Truckee River Fund helps fund Great Community Clean-up

Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful is  organizing the Great Community Cleanup,scheduled for Saturday morning, May 2, 8 a.m., at 18 sites throughout the Reno-Sparks area. We are very excited that approval has just been confirmed for a project the same day by the Nevada National Guard to remove abandoned vehicles from the Hunter Creek/Steamboat Ditch area by helicopter. We will have more details about where press will be able to shoot helicopter extraction soon. If you have questions, you can contact me by cell (515.770.2186) or Bob Harmon at the Washoe County Sheriff's Office (771.8252). Contacts KTMB: J Merriman, Communications Manager | jmerriman@ktmb.org I 775.851.5185 WCSO: Bob Harmon, Community Relations | bharmon@washoecounty.us | 775.771.8252 Nevada National Guard: Col. Daniel Waters | daniel.r.waters2.mil@mail.mil | 775.971.6056 Community Foundation of Western Nevada: Margaret Steward, Communications Director | mstewart@nevadafund.org | 775.333.5499 Waste Management: Sarah Polito, Communication Specialist | spolito@wm.com | 775.412.1906 RENO, NV (April 30, 2015) – More than 700 volunteers will be cleaning 18 sites throughout the Truckee Meadows this Saturday during KTMB’s Great Community Cleanup. And the tonnage of trash pulled out of Reno open space will be a little higher on May 2, thanks to an Eagle Scout candidate named Jacob Waters – and all the government officials he got to help him on his project. “Dumped vehicles are a problem the KTMB Illegal Dumping Task Force partners have been trying to tackle for years, so we were beyond excited when Jake approached us with his Eagle Scout project,” said Jaime Souza, program manager for Keep Truckee Meadows Beautiful (KTMB). Jake was watching TV with his dad – Col. Daniel Waters, a helicopter pilot with the Nevada National Guard – when they saw a program about chemicals in the Truckee River. The show spurred Jake to do more research about the chemicals in cars and pollution in the source of Truckee Meadows drinking water. “His research and willingness to educate the public about this problem are spectacular to see,” said Souza. “When you know that removing the cars provides a unique training opportunity for the Nevada National Guard helicopter crews, and it also provides such a valuable service to the community, this project really fulfills two missions.” Jake and his dad did initial reconnaissance, with help from the Washoe County Sherriff’s Office, which has been tracking illegally dumped cars for years. Jake mapped the location of 15 cars pushed into ravines, which could not be dragged out by conventional means, and that’s where Jake’s dad – and the Nevada National Guard Chinooks with their longlines, helibaskets and rescue crews – came in. This week, staff from the Washoe County Sheriff’s Office, Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles, Nevada National Guard and KTMB went out to do advance work – hooking up the cars, looking at vehicle identification numbers and scouting staging areas – so the cars would be ready to hook up and fly out Saturday, and neighbors would be disturbed as little as possible, although Jake and Col. Waters have canvassed the affected neighborhoods to let people know why they will have low-flying helicopters in their backyards Saturday morning. “We get so many calls every year from volunteers and members of the public about abandoned and dumped cars, and once one car is there, it attracts other trash and illegal activity,” said Souza. “Removing these cars will really alleviate dumping in some problem areas.”

“We are so inspired to see this car-removal operation initiated by a 14-year-old Boy Scout,” said Sue Donaldson, a Truckee River Fund advisory board and expert on the local watershed. “Dumped cars are a source of contaminants in our groundwater, and the leaking chemicals can end up in the Truckee River. Volunteers like Jake, who care about our community, are why the Truckee River Fund is delighted to help fund KTMB’s Great Community Cleanup. Each spring, this event motivates volunteers from all over Reno and Sparks to get out and make a powerful difference together. The Truckee River Fund and the Community Foundation of Western Nevada look for projects that actively engage residents to work for solutions to our community’s issues and that pull together diverse organizations to accomplish a common goal of protecting our watershed.”

### The Truckee River fund is a fund at the Community Foundation of Western Nevada dedicated to support projects that preserve and enhance the Truckee River and its watersheds.