On the 37th day of the federal government shutdown, about two dozen Richmond residents and environmentalists met at Easter Hill United Methodist Church to discuss the cleanup of the United Heckathorn Superfund Site. The Environmental Protection Agency is responsible for monitoring and decontaminating the site, which includes the Lauritzen Channel (pictured above) in Richmond’s Inner Harbor and an adjacent section of land. The federal government shutdown has delayed the development of an agency-approved cleanup plan. However, Richmond residents at last…
Dozens of volunteers worked with the community organization Urban Tilth to clean up Wildcat Creek in North Richmond Ballpark on Saturday morning, extracting chunks of tires, stretches of inner tube, mud-encrusted plastic bottles, solitary shoes, a tired-looking soccer ball, and a plethora of other man-made waste from around spindly trees that hide the waterway. “It feels really good to come out and be part of a group like this, get dirty, get bitten by mosquitoes,” said Wittiker Schlauoh-Saiyawong, who joined…