Cleaning up Napa, one volunteer at a time

Presidents Day dawned bright and cloudless in Napa a beautiful day to help keep the city beautiful.

Armed with trash-picking poles, plastic bags and paint rollers, more than 85 volunteers teamed up Monday morning to scour streets, parks and trails of litter, spray-painted graffiti and other eyesores across the city.

We feel because were such a tight-knit community, volunteering should be an everyday part of our lives, said Jim Tomlinson, manager of CVNL Volunteer Napa, which partnered with Napa Valley CanDo and the city Public Works Department to organize the cleanup.

While the three groups have organized previous beautifying drives separately, nonprofits and the city joined forces this year to better reach volunteers, Tomlinson said. The creation of CanDos Napa Valley Give!Guide built up a contact list that helped promote Mondays event to a wider audience, he said.

Handfuls of helpers cleaned 14 sites across the city, from Kennedy Park in the south and downtown First and Second streets to stretches of the Napa River and San Francisco Bay trails. City Public Works staff helped choose the sites after observing which locations were the most litter-prone, said Tina Chechourka, a city construction inspector and event organizer.

Clearing broken glass and other hazards from Napas bicycle routes was a special priority for the cleanup effort, as was sweeping the Napa Valley Wine Train route clear of refuse tourists otherwise would see, according to Chechourka.

Its like the broken-window theory; people see trash on the ground and theyre liable to put trash on the ground, she said. And if you see someplace clean, youre likely to keep trash in your pocket.

One of the more visible targets for Mondays volunteers was the side of a self-storage building along the railroad track and bicycle path passing near California Boulevard. A group of five high school boys approached the building with long-handled rollers and paint barrels in hand, to efface the huge black letters on its side as well as older tags still faintly visible even under several coats of paint.

Lucas A. Rivera, a New Technology High senior, already had planned his own cleanup for Presidents Day, only to mesh his effort with the citys and recruiting 10 other teens in the bargain. I told (organizers) to give us, the teens, the harder jobs, so were doing the graffiti, the 18-year-old Rivera said.

Others cleaning up on Monday made the effort a more personal mission.

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Cleaning up Napa, one volunteer at a time