In South Baltimore, buy a tree and change a life [Video]

BALTIMORE — You can buy a tree for the holidays just about anywhere. But how about buying a tree to change a young person’s life?

On House St. at the Baltimore Peninsula, folks with the Brooklyn-based City of Refuge nonprofit are trying to encourage folks to do just that. Rows of Fraser firs straight from North Carolina sit in the lot at the Peninsula.

“It’s a purpose-driven tree,” noted Billy Humphrey, the charity’s founder.

Everything earned at the South Baltimore site goes toward youth engagement in Baltimore – the kind of programs Neal Carter, the nonprofit’s youth empowerment director, leads.

“Just about all the work we do is relational,” Carter explained to WMAR. “And a lot of that work is revolved around youth-driven activities. Whether that’s music or media, culinary classes, training classes for different jobs or whatever skills they want to pursue with their dreams or their goals.”

The …