Sign-ups now available for the Broome County Riverbank Cleanup

BINGHAMTON (WBNG) - Broome County is now looking for participation in this year’s Riverbank Cleanup. Slots are open for the one-day beautification effort to happen in Oct. 21.

“We have beautiful rivers, like the one behind me, and we just need to take care of them,” said Planner Gillian Sloan with Broome County Department of Planning and Economic Development. “This event not only helps with education about the rivers, but it also helps eliminate a lot of the solid waste that goes into the rivers.”

Come next month, Sandy Beach Park will be one of the many places to clean for a few hours as part of the decades-long Riverbank Cleanup effort. Volunteers are able to choose from over 30 locations, but organizers are open to the idea of participants selecting their own sites. For 2023, there will be a continuation of last year’s effort to expand efforts beyond riverbank sites.

“We do have sites outside of that, but we’re looking for more sites if there are certain places that we don’t know about,” said Sloan. “They do have to be municipally owned. So that would be in your towns, villages, cities, anywhere like that.”

This year, the ideal vision is to have about 200 volunteers to gather two tons of trash. Last year, the groups did 1.7 tons of trash removal.

In most cases, it’s one group per site. However, collaborations may have to happen for smaller groups or for individual volunteers.

“We’ll make that call,” said Sloan. “We’ll do the coordination through our committee and kind of make that known to each of the stream captains.”

Vinyl gloves, educational materials, bags and stickers for the bags will be provided to attendees. To get involved and to see the interactive map, head to this website.

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