By Mary Reid Barrow

Thanks to intern, Ysabel Wells, LRNow has a new tool in its trash cleanups arsenal, a tool meant for all of you out there who worry about trash in your neighborhood or work community.

Ysabel, a student in the City’s Environmental Studies Program, created the LRNow Litter Locator Map that you can easily use to report areas that need cleanups. She worked with Cristin Pullman, LRNow’s Community Outreach Manager, who also will monitor the reports and try to come up with ways to help.

Ysabel is captain of the Track and Field Team at Princess Anne High School, her home school. She got the idea for a Litter Locator map when she was on a cross country training run.

“There was a smaller retention pond that was full of trash behind an office building on Independence Boulevard,” she said. “I went back with waders to try and clean it up, but the more trash I picked up, the more rose to the surface!”

Areas like retention ponds and swales off running paths “act as catchalls,” Ysabel added. Trash sits there and builds up over time. No one is responsible for it, and they are not high visibility areas that LRNow or others would necessarily see.

Ysabel liked the idea of creating a trash locator map that would involve citizens in their own neighborhoods and might turn up more hidden areas that need cleaning. The map can be found on our website at: https://www.lynnhavenrivernow.org/waterway-cleanups/

“It ties into citizen science, “Ysabel said, “and allows people to feel responsible for their own neighborhood. And to make their own decisions.”

The form is easy to fill out right online, she added. You can report where the trash is, how much, whether land or water or both, upload photos and more. There also is a QR code that folks can use to access the map.

LRNow’s Litter Locator Map is only one of many contributions and activities that Ysabel has managed this year.

As an LRNow intern, she helped monitor the progress of one of our living shorelines, as well as participated in cleanups and tree plantings. She also is a student member of the city’s Active Transportation and Advisory Committee and participates in the Civil Air Patrol’s search and rescue program.

That’s not all. Ysabel is in the International Baccalaureate program at Princess Anne High School where she is captain of the Track and Field team. She will head to Longwood University in its running program this summer and plans to double major in chemistry and environmental science.

How does she find time to do it all?

“Eating in my car,” Ysabel said, laughing.

And there would be nothing that Ysabel would like more than if you scheduled a cleanup through the Litter Locator Map before she goes off to school. You can bet that would be one special clean up for her and she will try to find time to participate in it!