club of La Jolla, La Jolla Parks & Beaches, La Jolla Shores Association, La Jolla Traffic & Transportation Board and more hosted tables with information on their groups.

San Diego City Councilman Joe LaCava, whose District 1 includes La Jolla, also tended a table, and La Jolla Town Council trustee Ron Jones played music and welcomed participants.

Enhance La Jolla board member Barbara Bry said the day was “mostly an opportunity for all the groups in La Jolla to talk to each other, because ... they’re all about enhancing La Jolla.”

Ed Witt, president of Enhance La Jolla, said he hopes to help “develop synergies and activities between the different groups. A lot of these people never see each other because they’re doing their separate work.”

He added that the event also is for “the community at large … to come here and meet the vendors, and making the public aware” of Enhance La Jolla and its goals.

People from several La Jolla groups gather to connect and collaborate during Enhance La Jolla Day on April 23.

(Elisabeth Frausto)

Ben Colton of Nissho California, which provides landscaping services for Enhance La Jolla, staffed a table giving away milkweed to encourage the monarch butterfly population, plus succulents and other Earth Day-related items, including hummingbird feeders to promote pollinators and kits with biodegradable utensils and toothbrushes.

Witt said Enhance La Jolla will continue to hold annual versions of the event. ◆