From the Sunday Austin American-Statesman:

The first batch of 25 wooden benches painted with inspiring words and quotations of Martin Luther King Jr. will soon be popping up in East Austin, thanks to volunteers who built them Saturday in honor of the civil rights leader.

Building benches wasn't the only project that volunteers tackled at the third annual event, which marks King's birthday. Volunteers picked up trash along the Austin boulevard named after him, stocked shelves at an emergency shelter, painted an East Austin church and tended gardens at social service agencies.

Before the work started, participants of all ages gathered at Huston-Tillotson University for a kickoff that included poetry, hip-hop, a choir performance and remarks by state Rep. Dawnna Dukes, D-Austin, and the Rev. Joseph Parker of David Chapel Missionary Baptist Church. Parker's father, also a Baptist minister, was a colleague of King's at Morehouse College in Atlanta and later in Montgomery, Ala.
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