By Bruce GIBSON

Thanks to a break in the weather, sponsorship from local businesses and the largest turnout of volunteers in its history, the 17th annual Foothill Community Cleanup Day on Oct. 23 turned out to be an overwhelming success.

Over 300 participants from throughout the community – some even from as far as
San Gabriel – gathered Saturday morning at Dunsmore Park for the yearly event. After a continental breakfast and the welcome rally, the volunteers received safety instructions and were assigned to one of several cleanup crews to be dispatched throughout La Crescenta.

While most of the crews scoured a 2½-mile stretch of Foothill Boulevard, collecting litter from Briggs Avenue to Lowell Avenue, other crews worked in some of the area’s vacant lots removing rubbish, pulling weeds, tilling the soil and spreading wildflower seeds. Still other volunteers remained at the park and filled sandbags, in partnership with the City of Glendale’s Community Services and Parks Department, stockpiling them for future use to protect area homes against flooding when the heavy rains come.

Scout troops, high school students, school clubs, families, church groups and many others were on hand to assist with the cleanup effort and to earn credits for their labor.

After all the cleanup work was done, the crews returned to Dunsmore Park for a free pizza lunch. Prizes were awarded for the annual “Cigarette Butt Derby,” a contest to see who could collect the most discarded cigarette butts during the cleanup. The winner, for the second year in a row, was a group of students from St. Anthony’s Catholic School in San Gabriel.

The Foothill Community Cleanup Day, Glendale’s official “Make a Difference Day” project, is sponsored by the City of Glendale Neighborhood Services Department, the Committee for a Clean & Beautiful Glendale and the Crescenta Valley Chamber of Commerce. Local business sponsors Allied Waste, La Cañada Eye Care, and J’s Maintenance also helped make the event possible.

  foothill blvd., Foothill Community Cleanup Day