{"id":129937,"date":"2026-01-20T04:28:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T04:28:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/129937\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T04:28:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T04:28:07","slug":"dallas-arlington-residents-celebrate-mlk-jr-day-with-community-service","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/129937\/","title":{"rendered":"Dallas, Arlington residents celebrate MLK Jr. Day with community service"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>MLK Jr. celebrations in North Texas ignite communal spirit, with residents rallying for change and service.<\/p>\n<p>DALLAS \u2014 No matter where you are, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.\u2019s birthday serves as a reminder of his dream. \u201cRemembering Martin Luther King and letting everybody know his dream wasn\u2019t in vain,\u201d said Terry Jones, an Oak Cliff resident.<\/p>\n<p>It is a call to action that Jones experienced for the first time at the <a href=\"https:\/\/help-dallas.org\/mlk-parade\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">South Dallas MLK Jr. parade<\/a>. \u201cIt matters to the community. It matters to the whole world actually. We\u2019ve got to stand up and do something better,\u201d said Jones.<\/p>\n<p>Even if the youngest of those at the parade may not fully understand, the message is still passed along.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s all about the peace and the community,\u201d said Jones.<\/p>\n<p>In Arlington, fifth grader, Leighton Meitl, was in charge. \u201cI was a Girl Scout, and my Girl Scout troop took me to a packing event, <a href=\"https:\/\/mealsofhope.org\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Meals of Hope<\/a>, and I fell in love with it,\u201d said Meitl.<\/p>\n<p>She called on the Rotary Club of Arlington and The Oakridge School to pack nearly 50,000 meals for Meals of Hope and raise thousands of dollars.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cShe raised $4000 last year for this. She came to us, and we said if you raise $7000 we&#8217;ll match your $7000, and so she&#8217;s got $14,000 and I hear there&#8217;s 43,000 meals here that are going to be prepared today for the needy in Arlington,\u201d said Richard Hendricks, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.arlingtonrotary.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Rotary Club of Arlington<\/a> President.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt makes me feel so warm inside, and I hope that people who get the meals will feel warm too,\u201d said Meitl.<\/p>\n<p>Above all, MLK Day is about service. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt&#8217;s honoring Doctor King&#8217;s legacy. This is what he, uh, fought so hard for,\u201d said April Benjamin, The Oakridge School Assistant Director of Admissions. \u201cHave our world give back and be strong proponents of community service.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThese people have come out today on their day off so that they can make sure that people in our community have food, and that&#8217;s an amazing gift that anybody can give,\u201d said Victoria Farrar-Myers, a doctor.<\/p>\n<p>Although service can be shown in different ways, it\u2019s the message and action that lasts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MLK Jr. celebrations in North Texas ignite communal spirit, with residents rallying for change and service. DALLAS \u2014&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":129938,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[150,152,151],"class_list":{"0":"post-129937","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arlington","8":"tag-arlington","9":"tag-arlington-headlines","10":"tag-arlington-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129937"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129937\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/129938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}