Leave No Trace. Period.
Every year here in Cumberland, just as our New England weather turns Spring-ish (hopefully). We hold a town-wide cleanup where residents and local organizations, armed with the now ubiquitous yellow trash bags, scour the town of accumulated trash. Amazingly well coordinated, individual groups focus on specific areas across the town in an effort to cover all 26.4 square miles of land that we can, to the best of our collective ability.
Troop 12 and Cub Scout Pack 12 take on the fields, trails, and wooded areas surrounding McCourt Middle School. With Boy Scouts, Cub Scouts, and parents - fueled by incredibly generous and kind coffee and donut donations from Dunkin’ and Honeydew - working together to clean the area.
Every year, I keep thinking that nothing else could surprise me, after seeing the sorts of things we uncover and collect. Every year, I’m proven wrong. This year we discovered, and dismantled, what looked like a pop-up party spot that featured a number of eyebrow raising artifacts. And we found enough trash to end up with two separate drop sites.
Plus we found a really cool snake.
A huge part of Scouting is the effort to instill a strong sense of Community ownership, responsibility, and service. Cumberland’s residents can, and should, be incredibly proud of how strongly their local Scouts embrace and practice those ideals.
