By Margie O’Loughlin
If you’re walking around Lake of the Isles, take a look at the newly installed trash boom floating in the water where the parkway meets Euclid Place. You’ll see a smaller blue barrier that slows the speed of incoming storm water, and a larger black barrier holding captured plastic bottles, tin cans, cigarette butts, and probably much more.
Neighborhood resident and East Isles Neighborhood Association (EINA) board member Henry LaBounta is intimately acquainted with trash floating in Lake of the Isles. When he and his family moved here in 2020, he was excited to be able to kayak near his home. He quickly found a new mission to accompany his love of kayaking: picking up trash along the nearly three miles of shoreline and the two islands that give the lake its character.
As co-chair of EINA’s Green Team, he estimates that he and his team members have pulled about 1,000 pounds of trash out of the lake each of the last three years.
HOW IT WORKS
Lake of the Isles has several storm water outflows. The one at Euclid Place and the parkway is especially problematic, because it carries storm water from Hennepin Ave. and surrounding streets in a heavily-used commercial corridor. When car tires flatten pieces of trash, they flow effortlessly into the storm water system – and ultimately into the lake.
The trash boom public demonstration/installation was held on Wednesday, June 26 at 5 p.m. with more than 50 people in attendance. It marked the culmination of two years of work by the Green Team to combat litter in Lake of the Isles. Organizations that partnered in acquiring the trash boom included Minneapolis Department of Public Works, Minneapolis Park Board, and Freshwater Society.
Speaking at the event, LaBounta said, “The East Isles and Wedge neighborhoods worked together to host 28 clean-up events last year that drew 335 volunteers. We also organize two safety walks per month. Wearing bright orange t-shirts so that we’re recognizable, a group of us walk along Hennepin Avenue to check on folks who might be struggling. We pick up litter at the same time, and we have lakeside clean-up events on the second Saturday of each month, as well.
KEEP THOSE DRAINS CLEAN
LaBounta is a staunch advocate of the Adopt-a-Drain Program. Keeping storm drains clear means that trash and organic matter don’t enter the storm water system after it rains, and helps improve the water quality.
In his remarks to the crowd, LaBounta said, “At 53%, the East Isles neighborhood has the highest percentage of adopted storm drains in the country.” Visit https://adopt-a-drain.org/ to learn more about adopting a storm water drain in your neighborhood.
Following comments by each of the partner organizations, Yael Girard, Special Project Lead with the Osprey Initiative, explained the two functions of the trash boom. She said, “First and foremost, its job is to catch trash – but it also catches people’s attention. It’s a great way to show how water and trash move together through the storm water system. This is a very visible location.”
She went on to describe the Osprey Initiative’s role in this project. She said, “We’re a small environmental consulting business out of Mobile, Ala. We’ve designed systems to improve water quality in 22 states and four countries so far. We install and maintain our systems and, when the system is a trash boom, we also recycle or dispose of the trash that they capture.”
This is the Osprey Initiative’s second project in Minneapolis. Their first trash boom was installed in Lake Hiawatha last year, and was so successful that the City of Minneapolis wanted to tackle the problem of removing litter in another city lake. To learn more about the Lake of the Isles trash boom, safety walks, or upcoming clean-up events in the East Isles neighborhood, visit
www.eastisles.org.
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