On Saturday May 6, 2016, many of the “usual” suspects, and a few new ones, gathered at West Creek Reservation for RiverSweep 2016.   RiverSweep is a coordinated effort among many environmental groups to clean-up and beautify the creeks and rivers in northeastern Ohio every year on the Saturday before Mother’s Day.  It is volunteerism done in ½ day.

For the ninth consecutive year, NEOCHMM has helped out the West Creek Conservancy, aka the “WCC,” in Parma, Ohio, off of Pleasant Valley and Broadview Roads.  Starting in 2007,  the “usual” was for NEOCHMM to dig, hoist, pull, drag and recycle shopping carts embedded in ‘cart dams’ along West Creek.   It was ‘usual’ for NEOCHMM’s own Herb Mausser, distinguished by his blue bandana, to find and remove at least on shopping cart from the stream.  It was ‘usual’ for ‘soccer dad’ Ken Doyle, Parma Normandy HS Class of ’73, to exhort student volunteers from his alma mater, to find and remove even more shopping carts and litter from West Creek.  It was “usual,” for one of NEOCHMM’s originals, Elise Allen to move the Chapter forward, by carrying a lot of the Chapter’s baggage, i.e. rocks, in her backpack.   It was “usual” for Venky Venkatesh, to make one of his, now patented, ‘safety slides,’ to prevent tools and supplies from falling into the river.   And, it was “usual” for Heather Drouin, to lead by example and to have her children ‘volunteer’ in the cleanup effort.

Fast forward to 2016 and ‘the usual’ still occurs, but with a different outcome.   Only a few shopping carts are found West Creek, so much so, that Herb’s streak of finding one each year, is in serious jeopardy. (The bandana is wearing out, too.)  Much less litter is now found in the creek and Ken may have to take up golf.  Elise may have to jettison all the rocks and resume the hunt for the “Lucky Nickel.” (Elise does not know that the Lucky Nickel resides at the bottom of Mark Baumgardner’s cupholder for pens at work. –Baumgardner doesn’t use pens any more either.)  Venky is going to have to give up some of his “safety slides,” or face an OSHA Letter of Interpretation.  Heather now volunteers and makes examples of both her daughter and son-in-law.

The ‘usual suspects’ now spend their time planting cuttings of Willow and Dogwood, in the wetland areas of West Creek, so to retain more sediment and water upstream during flooding events. In 2016, with the help of a new suspect, Jim, “the Safety Man”, Chambers, two large Hickory trees were also planted along the flanks of West Creek.  NEOCHMM provided a donation to WCC and planted one of these trees in honor of Herbert Mausser, Herb’s dad, who passed away earlier in 2016.

Our thanks to Derek Schafer, and all those at WCC for hosting RiverSweep, as well as all NEOCHMM’s ‘usual suspects,’ that helped make this a successful day. Please save the date of Saturday, May 13, 2017, for RiverSweep 2017.   Everyone is welcome to participate.