Philadelphia Athletic Recreation Center

A teenager named Geraldo addressed a crowd of volunteers assembled to renovate the century-old Philadelphia Athletic Recreation Center one May day in 2016. Outside the Center was the Sharswood neighborhood, with a skyrocketing poverty rate. Inside was a place where both kids and adults could thrive in athletics and the arts, and take steps to build a better community.

Geraldo told the 147 volunteers gathered for the Center’s “blitz build” renovation that the Center was one of the main reasons his life had turned in a positive direction.

But it takes more than well-meaning volunteers to bring hope to a neighborhood in need of some. It takes materials, donations and a healthy dose of technology in the form of an innovative coating that actually kills harmful bacteria* on the painted surface. In both the Center’s lobby and auditorium, volunteer painters applied Sherwin-Williams Paint Shield^®, the first EPA-registered microbicidal paint that kills more than 99.9% of harmful bacteria* within two hours of exposure on painted surfaces. And it continues to kill 90 percent of bacteria* even after repeated contamination, for up to four years when the integrity of the surface is maintained.

Paint Shield^® is the first EPA-registered microbicidal paint that kills more than 99.9% of harmful bacteria* within two hours of exposure on painted surfaces.

For Project Coordinator Sandra Ho, the donation of Paint Shield^® provided a very important value-added benefit. Ho works for CMD, a leading provider of construction information and the organizing partner supporting AEC Cares, the non-profit that coordinated “projectPhiladelphia” and other projects that have resulted in hurricane relief and homeless shelter renovations. CMD donated construction management and an architect’s services for projectPhiladelphia.

“These are high-traffic areas,” Ho says. “So to be able to use a coating that has the power to kill harmful bacteria* on painted surfaces such as Paint Shield^®, the application is certainly warranted.”

Mark Hagopian, a Sherwin-Williams division sales manager, suggested the use of Paint Shield^® when he learned of projectPhiladelphia.

“When we explained to them what Paint Shield^® could do, that was the attraction,” he says.

Not to mention that the available Paint Shield^® color palette matched the initial design.

“It looks amazing,” says Ho.