Volunteers Pick Up Trash, Comments Youth Club Members Don Orange Vests, Raise Funds
They just didn’t understand those orange vests.
Drivers yelled dim-bulb cracks like “Work harder!” at the kids who walked up Government Way, scooping trash as they went. But the young refuse-maintenance engineers weren’t on work release. They were 11 volunteers who rounded up a litter-al ton of trash Sunday to raise money for Pathfinders, a Seventh-Day Adventist group. It will pay for their planned camping trip.
But the real jungle may have been roadside - the orange vests with the bright yellow stripes inspired some folks to heckle.
“We should have had a sign,” said a grinning Ben Rodriguez, a Pathfinders dad. “I don’t want people to think it’s a correctional-type thing.”
The volunteers picked up 2,000 pounds of roadside garbage before noon, said Debbie Henderson, whose husband, Roger, directs the program. The whole ton was found before they got a mile north of their starting point, Hanley Avenue.
“It’s amazing there’s that much trash in a small space,” Henderson said.
They hoped to collect 3,500 pounds by day’s end. That’s because the more trash they weighed in, the more money pledgers would donate. What did they find?
“A hubcap - I did,” chirped 10-year-old Matt Maniscalco.
Reuben Rodriguez, 9, found cigarettes. Greg Nehlich, 9, found old chunks of wood and wrappers.
They also found rusty car parts. Scratched lottery tickets. A bra. A dead seagull. A dollar. All of it (except the dollar) went into plastic bags and into the back of a truck.
One boy was inventive, using the end of a fishing pole to poke litter into its plastic place.
At the end of the day they would get a nutritious meal of nachos and ice cream. After they wash up, anyway.
But during the trek up Government Way, spirits were light. The sky was a clear, pale blue; and the sun actually made Greg a little too warm. Or was it the oversized, Tool Time-looking work gloves he wore?
Wasn’t that fun?
Silence.
Well? “Kinda,” said Matt.
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color photo