CAMDEN—Despite a drizzly 38-degree morning, a crew of volunteers led by Alison McKellar, gathered in the parking lot of Hannaford Supermarket in Camden both Friday and Saturday morning for an Earth Day clean up, in honor of Camden resident, Leonard Lookner, who passed away this winter. The initiative is a joint effort between the Camden Conservation Commission and Midcoast Waste Watch with the support of the organizers of Keep Rockport Beautiful.

Leonard Lookner's son, Grayson Lookner took the time to thank McKellar for the event.

"I want to thank Alison for putting this on in my dad's name," he said. "It's really great to see my siblings here. My dad was really big about picking up garbage on the side of the road. He couldn't stand to see the garbage, so he always picked it up."

Lookner said he thought his father would be happy to see this group going out.

"He would always say to everybody, you don't need a big group to go out and pick garbage on the side of the road," he said. "If everybody would just go out and pick up one piece of trash everyday we could clean things up in no time. This is one of things we do have power over in this great big, crazy world out there and this is the way we help our communities."

"Our good friend Leonard was a huge advocate of cleaning up trash on the side of the road," she said. "He was doing it all the time and was always telling people to do it. We've been talking for years about getting an organized clean up together in Camden."

McKellar said it was a great turnout for the Saturday morning part of the event.

"We are trying to hit every single road in Camden," she said. "We're hitting the big ones first where not a lot of people walk which is where you are more likely to find trash. We're also hitting some of the recreational areas like the Snow Bowl and Barrett's Cove."

She said despite our best efforts she didn't believe people are throwing things from vehicles.

"There certainly is some of that," she said. "A lot of us are probably littering without even knowing it. Things that fly out of the back of our trucks and trailers and the private trash haulers and those things that flies out when you open the window because you have a messy car. It's something that we all need to pay more attention to."

This was her first official cleanup, but it will be Rockport's third year.

"My first cleanup, but there have people doing it for many years," she said. "Rockport's 'Keep Rockport Beautiful' was started by a friend of mine Maggie Timmerman, who is a big passionate roadside cleaner got frustrated and started a group and it's now an official line item in the Rockport budget."

McKeller said Rockport's cleanup is next weekend, so they let the Camden group borrow all their vests and trash pickers this weekend.

"I keep calling Maggie asking how do you do this, how do you do that," she said. "I'm thrilled with the turn out this morning, even with the rainy, cold morning with all the people here. The fire department is here, public works is here even though they don't work on a Saturday morning, they're going to pick up all the trash bags, and it's very hard work."

McKeller said all the recyclables are getting separated form the trash.

Whether you have noticed or not, there have been groups from the Prison Work Farm this past week picking up trash in Rockport and Camden along the major routes. 

As Leonard Lookner was fond of saying: "If you see it, you own it" and "Sometimes we all have to clean up after our neighbors." McKellar said, “It’s something Leonard always wanted us to take on as a mission for Earth Day.”

Friday saw about 20 volunteers and Saturday morning drew twice that amount. The crews are all scattered around Camden today, in front of Hannaford Supermarket, the Camden Snow Bowl, Barnestown Road, Cobb Road, Molyneaux Road, and Pearl Street.

“We’re all over the place today,” she said, adding that any additional volunteers who wanted to show up are welcome.

The event invite speculated that water bottles would be the majority of trash to be picked up.”The only thing I would say is that water bottles are a small portion of what we picked up so far,” said McKeller. “We had a crew out on Friday and it was a lot of plastic bags, alcohol bottles, cigarette butts, fast food packaging, and Styrofoam.”

Even with the raw weather, the volunteers are in great spirits.

“It’s pretty darn impressive that there are that many people out here willing to pick up trash on a cold, rainy day,” said McKeller.

Kay Stephens can be reached at news@penbaypilot.com