More than 1,000 volunteers put on their mud boots and rolled up their sleeves Saturday, cleaning up Quad City water ways one piece of trash at a time. It was all part of Living Lands and Waters Xstream Cleanup. This year volunteers picked up a total of 47,407 pounds of trash.
In that heaping pile were 658 tires,16 appliances, and even a wedding dress. While there's no doubt that is a lot of stuff, organizers said those numbers are actually down compared to last year's cleanup. They said it goes to show just how big of an impact the event has on our community.
"Overall things are getting better and better," Volunteer Curtis Lundy said.
Lundy has been sprucing up our waterways since Xstream Cleanup started 9 years ago. He said a big reason the waters and shore lines have a bit more sparkle is because of awareness.
"Young kids, they just don't throw stuff away. It used to be a common habit, now, uh-uh can't do that. It's gratifying to see that."
There were plenty of kids Saturday, flexing their muscles and doing their part.
"It's kind of fun, yet, it's not really exciting to see the litter people have put around the river and streams," Boy Scout Blake Robinson said.
Robinson, along with other Boy Scouts, followed their code, and left the area "cleaner than when they found it."
While young and old at 43 different sites did just that, others, got really dirty sorting through additional trash straight off the Living Lands and Water's barge.
"About 200 people came down and did 65,000 pounds. We've set a record for this organization for number of people and number of pounds recycled," said Chad Pregracke, Founder of Living Lands and Waters.
Working quickly and efficiently, volunteers were able to recycle 30,000 pounds of the garbage. Another year and another victory for Xstream cleanup.
"It's just awesome every year, next year going to be the 10th so stay tuned," Lundy said.
