I Love A Clean San Diego (ILACSD) will hold its annual countywide cleanup event on April 22, Earth Day, from 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.

The 15th Annual Creek to Bay Cleanup is a one-day event that gives thousands of local residents the chance to channel their appreciation for San Diego’s environment into action. ILACSD anticipates over 6,000 volunteers for this year’s event. There are over 100 cleanup locations throughout San Diego County for volunteers to get involved.

“San Diego is the best city in the world, and we want to keep it beautiful. Community cleanups make it possible for us to keep our neighborhoods healthy, safe, and beautiful,” said ILACSD Executive Director, Pauline Martinson to La Prensa San Diego. “Our goal for the Creek to Bay Cleanup is to make it easy for San Diegans to make a difference in their neighborhood. We have 113 sites across San Diego County so volunteers are able to pick a site in their area. It allows volunteers to take ownership of their community spaces, meet and connect with neighbors, and truly make a difference both for their community and San Diego as a whole.”
The event tagline, Your Neighborhood, Our Environment, encourages volunteers to sign up for a site in their neighborhood to contribute to the health and beauty of the entire region. In 2016, more than 6,400 volunteers removed 170,000 pounds of debris during the three-hour event. While trash removal is a large focus of the event, volunteers will also make a difference in their communities through beautification projects such as planting native vegetation and graffiti removal. These beautification projects restore local outdoor areas and evoke a strong sense of community pride across the County.

“San Diego has a strong base of caring citizens; but in a city with a large population, there can still be many issues with pollution affecting our quality of life,” Martinson added. “Often our canyons are treated as dumping grounds and we continue to see the bulk of trash in inland areas. San Diego is connected through our watersheds, the debris you find in your neighborhood may find its way to your favorite beach and the Pacific Ocean through our waterways. So it’s important we give as much attention upstream if not more attention than to our beaches and bays. Creek to Bay addresses these issues and has a majority of our cleanup sites inland.”

This year’s event will have 77 inland sites.

ILACSD encourages volunteers to bring their own reusable water bottle, gardening or work gloves, and bucket to collect litter. By choosing reusables, volunteers will reduce the use of plastic disposable items and keep thousands of single-use bags and disposable gloves out of San Diego’s crowded landfills.

A complete list of cleanup sites is available at www.CreekToBay.org.