A mural completed over the summer, resonating even more this Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the city of Scranton honoring his life and legacy year round, through art.

"I have decided to stick with love, hate is too great a burden to bear." Those are the words painted on the 20-foot by 60-foot mural on Adams Avenue in Downtown Scranton.

“We really liked that quote, because it embodies the importance of love and forgiveness. It's just a timeless message," said artist Eric Bussart who painted "The Dream" mural with his partner Emmanuel Wisdom who completed the lettering.

“We just wanted to make something uplifting and brilliant for the community, something really colorful and powerful and just have a nice, pure message. We thought that Martin Luther King was a timeless symbol that sort of embodied everything we wanted to communicate with that mural," said Bussart.

Bussart said the mural took about 100 hours to complete. It was made possible through funding from the Lackawanna County Arts and Culture Department and the Scartelli family.

“It was really important for us to make our city look more appealing and beautify it, but also utilizing a lot of local artists and local students to make that possible. So, I'm glad that I could have been a part of it and been part of the community because there's so many beautiful murals and different things around the city, especially the MLK one is absolutely gorgeous," said Amber Viola, a Navy veteran and social worker, who worked for the city of Scranton when the mural was commissioned.

"As a person, a black woman living here in the city, you know, we don't have a huge black population here. We don't have a huge minority population, so it was really nice. It was really nice to feel kind of represented and seen with that. It made me it made me very happy and very proud to be a Scrantonian," said Viola.

Ty Holmes, the president of the NAACP of Lackawanna County, said the mural has been a big inspiration for the community.

“I've heard several people say 'I was moved by it, I was, you know, I joined because I saw that picture and it reminded me that I have a bigger purpose.' So that mural is just another reminder to people that through art, through music, through protests, through writing, there are many ways to go about effecting change, so long as you are acting ethically trying to do that, then great. That's that's all that matters, and that is what Dr. King would want from all of us today," said Holmes he says we should remember Dr. King everyday and the mural is a great place to start.

The NAACP of Lackawanna County said they are standing in solidarity with the King family in not celebrating Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday today. Instead, they are using their voices to call on Congress to pass voting rights legislation that they say preserves the rights of voters and strengthens democracy.