Bronx River Alliance hosts ‘Paddle and Pick Up’ in Starlight Park
While the event only started this past June, people involved say they have already pulled everything – from a pumpkin to electric bikes to car parts – out of the Bronx River.
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The Bronx River Alliance hosted its monthly "Paddle and Pick Up" trash clean-up Saturday in Starlight Park.
While the event only started this past June, people involved say they have already pulled everything – from a pumpkin to electric bikes to car parts – out of the Bronx River.
"When I arrived, I thought it looked OK," said Sophie Bennett, who was volunteering for the second month in a row. "It's only when you get in there, you realize there's actually quite a lot."
The Bronx River Alliance says the garbage comes from people littering, nearby roadways and storms that washing items downstream.
"It's a little sad sometimes seeing all that trash either being thrown in, or built up," said Andrew Villalobos, the paddling outreach coordinator at the BXRA.
Organizers say the “Paddle” clean up events are different because they get volunteers out onto the water.
"You see the potential," explained Victoria Toro, the BXRA's outreach manager. "You see how beautiful it is, how much wildlife there is - the birds, the turtles, the fish even. You want to protect all of that. You want to make it even healthier and better."
But Soto also says she feels that if the New York City Parks Department had more money allotted to it by the city budget, they might not need to be doing this work in the first place.
"It's not necessarily that our community is inherently dirtier than any other community. It's that our parks are just not funded enough to fund the amount of use they get," she said.
The BXRA says they plan on bringing back "Paddle and Pick Up" events in the spring.
