Lincoln is family for Anthony Bersamin

COVID-19 has pushed many community members to do more for each other than ever before, but for those who have always done all they can, it is another moment to put their skills to work. Lincoln resident Anthony Bersamin, 38, is one of those Good Samaritans who saw COVID-19 as another opportunity to find community members who needed help. As stores shut, reduced hours or changed their operations, residents scavenged across the internet looking for food, toilet paper, clothes and other items. "I said there needs to be a one-stop shop resource where people can go aside from Google, because that information is not always the most accurate, to get this information and have some transparency," said Bersamin, who works for a private security company. After partnering with fellow Lincoln resident Richard Buss and meeting with Lincoln Area Chamber of Commerce executive director Tom Indrieri, Bersamin and Buss created Lincoln CA Connect on March 21 To collect the hours of operation and how places were operating, Bersamin called each store and collected as much information as he could to add to the website. The website became a lifeline for residents to find out when senior shopping hours were, if a store provided curbside pick up and for store owners who wanted to let residents know that they were still open. "I am not just a person who likes to talk about something and then once I leave the conversation, that's it," Bersamin said. "I like to come up with ideas and then completely follow through with them." Another part of the community hurting from the quarantine's consequences that Bersamin wanted to help was Lincoln High School's Class of 2020. Bersamin was proud of the students' strength "to lose so much from their year in school and still hold their heads high." To support his community's students, Bersamin posted on Facebook that he would offer free photo shoots to seniors in downtown Lincoln. "It was just something where I had a little bit of equipment and the knowledge as far as photography is concerned so why not use it in a positive way and give the kids and their parents, more so even, the gift of this snapshot in life that they are never going to get back," Bersamin said. In the first week, five residents replied and, after that, an additional 50 parents and seniors asked for their photos to be taken. By the end of all of the shoots, Bersamin delivered several hundreds of photos between 53 seniors. "The photos may seem like a small thing now, but in 20 years or 30 years, when those kids are looking and the parents are looking back, I think it will be a positive memory of an otherwise tumultuous senior year," Bersamin said. These community-minded acts are not the first that Bersamin has carried out during his 10 years of living in Lincoln. Sacramento became home for Bersamin after moving from San Francisco at age 10. In 2010, Bersamin looked for a home in the Roseville/Rocklin area but didn't find anything that worked. His Realtor suggested that they "go up north a few minutes to check out Lincoln." With a more affordable and growing market, Bersamin decided to settle down in Lincoln. Shortly after moving here, Bersamin received a call that his grandmother was very sick in San Francisco and the family was unsure how much time she had left. He immediately drove to San Francisco to see her. "So she ended up pulling through that night, but a few days later, it was the same situation and we went down there and by the time I got down there, she was gone," Bersamin said. "I didn't grow up with a mom so she was kind of that motherly figure for me." During that first visit with his grandmother, Bersamin was reminded of the importance she placed on serving the community with absolute selflessness. "She would always volunteer places; she would always give her time. If anybody ever needed anything, she was one of those people in the community that you could go to," Bersamin said. "I think that is a mentality that I have been trying to channel." Bersamin said that seeing his grandmother during her final days gave him a new perspective of what he wants to leave behind in this world when it is his time to go. "Was my life beneficial? Did I accomplish everything that I wanted to accomplish? Did I raise my family and were they successful because of the work that I put in?" Bersamin said. While Bersamin was a part of the community before his grandmother's passing, he became even more determined to be like her.. In 2014, Bersamin became a part of the Fourth of July Committee after he ran a T-shirt fundraiser for the group. "I am also a part of the Downtown Lincoln Associations events and marketing team so we put together special campaigns together to draw people into the downtown and help those businesses thrive," Bersamin said. After the Fourth of July Committee lost its nonprofit status from partnering with the Lincoln Community Foundation and was about to cancel the annual holiday celebration in Lincoln, Bersamin stepped up as chairman. He began the process for the committee to become a nonprofit organization. Bersamin and other committee members also urged the Lincoln City Council to give them a permit to hold the event, after they had spent months securing contracts and vendors for the fireworks show. "In thinking about it, there are so many positive things about this community, even when there are politics or negative things happen. I still think that the positives far outway any of the negatives," Bersamin said. While Bersamin is fueled to support his community to continue the legacy of his grandmother, he said the Lincoln community motivates him just as much. "I just can't say enough positive things about the people in this community and they step up and answer the call," Bersamin said. "It is really just a great place to live and I tell everybody that is not from this area that they can't understand how great it is until you have lived it." As a single father of two young girls, Bersamin said he also wants to create a better community for them and to show them that your actions go farther than your words. "The work that I do is primarily for my kids," Bersamin said. "I think above anything else, being a father is the most important job that I will ever have, so with that in mind, I try to model what I do in the community as something positive they can maybe aspire to be a part of."