Volunteers Needed to Help Clean Loantaka Brook

Local Environmental Groups Plan to Battle Pollution for National River Cleanup Week

The Great Swamp Watershed Association (GSWA) and the Morris County Park Commission are planning to tackle pollution and clean up the Loantaka Brook in Morris Township on Saturday, June 9th, as part of National River Cleanup Week 2007. The public is encouraged and invited to help. The organized cleanup will take place from 9:30 a.m. to 12 noon and volunteers should meet at the Loantaka Brook Reservation South Street Pavilion in Morristown.

“We are dedicated to protecting Loantaka Brook because a healthy community starts with a healthy river. Our volunteers are excited to pitch in because a cleaner river is a healthier river,” said Kelley Curran, GSWA Director of Water Quality Programs.

National River Cleanup Week is presented by American Rivers and kicks off with a nationwide series of community-based stream cleanups the week of June 2-10, 2007. This popular annual event raises public awareness of the magnitude of trash accumulating in our nation’s waterways. Morris County volunteers will be joining tens of thousands of other volunteers across the country working at hundreds of cleanup sites to remove trash from local rivers and streams.

Loantaka Brook is the most impaired of the five streams feeding into the Great Swamp National Wildlife Refuge. The stream consistently fails to meet the State’s water quality standards.

“Loantaka Brook is so important to our community that we’ve got to take every opportunity we can to protect it, for us and for future generations. Keeping it clean is one way that the public can do their part for the river we all love,” said Curran.

“It’s thrilling to see so many people across the nation pitching in to protect their local river or favorite stream,” said Rebecca Wodder, president of American Rivers. “We applaud the work of the GSWA and the Morris County Park Commission not just for speaking out for Loantaka Brook, but for taking action to keep it healthy.”

Anyone interested in helping to clean Loantaka Brook on June 9 should call Kelley Curran at 973-538-3500, ext. 16 or email kcurran@greatswamp.org.

 

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Founded in 1981, the Great Swamp Watershed Association is a non-profit organization dedicated to preserving and protecting the water and land of the 36,000-acre watershed region in Morris and Somerset counties. We work to maintain the beauty and health of our open space, and to monitor and protect five streams — Loantaka Brook, Great Brook, Primrose Brook, Black Brook, and the headwaters of the Passaic River — which feed the Passaic River, providing drinking water to more than a million people.
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