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Earth Day 2006 |
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Written by Greg Fuderer
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Thursday, 27 April 2006 |
“We’ll come back Monday and get the rest of this stuff,” said Crosby Gardner, as he climbed down from the big yellow front-end loader. With the last bucketful of trash-filled orange plastic bags barely visible in the dump truck, Gardner and Lee Dong had nearly completed their Earth Day volunteer work at Compton Creek.
Down and dirty in the channel, Lydia Lopez-Cruz, Timothy Kennedy, Joe Lamb and Alex Watt walked through weeds, mud and muck to fill the orange bags with debris that is not only an eyesore, but also hinders the channel’s ability to drain water. The Earth Day cleanup, sponsored by Heal the Bay, drew several dozen volunteers from environmental groups, local churches and civic organizations.
On Sunday, Tony Risko and Jane Grandon represented the Corps at an Earth Day celebration held at the Peter and Mary Muth Interpretive Center in Newport Beach. The center sits next to Upper Newport Bay, where the Corps recently began a three-year, $39 million ecosystem restoration project to remove silt and sediment from the Upper Newport Bay Ecological Reserve. On a warm, clear afternoon, several hundred hikers, walkers, residents and passers-by ambled from one booth to another, learning about the bay’s environment and steps they can take individually to help preserve one of Southern California’s few remaining active wetlands.
“This project has been two decades in the making,” said Risko said, the Corps’ project manager for the bay’s ecosystem restoration. “I feel fortunate to be able to share the results of many years of hard work by many people to restore this critically important coastal wetland.”
As for his afternoon in the sun, Risko said, “It’s been a great opportunity to talk individually with people about the project and how it directly benefits the environment and the surrounding communities. It was good to hear their concerns and help clear up any confusion about what we’re doing.”
Jane Grandon is the Corps’ engineer for the Upper Newport Bay project and has worked on the project for about three years. This was her first Earth Day event, and she was as pleased to visit the other displays as she was to explain the environmental project to the many visitors to the Corps’ booth.
“It was a great opportunity to describe the Corps’ role in this important ecosystem restoration project,” she said. “People were really interested to learn how we’re removing sediments with dredges and scows and how that’s helping to maintain the balance of habitat types that are important to the ecosystem.”
Grandon disseminated more than information. “I enjoyed handing out the pins with the Corps castle and life preserver and explaining to the children and adults that the castle is the Corps logo and that ‘Safety is first.’”
The Corps representatives were joined by Andrew Hunt, from the dredging contractor DD-M Crane and Rigging. Hunt helped answer questions about the project and was clearly pleased with the change from the typical dredging projects with which he’s more familiar.
“I like this environment,” he said. “And it’s not just me. To work on a project directed to restoring the environment, something that benefits nature, is exciting for the whole crew. It’s one of the reasons we’re attracted to this type of work.”
 Alex Watt, Lee Dong and Crosby Gardner load trash into the bucket. They and several other Corps volunteers collected litter and other debris from the Compton Creek flood control channel.
 Tony Risko (left) discusses the Upper Newport Bay project with one of the many environmental educators who visited the Corps’ booth during Earth Day activities at the Peter and Mary Muth Interpretive Center.
 Andrew Hunt (left) and Jane Grandon (center) answers questions about environmental restoration in Upper Newport Bay. The Corps’ project will remove about two million cubic yards of sediment, restoring a more natural water flow and improving the habitat for native.
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