‘Protecting our water’: Volunteers help clean around Grand River

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — Dozens of volunteers gathered in downtown Grand Rapids to help clean up along the Grand River Saturday morning.

It was the 21st year of the Mayor’s Grand River Clean Up . It started around 9 a.m. at Sixth Street Park. Volunteers heard from public officials and then grabbed gloves and bags to get to work cleaning up around the river.

The West Michigan Environmental Action Council said last year volunteers picked up more than seven thousand pounds of trash. The event is a week-long effort to promote keeping our waterways clean.

“It’s about protecting our water as Michiganders. It’s a lifeline. It’s a life source and we have to do our part to protect it. So many of the things that we fish out of this river and take from our communities and storm drains are manmade things,” Marshall Kilgore, the director of engagement for the council, said. “It’s a collective problem, pollution is. Now things like our clean up are a collective solution to these problems.”

Registered volunteers will be cleaning up sites along the river until Sept. 14. The event continues Sunday in East Grand Rapids. Volunteers will be able to clean up around Reeds Lake starting at 10 a.m.

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