Nathan Luke is two and a half years old, wearing a warm jacket and the widest smile in Hunting Park. He sat at a picnic table near the park offices on Saturday morning, April 11, eating a soft pretzel with the focused dedication of someone who understands that every bit of help matters. Around him, volunteers in work gloves fanned out across the 87-acre park, hauling brown paper bags full of last year’s leaves and debris. Hard work and laughter filled the cool spring air. Nathan watched them from his table, unhurried, content, bearing witness in the way that only very young children can.
His parents, Steven Luke and Jasmine Hawkins, were there beside him, both part of the coalition of residents and organizations that coordinated the cleanup. His father looked out over the park at the volunteers and said, «We want a better future for Nathan’s generation,» Steven Luke said. «We are out here claiming and cleaning our space so that the next generation will have a safe place to play, swim, and run. We are working to make a difference for the kids. But we cannot do it alone.»
A family, an organization, and a promise
Nathan’s grandmother, Karen Hawkins, stood nearby with a clipboard, keeping watch over both the pretzel table and the larger operation. Karen is the treasurer of Urgent365, the Philadelphia nonprofit whose students turned out in force for the cleanup. She described what the organization does and why days like this one are inseparable from that mission. Urgent365 was co-founded by Karen’s daughter, Jasmine Hawkins, who is the organization’s President, and Nathan’s mother. Each year, Urgent365 equips more than 15 students with essential supplies and a $300 book award, targeting students with the greatest financial need who are often the first in their families to pursue higher education. The group works primarily with students from Gratz High School. The organization sponsors trunk parties — joyful send-off celebrations that load new college students up with everything from bedding to school supplies — and stays close throughout the year, checking in on students, helping with applications, and connecting them to internships.
For Karen, watching her grandson at the picnic table while her daughter directed the student crew, the morning was a living picture of what Urgent365 exists to build: a neighborhood where the next Nathan has a safe place to grow, and the next generation of students has someone in their corner to make sure they get where they are going.
The Coalition Taking the Park Back
Organizing Saturday’s effort was Hunting Park United, the grassroots 501(c)(3) led by Leroy Fisher, a longtime Hunting Park resident who has spent nearly two decades working to restore the park to its rightful place. Fisher founded the organization in 2008 and has since convened monthly meetings at the Hunting Park Recreation Center, at 1101 W. Hunting Park Ave., where neighbors, elected officials, and community partners sit in the same room and work out problems together. His coalition has secured over $5 million in park improvements, including a state-of-the-art baseball field funded in part by former Phillies first baseman Ryan Howard, and is actively pursuing Phase II of the park’s Master Plan. «We are doing everything we can to take back this park,» Fisher said. «I live here, and with the help of collaborating organizations, we can do it. It takes partnerships to make this happen. No one can do this alone.»
Also anchoring the cleanup was Philadelphia Amateur Baseball, whose teams have long called Hunting Park home and whose players have a direct stake in the condition of these fields. PECO, the regional energy provider, contributed resources and support. And State Representative Danilo Burgos lent the authority of his office and supplies to the effort — a signal that reclaiming this park has allies in Harrisburg.
What this park once was — and is becoming again
There are people in this neighborhood who remember when Hunting Park was the place you wanted to be on a summer evening — when families spread blankets on the grass to listen to the brass band from the pavilion, when kids lined up to swim. The factory closings, the flight of investment, the drug corners of the 1980’s that swallowed whole blocks, and more recently the fentanyl and xylazine crisis that turned park benches into something else entirely, are wounds the neighborhood has been working to close for a long time. The park did not die. But it suffered, visibly and for years, in ways that residents carry with them even now. The rebuilding has been underway for decades. Esperanza (Nueva Esperanza, Inc.), the faith-based Hispanic multi-service organization founded in 1986, has invested more than $126 million in the neighborhood. Partners, including PNC Bank, Wells Fargo, the City of Philadelphia, the Shapiro Administration, the EPA, the Reinvestment Fund, and the Nowak Metro Finance Lab at Drexel University, have joined that work. As of early 2026, police data shows a measurable decline in shootings, and the people who live here are beginning, carefully, to say out loud what they have believed all along: that this neighborhood is coming back.
What does that mean for Nathan and his generation?
By midmorning, the bags were full, and the paths were clear. Nathan Luke had finished his pretzel and was watching the world with the unhurried calm of a child who has nowhere else to be and no reason to worry. His father stood nearby, thinking about summers to come — Nathan on these fields, Nathan at the swimming pool, Nathan with his own group of friends running across this grass. «We have to make a difference for the kids,» Steven Luke said. «But we cannot do it alone.»
The people who showed up on Saturday — Leroy Fisher and his volunteers, the Gratz students in their work gloves, the Philadelphia Amateur Baseball families, Karen and Jasmine Hawkins, and State Rep. Burgos — are proof that he is not alone. They are the answer to the question Nathan will one day ask about who built the world he grew up in. Some things, these community groups have decided that the future of our children is not up for negotiation. Nathan Luke is one of them.
Get Involved
Hunting Park United | 1101 W. Hunting Park Ave., Philadelphia, PA 19140 | (267) 584-8980
Urgent365 | Philadelphia, PA
Philadelphia Amateur Baseball | Philadelphia, PA
Esperanza (Nueva Esperanza, Inc.) | 4261 N. 5th St., Philadelphia, PA 19140
