UC Green chief plants trees and builds community

In University City, 38th Street is barren, populated only by cars and concrete.

UC Green Director Esaul Sanchez wants to change that. Building on the momentum created by leading the effort to round up 800 volunteers to plant 128 trees along Chestnut Street earlier this month, Sanchez now sees potential along this roadway for a combination of neighborhood beautification and volunteer empowerment.

"Take a look at this. Memorize it. And then come back in five years. You won't recognize it," Sanchez said, gazing upon 38th Street south of Chestnut. "It's a big avenue, with lots of cars, but all of a sudden you've got trees planted. It could look like Miami."

As the head of UC Green, Sanchez looks to spruce up dilapidated or dreary areas of University City with a simple plan -- adding trees to the existing mix of buildings, roads and streetlights. Since he took over UC Green in 1998, 46-year-old Sanchez has lined University City streets with 450 trees in the last three years. And before that, he ran a program called UC Brite that illuminated neighborhood streets with over 2,500 lights.

The transition to eliminate urban blight was an interesting one for Sanchez, who envisions University City as a potential "urban arboretum," given his background completely outside the realm of urban planning. He holds a Ph.D. in physics from Columbia University.

But the combination of his 16 years of rigorous scientific training and years spent as a political activist have proved to be enough to take on some of University City's urban woes, which doesn't surprise those who know him.

"Most people, if they thought about the projects that he's undertaken, would simply say no way, that's impossible because you can't cut through the bureaucracy or you can't cut through the community apathy to get it done," said Mike Hardy, a member of UC Green's board of advisers.

But Hardy added that "Esaul is able to overcome all of those things through sheer force of will and good humor."

Willy Brown, a construction teacher at West Philadelphia High School, was one of many who have had their expectations exceeded by Sanchez. Both men were part of a team that was charged two years ago with building a pavilion for University City High School's garden.

Brown estimated the project would take all summer to complete. Sanchez said that it could be wrapped up in a day. And after rounding up volunteers, it was.

"There were swarms of people all over the place," Brown, also a member of UC Green's board of advisers, recalled with a chuckle. "It was sort of like an old-fashioned barn raising."

The capacity to tackle logistical problems while inspiring many to commit to a solution had an early start in Sanchez's life. At 16, he became a leader of a student movement in his hometown on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques. The U.S. Navy has controlled more than three-fourths of the island since World War II, and the majority of residents -- Sanchez included -- want them gone.

Sanchez was jailed three times for his actions, and suspended for a year from the University of Puerto Rico, from which he eventually graduated magna cum laude. But the lessons he learned outside the classroom on grassroots organizations and democracies would prove to be just as valuable as the physics instruction he received while sitting behind a school desk.

However, after heading to New York City for his graduate work and then to Penn for a post-doctoral fellowship, his love for physics -- the most challenging subject he said he ever encountered -- began to wane.

The turning point came on the day after Halloween in 1996. Sanchez woke that morning to learn that a Penn post-doctoral student, Vladimir Sled, had been murdered less than a block away from Sanchez's University City home.

"I just got tired of the city at that point," Sanchez said. "I said, 'You know what? If I cannot do anything to change the way this city is, I'm going to leave.'"

He found his way to UC Brite in 1996 and then to UC Green two years later. Along the way, he discovered that lights and trees were not the most important aspect of revitalizing a neighborhood.

"What we've found is that greening is an incredible tool not only for making the neighborhood look better, but also for neighbors to be better neighbors to each other," Sanchez said.

According to his friends and colleagues, a key to the success of Sanchez's projects is his people skills.

His neighbor, Veterinary School Professor James Serpell, says that he has the "common touch," the British term for being able to talk with people at their level, no matter their identity or background. However, Sanchez's 17-year old daughter, Vanesa, says it may have more to do with reading books like "The Healing Power of Humor" and "Human Understanding: Dialogues of Scientists and Sages."

"He touches you in all the right ways so that you feel that you can do anything, you can conquer any task," said Engineering and Wharton sophomore Amin Venjara, who has worked with Sanchez since before his freshman year.

Venjara said that Sanchez has made UC Green into a place where everyone who contributes takes away something, be it a feeling of accomplishment, leadership skills or merely the memory of having had a good time.

On the recent Chestnut Street tree planting project, for example, Sanchez trusted the students who were assisting in the organization to take on a great deal of responsibility themselves. After this, Venjara wants to continue their working relationship.

"I was like, 'There's something special in this man -- he's someone I want to learn from, he's someone I want to emulate,'" Venjara said.

In the next six months, Sanchez's goal for UC Green is to help the organization expand to catch up with its accomplishments, which include both the major street tree plantings and small neighborhood block projects.

Although their efforts have been largely successful, problems have cropped up when trying to bring the many stakeholders -- which include students, community groups, residents and institutions -- together on some of the projects. And occasionally with the more minor block improvements, the volunteers have not completed the work by the time the funding ran out.

The group, which is funded primarily by Penn, needs more money and more staff to grow.

But while Sanchez wants to see UC Green get fully on its feet, he knows that his time with the organization is limited.

"I know that my attention span is very short," Sanchez said. "Look, after you quit a life in physics, I think you've lost any fear of going and trying something difficult and exciting, you know what I mean?"

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