Giving Yosemite a facelift: 1,300 volunteers clean up after busy summer

YOSEMITE, Calif. ( KSEE/KGPE ) – More than 1,300 people are volunteering to clean up Yosemite National Park this week.

The annual Yosemite Facelift project aims to clear away the remnants of the busy summer season, preparing the park for the following year.

“We certainly don’t have the staff. You know, we don’t have people that can go out and pick up the litter,” Park Ranger Scott Gediman said.

The event is from Sept. 25 until Sept. 29 and organizers welcome anyone able to lend a hand.

“There are people who are going up and cleaning ropes and gear off of [high peaks]. That’s not my ministry. My ministry is a little bit more on the valley floor and just picking up things that we’re seeing,” volunteer Langston Avery said.

This was Avery’s first year participating, but others like George Ridgley and Jim Painter have volunteered for each of the event’s 21 years, helping to clean up more than 1 million pounds of trash.

“When you have a beautiful place like Yosemite, very picturesque, and there’s trash everywhere, well, it takes away from everything,” Painter said.

“We’re just really grateful and thankful for people taking time out of their lives to come up and help clean up Yosemite National Park,” Gediman said.

Rock climber Ken Yager birthed the project more than two decades ago and believes he has truly made a difference over the years.

“This year it seems really clean, and I’ve noticed the park is cleaner and cleaner every year,” Yager said.

Yager says Yosemite’s beauty makes it easy to collect volunteers every year. Many sign up day of.

Some of the volunteers are regular park users who believe it is their responsibility to keep Yosemite clean.

“I feel like this place offers space for people to kind of clean themselves from the toxic stuff coming from the world in work, the rat race and things like that. So this is an internal and external cleanup effort,” Avery said.

Avery says people do not have to volunteer for a specific cleanup event to make a difference.

He says anytime visitors pick up a piece of trash off the ground in Yosemite, they help to keep the great outdoors great.

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