Volunteers Clean Up the Trails in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park

On Saturday, I joined Fairlawn-Bath Patch Editor Kymberli Hagelberg, Cuyahoga Falls Patch Editor Lindsay McCoy and a number of other volunteers for a “trail sweep” in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park. 

The other Patch editors and myself were volunteering as part of Patch’s Give 5 initiative, which encourages editors to get more involved in the communities we cover. We spent most of the morning and afternoon walking the Plateau Trail in Peninsula, trimming branches, picking up any litter we found and just generally tidying up the trail. Other groups of volunteers worked on projects around the park.  

The Cuyahoga Valley Trails Council, the group doing the various projects, has a work session somewhere in the park once a month, said Dave Burgan, a member of the council and leader of the Plateau Trail's volunteer team. The council, which takes on bigger projects in the park, has been around since the 1980s, he said. Volunteers in the “Adopt a Trail” program do the “trail sweeps,” which includes more light maintenance of the trails. This week’s program combined both groups, but that’s not always the case.

If you want to learn how to get involved with the Cuyahoga Valley National Park’s volunteer program, visit the park’s website. There are Adopt-a-Trail sessions scheduled through the end of September.  

According to the park’s website, the volunteer program is co-managed by the National Park Service and the Conservancy for Cuyahoga Valley National Park.