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French River cleanup in
Webster yields 2 tons of trash
John Dignam
T&G STAFF
Kenneth A. Parker prefers walking along the banks of the French
River, but he doesn't mind wading in and pulling out a tire or
chair or barrel, if the need arises.
He needs a little help with the sofas, though.
"They must weigh a couple hundred pounds when they're wet," he
says.
In May, Mr. Parker organized a cleanup in which 16 people
extracted an estimated two tons of trash from the river, including
80 plastic bags of rubbish, 30 tires, four box springs, four
reclining chairs, a dryer, refrigerator, gas grills and barrels.
But late last week he pointed to a dark, sodden sofa down river
from the Perryville Road bridge.
And there was a discarded easy chair that sat beside the road near
the site where Mr. Parker and the other volunteers had deposited
the piles of trash they had collected.
Mr. Parker said that when he and his wife, Elaine, moved to
Brookside Avenue from Rhode Island in February 2003, they were
happy that the French River was at their back yard.
"But when the snow melted, I observed that the river at Perryville
was a dump. I thought surely there must be a group that takes care
of it, that nobody would let the river stay that way. But that
wasn't true. I thought the situation was appalling. Somebody has
to love this river."
Mr. Parker said one of the difficulties in the towns addressing
the dumping problem is that the river is the border of Webster and
Dudley and that neither town takes responsibility for it. He said
he had contacted Webster and Dudley officials about the trash
along the river but had not gotten a response.
In March, Mr. Parker walked the river from the Oxford-Webster line
to Connecticut, about four miles, to see "if there are areas
dirtier than the Perryville. There are not."
He said there was more trash on the Dudley side because there is
more access, much of it "invisible" from Perryville Road or Route
12.
And, he noted, some of the trash in the Perryville area probably
had washed down river, coming to rest in the coves and the
Perryville Dam itself.
Health Board Chairman Adeline Healy praised Mr. Parker's efforts
and said the board is working to put up signs warning against
dumping and to strengthen enforcement of laws on illegal dumping.
"They were good enough to do the work," Mrs. Healy said of the May
22 volunteers, "but the town needs to help."
She said the Board of Health wants to work with selectmen on ways
the town can clean up illegal dumps, although, she noted, the
Highway Department "is really stretched to the limit."
"Dudley really could use a recycling center. Illegal dumping is a
problem throughout town. I've never see it as bad as it is," Mrs.
Healy said.
Her husband and grandson, William Healy and Andrew Safaee, hauled
the trash from Perryville Road to two containers that the Board of
Health had rented for the townwide cleanup. Mr. Parker said Val-Go
Construction had earlier picked up trash dumped along Route 12
near the river. And, he said, the Dudley Leos Club Saturday
removed trash that has been collected since the May 22 cleanup and
the easy chair that had been dumped by the side of the road.
"It's really gratifying to see interest taking hold," he said
yesterday.
Two member of the Dudley Conservation Land Trust, Sandra Peterson
and Mark Smith, who are married, also participated in the cleanup,
bringing along a kayak to aid in the trash recovery.
Ms. Peterson said the land trust is reorganizing after many years
of inactivity and, although the cleanup was not connected to the
land trust, "we're working to keep the environment safe and clean
and this was very encouraging."
"We're looking for environmentally minded people to be land trust
members and those were the people out there that day," Ms.
Peterson said.
In April, the Parkers took about 20 bags of trash out of the
Webster side of the river during Webster's annual cleanup. Mr.
Parker said he worked to get word out about a similar cleanup
during Dudley's annual cleanup day, and it seemed to work.
A number of Dudley residents who live in the area pitched in, Mr.
Parker said, as did four people from Southbridge and Sturbridge,
who brought two canoes with them.
Kenneth S. Pickren, chairman of the Southbridge Conservation
Commission, said he learned about the planned cleanup from an
official at the Massachusetts Riverways Program and went "because
he needed help."
He praised the work Mr. Parker had done to clean the river and
said the area, which is located along the half-mile long abandoned
Lower Perryville Road, has beautiful potential for a park.
Both Ms. Peterson and Ms. Healy said they want to see more cleanup
effort targeting the French River.
That's what Mr. Parker had hoped to hear. "I want to see the
cleaning of the river become part of the civic life here. Maybe
the towns, jointly, can open up access and identify heritage sites
and views so people can appreciate the culture and heritage of the
river."
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