Hi gang, Rick Ostler here again from Used Pontoon Boats. Thirty-four volunteers braved the cold Saturday morning to help with the annual shoreline cleanup effort organized by POWER, the local group headed by Carl Russell.
Driving by Banks Lake on SR 155, or plying its waters in a boat, you might only notice the cattails and rushes along the shore, where bass hide and blackbirds sing.
But there is trash, too. Flotsam blows in on the predominantly west winds after a cooler falls off a boat or an empty bait container is carelessly tossed. It builds up along the shores, but POWER (Promoters of Wildlife and Environmental Resources) has been working to clean it up, one area of the lake at a time. Saturday's was the fourth such annual event on the weekend before Earth Day. The group focused efforts on the bay between Steamboat Rock and the Devil's Punchbowl and along the shores of the islands along inter-island waterway called Lovers' Lane.
The group gathered at the Northrup boat launch, across the water from Steamboat Rock, where three pontoon boats waited to carry them to shorelines on Banks Lake. They gathered bag after bag of trash, enough to fill three large dumpsters, plus another trailer load for the local dump.
"Some of this doesn't decompose very easily and we need to pick it up," explained 11-year-old Ben Brougher, who used a mechanical picker to reach into the weeds and rocks between the shore and the highway.
Brougher was looking forward to the 1 p.m. barbecue lunch provided for volunteers.
Russell said the 34 volunteers, including eight who worked from pickups and four on four-wheel, all-terrain vehicles, logged 161 hours in the effort. He said they cleaned most of the Punchbowl Bay area between the highway and Steamboat Rock, also the Lovers' Lane to Devil's Lake area.
"We had a great crew with participants as young as 6 with their parents and as young as 84, so you see you are never too old or to young," Russell said.
The program is co- sponsored by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, the Washington Dept. of Fish and Wildlife, the state Dept. of Parks and Recreation and Coulee Playland.
A grant from the state's Aquatic Lands Enhancement Account helped pay for garbage disposal, fuel for boats and other expenses.
The lunch was funded by the USBR through the Job Corps, Russell said.
Thanks to Scott Hunter, editor and publisher, Townnews.com for this
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Rick Ostler, Bayliner Boats.
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