Communities spend weekend cleaning up Hundreds lend a hand in Bangor

BANGOR – Julie-Ann Splan, an 8-year-old pupil at Downeast School, was one of hundreds of city children who gave up some of their Saturday morning playtime to help clean up 17 city parks, schoolyards and other public places.

As a result of the project, several sites around the city are clear of a winter’s accumulation of trash. In addition, Splan’s participation helped her meet the public service requirement for a $1,000 Camp Bangor Scholarship from the Libra Foundation.

Splan said she plans to use the scholarship to enroll in a YMCA-sponsored day camp this summer.

Michael Smith, 10, and his mother, Tammy, also took part.

“We’ve been pretty much doing it for a couple of years now,” Tammy Smith said. Among the trash the two collected were lots of plastic bags and corrugated cardboard, a discarded barbecue grill and old skill saw blades.

Now in its fifth year, the citywide cleanup was jointly sponsored by United Way, the city’s Parks and Recreation and Public Works departments and Keep Bangor Beautiful. It also is supported by local businesses.

This year’s event drew more than 400 participants, many of them adults, according to Erica Salenius, an AmeriCorps Promise Fellow youth volunteer.

Besides camp-bound children and their families, volunteers on hand came from the General Electric plant and UnitedKingfield Bank.

Salenius said Matt Oakes of the city’s Public Works Department reported that volunteers collected an estimated 250 bags of trash.

Afterward, volunteers headed to Stillwater Park on Howard Street, where they were treated to a free barbecue and children’s activities, including a bounce house, art projects with Windover Art Center and a goal challenge with All Pro Soccer.

Sara Yasner, administrator of the Camp Bangor program, said the citywide cleanup also launched this year’s Lend A Hand Month observances, aimed at encouraging workplace, family, church and civic group volunteers to support area social services agencies by completing one-day service projects.

To sign up for a Lend A Hand project, visit United Way of Eastern Maine’s Web site at www.unitedwayem.org.