Volunteers beautify Mingo, area parks on Earth Day
Photos: Katherine Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
Sophia Misner, left, tosses trash into a bag held by her friend and fellow Trinity Environmental Club member Ava Campman. Both high school juniors were proud to be part of the Earth Day clean up at Mingo County Park Saturday.
Katherine Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
Patrick Caffrey, of Washington, walks-and-beautifies his way through Mingo Saturday morning, where he and about 19 other volunteers spent a few hours ridding the park of litter. Caffrey said this was his first time participating in the Washington County Parks and Recreation Earth Day clean-up.
Photos: Katherine Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
Roger Shaw holds open a trash bag for his buddy Bernie Slezak, left, who adds trash to the duo’s litter collection. Shaw and Slezak spent Saturday morning volunteering at their first Mingo County Park Earth Day clean-up, but Slezak said they try to participate in clean-ups throughout the area.
Katherine Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
Enna Schybert-Mielnik, 7, shows off the ballon she fished from Mingo Creek to her sister Nora, 5, Saturday morning. The girls volunteered for the Earth Day clean-up, hosted by Washington County Parks and Recreation, with their dad Uli Schubert-Mielnik.
Enna and Nora Schubert-Mielnik darted to and fro, inspecting anything remotely resembling trash and proudly bagging litter in Mingo County Park Saturday morning as part of the Washington County Parks and Recreation’s annual Earth Day Clean Up.
The Schubert-Mielniks, 7 and 5, respectively, disregarded the forecast’s calls for rain and spent the morning beautifying Mingo with their father, Uli Schubert-Mielnik, under overcast skies.
The rain held off for the event.
“We’re from Bethel Park. We like to come here,” said Uli Schubert-Mielnik, following his enthusiastic daughters along the creekbed, where the girls fished a bright orange balloon from the water. “We wanted to come help clean up for Earth Day.”
About 20 people gathered at Shelter 4 Saturday morning for the Earth Day clean-up event. Volunteers received trash bags and gloves donated by PennDOT and instructions from Sarah Bujanowski, program coordinator for Washington County Parks and Recreation.
“We’re pretty blessed,” said Bujanowski. “We just are happy for anyone to show up and help out. I think it goes to show how much people really care about this park and what it means to them to have something like this in Washington County.”
Mingo and all the county’s parks and watersheds are meaningful to Bernie Slezak and Roger Shaw, both of Eighty Four, who spent the morning scouring the creek for trash and pitching it.
“This is where we live. You take care of where you live. Nobody else is going to do it,” said Shaw, affiliated with the Chartiers Creek Watershed Association. “They’ve done studies. If you beautify where you live, people litter less.”
Beautification efforts at Mingo seemed to pay off Saturday, where Trinity High School junior Sophia Misner said, “I expected there to be more (litter).”
Misner and her friend Ava Campman, both Trinity’s Environmental Club members, have participated in other clean-ups, including one at Washington Park. As avid outdoorswomen, the two agreed that keeping area parks clean is a cause that is dear to them.
“It feels nice to know that we’re doing something,” Campman, a junior, said. “Global warming and climate change can be kind of concerning, but knowing that we’re doing something, at least, makes it a little bit better.”
“We’re learning about the importance of keeping things clean because pollution is hurting the environment. It just feels morally good,” Misner added.
While the high schoolers worked together to spruce up Mingo, Patrick Caffrey sped along the park’s meandering roadways, bending, but never entirely stopping, to pick up cigarette butts, bolts and other litter.
“I love the park. When I walk, I tend to pick up litter,” Caffrey said, noting that he’s informally adopted a few of his neighborhood roads. “It’s Earth Day, so it’s good to do things for the Earth.”
Like Misner and Campman, Caffrey is concerned about the Earth’s health, but his worries come in waves. He said he’s primarily hopeful for the future.
“We can make things better,” Caffrey said, doubling back to scan the other side of the road before heading to the park’s outskirts to clean areas folks hadn’t yet reached on foot.
Following the clean up, which ran from 10 a.m. to noon, volunteers returned with full trash bags to Shelter 4, where litter was disposed of, and hot dogs – grilled to perfection by Bujanowski – and bottled water waited.
Bujanowski was pleased to see folks volunteering on Earth Day but said Mingo visitors are a generally great, conscientious group.
“I don’t think that Earth Day makes a difference,” she said. “I think that every day people are loving the park and looking after it. When people see trash, they pick it up. They just really care about the well-being of it. The main part is to bring people to the park. We just want people here to enjoy it.”
For more information on Mingo and other county parks or a list of upcoming events, visit co.washington.pa.us/164/Parks-Recreation.