That’s so nice to see!
— In Yahoo Canyons Group, “adkramoo” wrote: > Southern Utah group toils to clean up canyons > CEDAR CITY (AP) =97 Underwear, construction debris, a washing > machine =97 Carin Miller and her many volunteers have picked them up and > much more while cleaning canyons in southern Utah. > “If you can think it, we’ve cleaned it up,” said Miller of Cedar > City, who tries to get out at least twice a month to check areas in > Iron and Washington counties. > She is president of Clean Our Canyons, a group she started to > raise awareness about beautiful canyons being turned into open dumps. > Besides speaking to community groups and schools about the > problem, Miller gets help from public employees in Iron County and > Cedar City and staffers at the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. > Since April, Miller and her volunteers have regularly filled > 60-gallon trash bags and a truck with junk. Bed springs, refrigerators > and recliners are commonly dumped in canyons instead of being taken to > landfills. > On a trip last week to BLM land, west of Bloomington in > Washington County, Miller’s troops included eight students from the > Red Rock Canyon School, a rehabilitation school in St. George. > “This is an alien environment for a lot of our students who come > from out of state,” said Barry Moore, a school official. “She (Miller) > provides them an opportunity to help the community, and get kids out > into the desert.” While handing out large orange bags and latex > gloves, Miller gave students instructions on what to avoid: broken > glass, needles, hazardous chemicals. > “Go for the big, visual pieces, not things like cigarette > butts,” she told the teens. “Anything that could hurt you or are > natural or biodegradable, like a carcass, just leave.” > Celina Prim, a student from Sacramento, Calif., said it was > terrible that people would litter the landscape. > “I just can’t understand it,” she said. At the end of the > outing, the students had filled 29 of the 60-gallon bags. > “They worked together as one team. They had a blast,” Miller said. >