Want to clean up Savannah? These volunteers tackle new neighborhood every weekend

SAVANNAH, Ga. —

On a Sunday morning in August, soon-to-be 5-year-old Emilia Robinson was given a choice.

“I said, ‘You want to go to church or pick up trash,?'” Emilia’s father, Johnathan Robinson, said. “She said, ‘I want to pick up trash, Daddy.’ I said,’Hey, that’s a win in my book.'”

For the first time, Emilia spent her Sunday with the Savannah Trash Warriors, a Savannah organization that cleans up litter and garbage in different neighborhoods around the city.

“We’ve picked up almost 1,000 buckets of trash and the same as recycling, thousands and thousands of cigarettes,”said co-founder Jenna Bower, who started the organization with her friend Stacey Fuller almost a year ago.

Every weekend, volunteers visit different neighborhoods to help make them a little cleaner. On this particular Sunday, Emilia and the rest of the volunteers helped clean up the Avondale neighborhood of Savannah, which locals say presents its own unique problems with garbage.

“People get stuff to eat and just toss the trash throughout the neighborhood,”
said Anthony Texeira, who lives in the neighborhood and is president of the area’s neighborhood association. “It’s not uncommon to find a half -dozen carts here. A lot of people push their groceries and shopping carts into the neighborhood, and don’t take them back.”

As Emilia walks the streets picking up pieces of litter, right beside her is a fellow warrior, Jane Fishman, who is more than 70 years older than Emilia, but they are united through one common goal: cleaning up the city.

“Trash is everyone’s problem,” Fishman says. “It’s just insane.”

For more information on how you can volunteer your time with the Savannah Trash Warriors, you can find the group’s weekly cleanups on their Facebook page.

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