Stepping up service on Skid Row

Instead of spending Saturday morning preparing for USC's afternoon football game, members of Alpha Phi Alpha and Delta Sigma Theta prepared back lunches to hand out to the homeless in Downtown Los Angeles.

Seventeen USC fraternity and sorority members from the National Pan-Hellenic Council chapters and volunteers from CSU Los Angeles packed hot dogs, condiments and crackers into 200 brown paper bags and brought boxes of bottled water to Skid Row residents for the second annual Service on Skid Row.

"Every time we do this event, I feel humbled because you don't know why [they're here] or their position," Delta Sigma Theta President Helsa Irizarry said. "I'm humbled that we came down here, and we put a smile on their faces."

The group drove to Skid Row and stopped at two locations. They first passed out food and water in front of Union Rescue Mission, then moved in front of the Lamp Community building a few blocks away.

While most people took the items and left, some struck up conversations with the students.

When one man, who declined to give his name, found out the members were from USC, he cracked jokes about last week's football loss to Stanford University.

Many expressed gratitude about the Greeks' philanthropic efforts.

"It's a blessing what you guys are doing," one man said.

But a staff member from Lamp Community, who identified herself as Dee, asked for more from the student volunteers. She yelled from across the street that the fraternity and sorority members should perform "stepping," a competitive art form with African-American roots that is widely performed by NPHC fraternities and sororities.

Dee said that people needed more than just food and water. She said performing step would energize the people living in Skid Row to go back to school and move off the streets.

But Jamelle Nelson, president of Alpha Phi Alpha, said stepping was just one social aspect of Greek life, and the fraternity wanted to keep Saturday's focus on the service.

"We're about more than [stepping]," he said. "Stepping shouldn't be all that we're about."

Nelson stressed that his fraternity and Delta Sigma Theta are community service organizations whose main focus is to help others.

"We're aiming to not only uplift humanity but also African-Americans, and this area is heavily populated with African-Americans," he said.

This was the second year Alpha Phi Alpha and Delta Sigma Theta joined to serve on Skid Row, the presidents said.

Irizarry said her sorority had been looking for another Greek group to join them in their Skid Row community service. She said both her sorority and Alpha Phi Alpha had the same passion for community service, which helped them to cooperate and serve together.

Nelson said the group received $150 in funding from the USC's Philanthropy Fund, but that the fraternity and sorority also paid for some of the expenses.