Annual river cleanup returns to Athens-Clarke County

Katherine Davis  |  October 19, 2023

Athens-Clarke County will host the annual Rivers Alive cleanup, a volunteer event to remove trash from Athens waterways, on Saturday.

The event kickoff will begin at 8:30 a.m. in Dudley Park, after which volunteers will travel to 14 different cleanup locations. 

Rivers Alive is a statewide campaign aimed at education, awareness and community involvement in water resource preservation. The campaign encourages volunteers to get their hands dirty by removing litter from state waterways. According to the Georgia Rivers Alive website, 410,744 pounds of trash were collected statewide last year.

Stacy Smith, a Rivers Alive committee member, said that Athens-Clarke county has participated in the event for more than 20 years and that it brings together many different groups of people.

“We want our community to be clean and healthy and that’s something that we all need to pitch in together to make happen,” said Smith, a program education specialist for Keep Athens-Clarke County Beautiful.

Cleanup locations include areas along the North Oconee River, Brooklyn Creek, Carr Creek and Sandy Creek. Some sites have age restrictions due to potential hazards. For example, the Dudley Park at Trail Creek site is labeled not kid-friendly, due to poison ivy, steep slopes and an active construction area. Many of the sites offer both wet and dry cleanup options for volunteers and some areas are dry cleanups only.

All volunteers will receive a free T-shirt and one volunteer will be randomly selected to win a goodie bag from REI Co-op, one of the event sponsors. The goodie bag includes sunglasses, a dry bag, an REI gift card and more, according to the Athens-Clarke County Water Conservation Office . Volunteer sign-ups were open from Sept. 15 to Oct. 18.

“I just want to help out clean waterways,” said Bill Pevey, a third-year student at the University of Georgia who is volunteering at the event. “I really like the ocean, of course, and you know all rivers lead back to the ocean, so I’m big on taking trash out of rivers, minimizing pollution wherever we can.”

Many sponsors are environmentally focused companies and organizations, including REI Co-op, Koons Environmental Design and the Oconee Rivers Greenway Commission.

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Why I Wrote this Story

This story was an opportunity to learn more about sustainability in Athens beyond the University of Georgia’s campus and to practice social media coverage. It was also the first time I had to interview random people on the spot, rather than setting up a time and preparing for it. It was definitely tough for me to go up to strangers but I think with more practice I could become comfortable with it.