"I never felt like this before. Ever!" 23-year-old Myra Esparza of Pacoima was telling me, explaining the excitement she and other young people feel about President-elect Barack Obama and his call to public service. "People will definitely stand up."
Will they?
And if so, can Obama act quickly enough to take advantage of the momentum and deliver on his pledge to recruit millions of volunteers and increase the ranks of AmeriCorps from 75,000 to 250,000?
Hard to say. But after talking to national leaders in the service field and to Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown, who initiated the California Conservation Corps 32 years ago and could well be governor again in 2010, I'm convinced we're sitting on a rare opportunity.
Civic engagement can't solve all our problems, which expand with each ripple from the global financial collapse. But if you take the spirit of Myra Esparza and magnify it a million times, you'll have a sense of what's possible now that service is suddenly cool.
Esparza, despite a strong distaste for the two-party system, got swept up in Obama-mania and campaigned for him, sending donations of $5 and $10 when she was able. Now the Pacoima native and recent college grad is a coordinator at a nonprofit called Youth Speak! Collective in Pacoima, where she helps keep teens on track in school and ushers them into community service.
"Some have worked at Olive View Medical Center running supplies from one hospital division to another," Esparza said. "Some are at elementary schools assisting teachers, some are in after-school programs doing recreation activities and tutoring elementary kids."
This coming Saturday, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is scheduled to help Youth Speak! Collective kids and volunteers develop a community garden as part of the Mayor's Day of Service program.
Former U.S. Sen. Harris Wofford, a special assistant to President Kennedy who helped create the Peace Corps and later was chief of AmeriCorps, is an Obama advisor. He helped draft the platform calling for doubling the Peace Corps' ranks and increasing AmeriCorps' focus on education, disaster relief, healthcare access for low-income children and environmental defense.
"Obama has said that given the tight budgets, even before the fiscal crisis, the case for this new investment in AmeriCorps has to be that it will solve some major problems," Wofford said.
