Marisa Garcia and Diego Cevallos of Burbank’s Parks & Recreation Department are changing the lives of the city’s wheelchair-using residents with the Burbank Adaptive Sports Program. Getting their hands on the best adaptive-sports technology, marshalling city-wide resources, and inspiring grassroots community support, Garcia and Cevallos’ program has become a beacon for disabled athletes across Southern California.

And there’s no better microcosm of the impact the program has made than the story of Joci Scott, who was left paralyzed from the waist down as a result of a plane crash.

The Heart

Joci, 27, has always been very active. She was a dancer, a performer, a swimmer, and a long-distance runner. And one of her favorite pastimes was hiking in Glacier National Park, or Yosemite, and the mountains of Montana with her family at their cabin. In other words, this is a person who always had her feet on the ground and is chasing the next adventure.

That identity was shattered when Joci, her parents, and her brother were involved in a small plane crash on July 19, 2019. When the single-engine plane her father was flying missed the runway for an emergency landing at Hudson Valley Regional Airport in Wappinger, New York, the aircraft slammed into a nearby wooded area. Everyone survived, but Joci suffered a severe spinal-cord injury that left her paralyzed from the waist down.

In the blink of an eye, Josi was now in a wheelchair… but being in a wheelchair doesn’t suddenly change what you love. Joci decided she would get active, however she could. She joined a disabled dance crew called the Rollettes (great name, by the way) and tried to find ways to go hiking. When it came to hiking, she had no choice but to keep it simple, using her wheelchair to traverse mostly paved, short trails near parking lots. It was something, but it wasn’t the “real” hiking that got her in touch with nature and ascended to some epic vista. It wasn’t the same hiking that set Joci’s soul on fire.

The Journey 

And that’s what brings us to the Burbank Adaptive Sports Program, which Parks & Recreation Director Garcia and Assistant Director Cevallos spearheaded. For those who don’t know, adaptive sports are competitive or recreational activities that are modified with specialized equipment so that people with physical disabilities can participate, such as tennis, fencing, or soccer. It’s what The Paralympic Games are all about.

Diego invited Joci to a ribbon-cutting ceremony a few weeks ago to unveil a new piece of equipment. Joci wasn’t sure what they would be showcasing, but she definitely didn’t expect that it would be brand-new adaptive-hiking track chairs. Wheelchairs that are rugged and nimble enough for hiking dirt paths and rising elevations – the real hiking that Joci had missed so much.

Joci never thought she would get the chance to use one, considering they cost $20,000. But she got to do the “maiden voyage” of one of the track chairs around Stough Canyon Nature Center. You can see her in action in this video. Joci was overjoyed and impressed, feeling as if she were reconnecting with “part of myself that I had lost.”

The Takeaway

What the city of Burbank has done demonstrates good at the city scale – using the power of government to lift those that society can so easily forget. For Joci, it’s a chance to reclaim her passion and reunite with her family in what had bonded them. It’s a chance at adventure, despite her limitations. It’s a chance at newfound freedom. It’s a chance for Joci to feel like Joci again.

Joci is just one life that has been changed by Burbank’s program in only a couple of years. The impact has been so strong that Marissa and Diego recently presented the program to Los Angeles County’s Parks & Recreation directors, hoping to serve as a “playbook” for how to implement it nationwide.

Jenny Hubbard wrote to me with a story that truly makes my heart smile… that has roots in a tragedy that broke my heart 13 years ago.

Jenny’s daughter, Catherine, was killed at Sandy Hook Elementary on December 14, 2012. I covered the story, and it gutted me like the rest of America. But what Jenny felt is just incalculable. Yet, she and her community found a superhuman strength to turn tragedy into legacy, starting the Catherine Violet Hubbard Foundation in 2013 to promote compassion and healing through the connection between humans and animals. It was the realization of Catherine’s wish to “bring all the animals together,” Jenny told me. This video gives a great overview of the amazing work the foundation is doing.

In 2014, the state of Connecticut awarded the foundation 34 acres of land that Jenny turned into the Catherine Violet Hubbard Animal Sanctuary. And for the past ten years, the foundation has been putting on Catherine’s Butterfly Party – “a free, intentionally inclusive afternoon where tens of thousands gather to adopt family pets, meet wildlife ambassadors, learn through interactive animal demonstrations, and simply spend time outdoors together.”

Jenny shared with me that, for this year’s tenth-anniversary event, they have dedicated one of their acrylic “Beautiful Butterflies” to me… which is one of the best honors I’ve ever received.

Somehow, in the aftermath of unexplainable loss, Jenny and Catherine have likely done more to heal this world than most ever will. It’s a blueprint for us all on how to turn grief into good.

Help me help Juan and his son Max. NYC resident Juan Uribe made a TikTok for one reason – to tell the world that his 15-year-old son, Max, is in desperate need of a life-saving stem-cell transplant… and fast. He has a rare blood disorder that, if not treated, is guaranteed to develop into blood cancer. If he gets the transplant, though, he has a 95% chance of survival.

The video has gone viral; but unfortunately, stem-cell donors need to be a near-perfect match… and there’s been no such luck yet. Max is 50% Columbian, so his donor needs to be Latino too, but only 13% of registered stem-cell donors are. Since Juan posted, there’s already been a 40% increase in Hispanic/Latino registrations. 

Juan’s goal is to register one million more people as donors by April 1. What do you say, Do Good Crew – can we get him there? Register here. One person on our team already has!

If you plan to do the same or get involved in any do good actions, make sure to comment below.