April 21, 2021

Pawtucket Celebrates Earth Day with Clean Up Event 

PAWTUCKET- The City of Pawtucket, in partnership with the Pawtucket Youth Commission and Keep Blackstone Valley Beautiful, held a community clean up downtown on April 20^th in honor of Earth Day. 

Beginning at City Hall at 10:30am the 11^th and 12^th grade students from Shea High School, Tolman High School, and Davies, Jr. Career and Technical High School spent time picking up trash around the area and concluding back at City Hall for an outdoor lunch and discussion on the importance of clean up events for the community with Mayor Grebien. 

“It’s great to see our Youth Commission participating in our community in such an engaging way,” said Mayor Donald R. Grebien. “Their participation in this clean up today helps to show how young people have made and continue to make the environment a priority.” 

“The Earth Day event’s goal was to clean up the downtown area and bring awareness to the issues of littering,” said Donna Kaehler, Director of Keep Blackstone Valley Beautiful. “It was a fantastic opportunity to teach the students and take part in our state-wide campaign #RIMillionPieces. We are asking each resident to pick up one piece of litter, and with 1 million residents, we easily remove 1 million pieces of litter from our communities.” 

Keep Blackstone Valley Beautiful serves as the environmental education branch of the Blackstone Valley Tourism Council and aims to educate youth on environmental issues that are present in our community.  

The Pawtucket Youth Commission is a group in association with the Pawtucket-Central Falls Health Equity Zone comprised of students in Pawtucket who are looking to participate in community service activities to become leaders in the community. For students looking to join the group, please contact slarbi@bgcpawt.org for more information. 

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Emily Rizzo 

erizzo@pawtucketri.com

Office: 401-728-0500 Ext. 429