The City of Guelph is expecting a record number of groups to participate in this year’s Clean and Green initiative, an activity to celebrate Earth Day by volunteers cleaning up the city on Saturday, April 27.
The 16th annual Clean and Green initiative expects approximately 1,200 people and more than 180 different groups that include individuals, families, community groups and businesses to assist in cleaning up trails, parks, roadways and various different places across the city.
Last year, the event saw over 1,300 volunteers contributing to the cleanup that collected 3,000 kg of garbage and collectively helped clean 57 parks, and 61 trails and roadways despite the fact that the event was postponed due to an ice storm.
“It's the biggest if not the second-biggest. It's certainly the most number of groups that we've ever had,” said supervisor of trails and natural areas Dave Beaton.
Beaton said the event continues to grow and improve each year as the organizers learn from previous years.
“With more involvement were able to get more thorough and get into more areas than in previous years,” said Beaton.
Beaton said the parks department doesn't have the people power to complete this cleanup so the community involvement makes a significant difference.
Since 2007, 40,000 kg of waste has been cleared out of the city by this effort.
The city also partnered with HIV/AIDS Resources and Community Health (ARCH) for the second year in a row this year. ARCH provides training for safety precautions for their Pins and Needles program, an initiative where volunteers go around the city picking up discarded syringes.
“Needles are a small but distressing issue in our community and our Park staff do an incredible job of keeping parks clean and clear of that,” said Beaton.
“Fighting needles as part of clean and green is relatively rare. Last year there was less than 10 found for the whole city it is not a major component of the cleanup we hope to have people from the cleanup support ARCH to have this on an ongoing basis to keep the community safe,” said Beaton.
“We're very pleased to have such an activist community in the city that takes pride in our parks and our community. That's incredible.”
Registration for this program was open from March 1 to April 21. Volunteers are asked to arrive at their chosen location by 8:30 a.m. The clean up is open for everyone and will take place between 8:30 and 11:30 a.m.