Cleanup to Sweep Through County

They’ll be cleaning up near Padre Dam and they’ll be cleaning up in the streets of San Diego. They’ll be cleaning up in Rancho Bernardo and San Ysidro. And Linda Vista. And Mira Mesa. And a lot of places in between.

Yes, they’ll even be cleaning up on the ocean floor.

On April 19, members of at least five community organizations and more than 2,000 people from 23 communities in San Diego County will be working together to give San Diego County its first border-to-border all-volunteer cleanup since 1978.

I Love a Clean San Diego, the nonprofit group that is organizing the effort, is run by Joyce Urban. She said the group will be aided by the American Emergency Radio Corps, which will use walkie-talkies to keep in touch with each community.

More than 15 scuba divers will collect underwater garbage in San Diego Bay. County residents working along streets and bicycle paths will be equipped with trash bags, rakes and brooms, Urban said. Six private garbage disposal agencies volunteered to haul the trash away.

It’s not that San Diego County is filthy and needs a bath, Urban said. What the group wants is to enlighten residents about what they can do to keep their neighborhoods clean.

“I think San Diego is basically a clean city. The purpose of this is awareness. . . . We can make a difference in our own communities and the city doesn’t always have to do it for us,” she said.