On Sunday, October 17th more than 200 students from the University at Albany volunteered at the Pine Hills Clean Up. The bi-annual event involves students assembling at a local City of Albany park, breaking into teams and then dispersing into the community seeking any trash/litter than can be found. Armed with work gloves, trash bags and garbage pickers the students spend approximately four hours in the neighborhood removing litter that would otherwise likely end up polluting our streams, rivers, and oceans.
The event is hosted twice a year, once in the spring and again in the fall, and the program is a collaborative between the University, City of Albany and the local Neighborhood Association. Student volunteers are often members of various organizations at the University such as fraternities/ sororities, sports teams, community service groups or other Student Association sponsored clubs. Members of the Pine Hills Neighborhood Association assist by staffing the event, setting up tables, distributing supplies and directing volunteers to parts of the community that are most in need of attention. The City of Albany’s Department of General Service provides all the cleaning materials (trash bags, gloves, brooms, shovels, garbage pickers, rakes, etc.) and at the conclusion of the event dispatches numerous waste management trucks to pick up the bagged trash.
City of Albany Mayor, Kathy Sheehan and Common Council Member, Owusu Anane stopped by the event on October 17th to thank those in attendance and stress the importance and impact of programs like this on the local community.
