Valley picking up after itself

PALMER — It’s that time of year again; the winter snow has melted, revealing months and months of forgotten trash.

For some this is simply a time to break out the rakes and the trash bags and tidy up the yards. But when spring comes, the more community-minded among us walk around town tidying up the public spaces.

Kim Ziegler, a career development specialist at Alaska Job Corps, is among them. Friday she and more than a dozen students combed the grassy spaces and parking lots surrounding Carrs in Palmer.

And while her particular group of students was large enough that their efforts moved along at a brisk pace, they were but one of a number of students who fanned out across Palmer. Ziegler said there were 115 trash-bag-wielding Job Corps students in all, nearly half of the center’s 260 students.

“We don’t do anything small,” she said of Job Corps.

Ziegler’s group’s plan was to walk into downtown, picking up trash along the way. But just in the 10 minutes it took to clean the area next to Carrs the group filled a half-dozen or more bags with trash ranging from old cellophane wrapping to cigarette butts to a substantial — and disgusting — pile of old beer cans.

If you’re struck by a need to help tidy up your corner of the Valley, it’s never a bad time to do it. But, according to the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, and discounting the cities of Palmer and Wasilla (which have already done their clean-ups), the organized community clean-up schedule is as follows:

n Houston — Today through Saturday.

n The Buffalo Mine/Soapstone Road — Through May 18.

n Birch Harbor homeowners — Saturday.

n Sutton — May 14-16.

n Point MacKenzie — Saturday and Sunday.

n Caswell — Saturday.

n Butte — May 15-22.

n Big Lake — May 16, sponsored by the Big Lake Lions Club.

n Tanaina — May 22.

n South Knik River — Saturday.

n Meadow Lakes — Through May 16, wrapping up in a block party May 17, according to meadowlakeschatter.com.

And, of course, what mention of the Valley’s efforts to gussie itself up at springtime could be complete without a discussion of the aptly named borough Bumper Drag. From Friday to May 16, junk cars and appliances — so long as they’re not refrigerators or freezers — can be dumped for free at the Mat-Su Borough Central Landfill.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.