Cleanup Crew Tidies Upper East Side

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — Elected officials and ordinary folks alike took to the streets on the Upper East Side this weekend, aiming to spruce up the neighborhood during a bout of unseasonably warm weather.

The "Love Your Neighborhood Day" on Saturday was hosted by the East 72nd Street Association, Friends of the East River Esplanade, and City Councilmembers Keith Powers and Ben Kallos.

About two dozen volunteers joined to clean up Second Avenue, First Avenue and the East River Esplanade. They also distributed hundreds of masks, courtesy of Kallos's office, and 200 bottles of hand sanitizer, said Cameron Koffman, an E72NA member who helped plan it.

Also participating were four of the six candidates in next year's City Council District 5 election — Billy Freeland, Rebecca Lamorte, Kim Moscaritolo and Tricia Shimamura — as well as Lou Puliafito, a recent challenger for a neighborhood State Assembly seat.

Serendipitously, the event coincided with a bit of history: while the cleanup was underway, networks called the presidential race for former Joe Biden, leading to an impromptu celebration on the East River Esplanade by volunteers supporting the former vice president — as well as U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney, who was paying a visit to the recently-repaired Esplanade sinkhole.

Impromptu celebration with @RepMaloney, @kallos and others on the East River Esplanade. pic.twitter.com/aiCqAZu9D5
— Nick Garber (@nick_garber) November 7, 2020

All told, the group picked up about 10 bags of trash and aims to make the event recurring, Koffman said.