About 150 volunteers spread out across the Glade Run Recreation Area on Saturday to fill dumpsters with trash and junk, build information stations, improve parking areas, remove paint from rocks and repair and build fences.
The event was National Public Lands Day, celebrated throughout the United States on the last Saturday of September, when citizens donate their time to improve public lands.
Volunteers put down 50 railroad ties around the edge of a parking lot at an entrance to Hood Mesa Trail, swinging sledge hammers through the morning to pound metal stakes to hold the ties in place.
There is now a new Kiosk installed by volunteers Saturday at the entrance to the recreation area at Glade Wash. The federal Bureau of Land and Management oversees the recreation area, which borders much of Farmington’s north side. Volunteers built and painted a pipe and cable fence around the kiosk to protect it.
At Brown Springs, young volunteers used wire brushes to scrape paint off sandstone. At another area, where the recreation area borders private land, young volunteers helped mend fencing.
Most activity in the Glade on Saturday, however, was picking up litter and other illegally dumped trash and junk. The BLM set four dumpsters at three locations in the Glade and issued heavy-duty trash bags to volunteers, directing volunteers to patrol areas with easy access to the dumpsters. Large items collected by trash patrol volunteers included computer screens, living room furniture, appliances and mattresses.
Randy and Mindy Calcote of Flora Vista hauled three pickup truck loads of trash and junk to dumpsters. One load was mostly old drywall, which Randy said was just part of a bigger pile that he and Mindy discovered. Their third load was a very large reclining chair, stuck in the full reclining mode. The chair took up most of the space in Randy’s pickup.
“We are here because we use the land and it’s our part to keep it as clean as we can so we can keep using the land,” Mindy said.
Among the large items hauled in by members of Boy Scouts of America Troop 152 of Farmington, were a refrigerator and an old truck bumper. “We go out and camp on public lands, so now we are giving back to public land,” said Andrew Hunter, assistant scoutmaster for Troop 152.
Volunteers were served a barbecue lunch at Farmington’s Lion’s Wilderness Park Amphitheater picnic shelter. In addition to the BLM, the city and the Boy Scouts of America, those helping with National Public Lands Day included ConocoPhillips, Girl Scouts of the United States of America, the Country Rebels 4–H Club and members of other groups, and people who work for other companies.
The majority of volunteers Saturday were people who said they participated simply because they care about their public lands. Leftover food was taken to a shelter operated by Family Crisis Center.
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