LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Next week, Lake County will be among several hundred locations around California participating in cleanup efforts to improve lakes, creeks, streams, shorelines and the ocean itself.
The California Coastal Commission’s 28th annual California Coastal Cleanup Day – the state’s largest volunteer event – will take place from 9 a.m. to noon Saturday, Sept. 15.
The commission said the event will take place at more than 850 locations around the California, comprising the largest single effort to remove the debris that has accumulated on California’s beaches and inland shorelines over the past year.
This year’s cleanup also will provide one of the first opportunities for organizers to measure a baseline of debris on California’s shores that may have washed up as a result of last year’s devastating tsunami in Japan, the commission reported.
Carolyn Ruttan of the Lake County Department of Water Resources is coordinating the local event.
“I want everybody in Lake County to go to their closest waterway and clean it, basically,” she said. “That’s what I would love to happen.”
Ruttan said the focus doesn’t have to be Clear Lake – working to improve creeks, streams and other waterways also is important.
For many years the cleanup had a large local presence, but more recently it has fallen off, with Ruttan estimating that the trash problem near local waterways became worse in the interim.
Now, Ruttan is trying to build public participation in waterways cleanup back up again. “We need to get back on the map,” she said.
She’s coordinating with local waste disposal companies to pick up trash that is recovered from the shoreline and local creeks. Those companies are donating free trash pickup, dumpsters and trash bags.
“It’s amazing how people want to help,” Ruttan said.
She said there will be a dumpster at the Northshore Fire Protection District’s Clearlake Oaks station, 12655 Highway 20, and another at the Lake County Fire Protection District station at 14815 Olympic Drive, Clearlake.
There also will be a dumpster at Natural High School on N. Main Street in Lakeport and others in different parts of the county if Ruttan is able to arrange them them.
Ruttan said if every person picked up a bag of trash or recyclables it would add up.
Anything that can help the county get back on track with the cleanup effort is “going to ripple through everything we do,” she said, adding that agencies that give grants also will look at such creek and watershed cleanup efforts.
Ruttan is also considering starting an “adopt a shoreline” – Clear Lake has 120 miles of shoreline – or an “adopt a watershed” program to place more focus on the importance of keeping local waterways clean.
For Lake County residents wanting to take part in a local cleanup, call Ruttan at 707-263-2256 or email her at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .
For those who cannot attend Coastal Cleanup Day, the Coastal Commission maintains a calendar of events taking place during the three weeks following the cleanup, known as “Coastweeks.”
For more information about the Coastal Cleanup Day and ongoing events, including Coastweeks, visit www.coastalcleanupday.org .
Email Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .