First Clean-up
The first gathering went well! Twelve of us showed up this time. We were expecting a handful more, but the threat of bad weather and unexpected last minute issues kept some of them away.
Despite the light threat of rain, only boots and pant cuffs got wet from dew on the vegetation. The rain clouds had already clear out. Overcast skies, and 50 degree temps kept us pretty cool, even though some of us overdressed and got a little warm.
We manage to pick up somewhere between 20 and 25 bags between 10:45 and noon. We found a lot of normal refuse like cans, bottles, wrappers, cigarette butts, etc. But we also ran across some more interesting items such as an abandoned tire iron, dear skull, a blown out tire, and even a "throw away" cell phone.
A Pioneer Press reporter, Nick Ferraro, came to check out the event after seeing our press release. He wrote a piece on us that appeared in the Monday, October 26th, 2009 edition on the front page below the fold. The online version is here. IMO, it's a pretty favorable article and even garnered quite a few appreciative reader comments.
How many of us were carrying? I can't honestly say. We didn't make this event about open carry. I didn't look hard and only saw a couple OWB holsters peeking out from below jackets or sweatshirts. But I think most of us were.
I want to thank Jason for running the press release, bstrawse for hosting this site and domain, and everyone who came out to pick up (some of them their own sites). Look forward to a more of these in the future. We need to do it at least a couple times a year, but I expect we'll be doing 3-4 in 2010, as conditions require.
- Evan
