Mill River Clean Up Shows Year to Year Improvement

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Mill River Assault Team – Left to Right: Nick Hurlin, Marlene Schroeder, Thomas Wooldridge, Natalie Wooldridge, Amy Madden, Max Madden, Jack Van Loan, Jack Monaghan, Chett Walsh, Tom Schultz, Mike O’Neill, Behind the lens – John LeJeune

Nor’East TU joined forces with the Parker River Clean Water Association for another battle against trash on the Mill River. The team labored fiercely for over an hour and a half yielding more than 20 man hours dedicated to trash removal at the Rowley/Newbury line put in. Fourteen bags of trash were collected and disposed of thanks to neighbor and friend of Mill River, Chris Latham. Chris facilitated the disposal of the trash collected via private trash collection. Although there was still a large volume of trash removed it is an improvement over last year’s efforts that yielded large appliances an amazing amount of cans and bottles along with paper and plastic trash of all kinds. This year’s team was able to really scour the area on both sides of the highway and remove every visible piece of trash in the area. Many items which became exposed due to the heavy snows of last winter were literally dug up from the river banks by the team. There was little debris in the water this year a welcome improvement over last year. We hope that keeping the area clean will encourage would-be polluters to think twice about defacing this beautiful part of the Mill River waterway. Following the clean-up, Thomas Wooldridge produced an amazing lunch for members to enjoy. Kudos to all who participated it was a fun and rewarding event. Special thanks again goes to Chris Latham for solving the disposal problem.

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Chris Latham crossed the river to collect another bag of trash for the clean up.