Hanscom celebrates Earth Day with cleanup efforts

  • Published
  • By Meredith March
  • 66th Air Base Wing Public Affairs
HANSCOM AFB, Mass. --  Earth Day, a national day of environmental recognition, was April 22. Members of the Hanscom community embraced the Earth Day spirit of appreciating and improving the environment by laboring in two major base cleanup efforts in recent weeks.

The first cleanup was a grassroots event, spearheaded by Staff Sgt. Tom Deckert, 630th Electronic Systems Squadron. Sergeant Deckert had noticed that a wooded wetland area near base housing had become over-run with garbage and other refuse.

"The area is considered a Protected Resource. However, upon looking at it, you would not have been able to tell. I could see tires and trash throughout the area," Sergeant Deckert said.

The sergeant proposed a community cleanup effort at an American Eagle Neighborhood council meeting, toward which American Eagle Communities offered donations of cleanup materials, said Marie McClanahan, American Eagle Communities office manager. AEC also provided additional workers to help out with the project, Sergeant Deckert said.

Sergeant Deckert recruited volunteers by visiting homes in the area and inviting the residents on base to help restore the area to a pollution-free state. "I wanted to have this area cleaned up and to have families come out and have a part in cleaning up their community," he said. "Everyone I spoke to was willing [to help] and gracious."

A weather-related date change eliminated some volunteers, but enough people, including 10 children, showed up to remove nine tires, nine bags of trash, a computer monitor, a steel bar, a propane bottle and numerous pieces of plywood, Sergeant Deckert said.

He considers the project a success, and hopes to encourage more such events in the future. "The overall look of the area has immensely improved," he said. "I'm hoping to do this again in the upcoming weeks and expand the cleanup area to other parts of base housing."

Hanscom's annual Earth Day Shawsheen River Cleanup, which was organized by Metcalf & Eddy Inc. of the Environmental Management Office, and took place on April 18, was another base cleanup success.

The Shawsheen River begins on Hanscom and flows out to neighboring communities, so keeping it clean is important, said Jim Maravelias, Metcalf & Eddy Environmental Compliance specialist. Additionally, the river area chosen for the cleanup was located behind the primary and elementary schools, providing an opportunity to teach Hanscom's youth about taking care of the environment, he said.

Nearly 35 people participated in the cleanup, including children from the schools and volunteers from a variety of base organizations. "I would like to thank Mr. Fred Lipton of the middle school for having his class participate in the cleanup. I was very satisfied with the large amount of participants and the fact that they represented many different organizations on base," Mr. Maravelias said. "I hope the participants felt successful because they were involved in an event where they could visually see the positive results of the large amount of trash we collected."

He hopes this success will encourage the Hanscom community to support future environmental events. "It gave the people on base the opportunity to be involved in an environmentally beneficial activity," he said. "We hope the community involvement will continue."