Lacey O’Grady, an Enumclaw resident, organized her fifth annual Green River cleanup Aug. 25. O’Grady is a young woman who was born and raised in southeast King County. A few years ago some friends from out of town came to visit her. She told them what a wonderful place the Green River was and sent them out to float a beautiful section of the river in August when the weather is warm and the river flows are languid and inviting.

When they returned they said they had a great time, but they couldn’t believe the amount of garbage they saw in the section of river they floated. They said there was garbage along the shores and floating in the river itself.

She was so embarrassed that she had sent them out to enjoy this beautiful river and the vision they came back with was of garbage tossed carelessly in the river. So she decided to do something about it. She decided to rally her friends and people she had met as a student at Green River Community College and through her jobs. Five years ago the first “Clean the Green” was started.

This year more than 50 locals showed up to pitch in to “Clean the Green”.

I attended as the executive director of Middle Green River Coalition to see what the event was all about. As a photographer I wanted to document the event. I had participated in and documented another event held in May where a group of the Washington recreation river runners (whitewater boaters) and friends of the green (regional conservationists) have organized a Green River cleanup for the past 25 years. Now there was a new cleanup and as a local I wanted to see what we were doing to help “Clean the Green”.

The advantage to the May clean up is that with rafts you can carry more garbage, but the advantage to O’Grady’s approach of a late summer float on inner tubes and small rafts is that there is more garbage from the summer activities that is retrievable in the slow moving waters.

By documenting the Aug. 21st event I wanted to show what can happen when a small group of dedicated locals, like O’Grady and her friends, can do to clean up their river and make a difference in their community.

O’Grady had her crews float three sections of the river. I decided to float the section from Flaming Geyser State Park down to the Whitney Bridge, which is a mile or two west of the park. I knew that there would be a large amount of trash because this is one of the most accessible parts of the river. On any hot summer day the area is packed with people along it’s shorelines and floating in the river.

I wasn’t wrong. The amount of discarded garbage was unbelievable. We pulled out plastic bottles, cans, countless single flip flops, cigarette butts, baby diapers and other garbage. At the end of this two-to-three mile section of river we had a mountain of garbage including three discarded rafts.

While it was completely disheartening to see the amount of garbage thoughtless people had discarded in the river it was inspiring to see a group of local people come out because they care about the river in their backyard and wanted to do something to make a difference.

We had people thank us for picking up the garbage as we floated down the river. What at first looked like a typical group of people floating the river in inner tubes just laughing and having a good time soon revealed itself to be something different. A group of local people who were having a great time on the river picking up trash instead of thoughtlessly throwing it into the river.