Hundreds volunteer in LA Works' MLK Day of Service

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Instead of taking it easy on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, more than 1,500 volunteers celebrated Dr. King's life by heeding the call to service, choosing to do some heavy lifting and getting their hands dirty by sprucing up the Santee Education Complex.

"There's a lot of people here helping the community, painting, pulling out weeds, doing other stuff to help the community and do better," volunteer Khaliq Herderson said.

The volunteers repaired or replaced murals across the campus that were peeling, painted and even did some landscaping. Many of the volunteers were students at Santee who say they're proud of the hard work they put in to keep their high school looking nice for themselves and for their central Los Angeles community.

"I've worked in the garden before and it feels really good 'cause you know that it's clean and like the school looks nice, and then when people come into school it looks like it just shows that the school is really nice," volunteer Michelle Gil said.

What some of the adults and students pointed out on Monday was the diversity of the group of people who volunteered at Santee.

"The guiding light, the guiding principal of Dr. King, which is that we must get along as brothers and sisters or perish together as fools. There was another king who said something similar about getting along, and that message is something that compels I think this yearly gathering of servants, public servants who have come together to make this city work," said Roger Smith of L.A. Works, a volunteer center.