Sat 4/29 @ 9AM-noon
You know what’s really depressing? Taking a walk almost anywhere and passing a park or lawn or vacant lot or public garden and seeing it strewn with fast food bags and plastic bottles and soft drink cans. Stopping at a highway off ramp one day in Lakewood, we saw a chain-link fence festooned with garbage people had thrown out of their cars. Trash is everywhere and it seems like there’s just no way to educate people about this mountain of litter.
Instead of seething about it (and I do a lot of that!), lift your spirits by joining the Cuyahoga Soil & Water Conservation District and Big Creek Connects for their 24th Annual Big Creek Watershed Clean Up this weekend.
Will there be trash there to pick up? You can count on it! Volunteers should meet a one of three locations: Brookfield on Brookfield Avenues between Bellaire and West 130th, the Brooklyn City Fire Department at 8400 Memphis Avenue, or the Snow Road Picnic Area along Big Creek Parkway. Dress to work — long sleeves and pants and sturdy boots or work shoes are recommended. They’ll provide trash bags and gloves. Thoughtless jerks have provided the trash.
“Healthy streams are not only vital for a healthy environment, but also for a healthy economy,” they say. “Water from all our streams in Cuyahoga County eventually flows into Lake Erie. Lake Erie is not only the source of our drinking water, but also provides us with recreational and economic benefits. Volunteers will gain an understanding of how streams work and evolve, potential threats that can affect the health of a stream, and what they can do to reduce or eliminate those threats.”
Put that empty bottle or can in a trash receptacle!