10th Annual Trail Clean-Up

[Laurel]

Chris was awesome, both he and Kathy were a lot of fun to ride with.

[Trail_Fanatic]

Shows that the people who are closing trails are actually good folks - they just need us to "educate" them on what we want kept.

Kathy is the Recreation Planner for the Baldwin District.
She has to sign off on any new route designatin we want to do in the future. I'll bet she's a lot more willing now!

[MIhummer]

Me & my kids had a great time, met lots of fun people & enjoyed helping out, glad we could be a part of it...it taught them a great deal about our responsibilities to the outdoors...couldn't believe the loads of crap we hauled out of that Dalton area...it was a shame to see it all there, and disheartening that we couldn't get it all.

Thanks Pat, great job coordinating! We'll be there next year.

[Trail_Fanatic]

You people ROCK!



Every year I'm AMAZED at your generosity and dedication to the trails and the event.

I can't thank you enough for coming out!

YOU are the TRUE environmentalists!



Preliminary totals look like 150 yards of trash and 525 tires this year.

I have to figure the shingle amount yet.

That brings us to 900 cubic yards and 3,450 tires total for the event's run!

That's AWESOME!



Registrations were down roughly 17%, but with the economy in the crapper, that's a lot less loss than I thought we might see. I was worried we might see as much as a 50% reduction.

But no, you care too much to let that happen.

To be honest; I find it touching.



This year, I would have NEVER imagined that 90 cubic yards of dumpster space wouldn't hold the trash from ONE teany, tiny, short, little, lousy piece of road!



I have to laugh at myself for being a poor judge of space, I guess . . .

I thought 3, 30 yard dumpsters would be enough for both the nasty road and the dead end counterpart (on the south side of that same little lake) to be completely cleaned.



BOY! Was I wrong!

I can DEFINITELY tell you were there, but there's still so much more to be done!



There was a little dead end trail not far from the Area 10 Dumpsters that I have NEVER been down because the trash pile blocking it predates my having a driver's license. It's now open, so I went down it . . .



Right to another area FILLED with crap!

The amount of trash out there is absolutely U-N-B-E-L-I-E-V-A-B-L-E-!!!



BUT!!!



IT IS WORKING!



The volunteers in Area 4 spent 2-1/2 hours driving every trail in their area - and didn't even find so much as an empty cigarette wrapper! That place was just as trashed as many of the roads in Area 10 (well maybe not quite THAT bad).

Now? NOTHING BUT FOREST!



SO, I guess that brings us to the question . . .



Do we want to keep at it and go out again next year?

[Trail_Fanatic]

We'll be there next year.

Thanks!
Guess we have your vote!

[jeepfreak81]

WOW!!!

What a FANTASTIC turn out!!!

I looked out the door at 9:00am (the 'supposed' end of registration) and couldn't see the end of the line!

I know I saw all of you, but the day was such a blur of activity, I don't remember 5 minutes of the entire thing! I hope you all had a good enough time to come back next year. This is REALLY starting to draw the attention of both decision and policy makers - in a great way!

181 people signed in with an estimated 3,580 man hours of labor donated for the event.



We hauled 100 cubic yards of trash, 645 tires, and 35 gallons of an unknown liquid I'm going to list as oil.

We turned over 3 pieces of evidence that will hopefully lead to citations.

The National Forest Service brought out a fire truck for the kids, as well as sending 2 people to work, a PR person from the head office, and Les Russell - the Baldwin District Ranger. They presented the Two Trackers with the Gold Level (Highest) Presidential Volunteer Award that came with a gorgeous plaque and a letter from President Bush. They also presented an official Forest Service edition Leatherman to me for acting as lead coordinator over the last decade. Baldwin Interdisciplinary Team Leader, Christopher Frederick, even took the time to sit down and compose a beautiful poem titled "The Volunteer Spirit of the Forest" just for the event(Below this post).

The DNR sent out both of the COs who work the project area. I thought that it was an especially nice gesture considering it was supposed to be Mr. Simpson's day off!

I'd like to thank:

Geoff Hansen - State Representative 100th District
Mary Valentine - State Representative 91st District
David Farhat - President Muskegon Chapter Pheasants Forever, Former State Representative 91st District
Jan Kutnz - Republican Party Senator Van VanWoerkom's Office
Charles Buzzell - Muskegon County Commissioner District 2
Marvin Engle - Muskegon County Commissioner District 5
Don Studaven - Blue Lake Township Supervisor
Marion Knash - Blue Lake Township Assessor
Kate Kremmel - Cedar Creek Township Zoning Administrator
Sharon Ackerman - Cedar Creek Township Treasurer
Jim Muston - Cedar Creek Township Supervisor
Kate Salm - Forest Service Public Relations Officer
Less Russell - Forest Service Baldwin District Ranger
Chris Fredericks - Forest Service Baldwin District Interdisciplinary Team Leader
Kathy Bietau - Forest Service Baldwin Trails Coordinator
Chris Pearson - Peterson's Off Road Magazine Reporter

- for their attendance and assistance in raising awareness of illegal dumping and the Michigan Coalition for Clean Forests program.

The Two Trackers Four Wheel Drive Club's Clean Up Committee - there's NO way I could have done this alone!

ALL of our financial and raffle donors: Star Customs, Forest Hills Foods, Pot Luck Pick Up, SWS Waste Services, Kool Toyota, Van Andel & Flikema Jeep, Harvey Hummer, and over 30 others!

I'd like to ESPECIALLY thank all of YOU!

We couldn't do it without you!

Pat, do they do any advertising of the event in the local general area? IE posting signs on the roads to be cleaned for the day of the event? I was airing up my tire in area 10 and had some locals stop to ask what we were doing. When I told them they asked me to pass on a HUGE THANK YOU as they said it has been this way for years and getting worse.

Might be cool even just to have some posterboard signs saying 'Trail cleanup in progress' or something so the locals know whats going on and that someone cares.

[Trail_Fanatic]

Not a whole lot, but some.


I was REALLY tired last night when I came home and posted this.
Doug pointed out that I posted it to LAST years Clean Up post.

Oops!

I'll continue this over in the right thread.