From stormwater management to dam removal, Akron-area waterways are seeing investments following decades of pollution and neglect.
And while multimillion-dollar projects, like Akron’s sewer project, tend to get the fanfare, much smaller — and cheaper — community-led efforts are helping to restore the health and beauty of the local environment.
River Guardians Ohio focuses on removing tons of trash that flow into Akron’s rivers, lakes and canals each year. Using relatively simple tools and a small base of volunteers, the group is working to make a difference in the health of Akron-area waterways.
“We actually offer simple solutions to complex problems,” group co-founder James Carnahan said. He founded the group with Dave Stoler and Wendy Hagen in 2023.
Carnahan spoke to residents recently at the April 7 Ward 9 meeting where Council Member Tina Boyes introduced him. She told attendees that “James and his group have cleaned up over 10,000 pounds of trash just last year. He’s got booms in more than 20 locations in three of our [Akron] wards.”
Akron Documenter Jessica Rice discovered this story at the April 7 Ward 9 community meeting.
River Guardians Ohio born out of Tuscarawas River oil spill
River Guardians Ohio took shape after Carnahan discovered oil leaking into the Tuscarawas River while he was fly fishing. After reporting the spill, he was dismayed by the slow pace of the cleanup, which he said stemmed from complex bureaucracies and the overlapping jurisdictions around Akron’s waterways.
“I spent about 11 weeks watching the response — or, quote unquote, lack of response,” Carnahan said. “Watching that whole situation is really what prompted me to get involved.”
While the full environmental impacts of the spill will not be known for years, Carnahan helped where he could and found new motivation to go beyond simply volunteerism, especially as he noticed how much trash was coming out of the river along with the oil.
“What we decided we were going to do is we were going to play the part of ‘they.’ Because everybody always says, you know, ‘well, they should be taking care of this, and they should be cleaning that up, and they should be watching this,’ but they don’t get to it,” Carnahan said.
”I could spend my time attacking ‘they,’ but we decided to spend our time being ‘they,’ and we just actually go out there and start fixing the issues.”
Booms across waterways help stop trash on its way downstream
River Guardians Ohio uses minimal tools in its work, mostly waders (large, high-waisted rubber boots), kayaks and volunteer muscle to remove trash.
There was another tool Carnahan knew could make a huge difference — booms.
Booms are floating, chain-like structures that cross waterways, designed to stop boats or debris from continuing downstream. Carnahan found that the necessary booms would cost thousands of dollars and were not readily available to non-governmental organizations. So he decided to try to make his own.
“We came up with a homemade boom — basically a trash boom — and we put that on Mud Run. That’s where it all started, pulling trash out before it ever got into Summit Lake,” Carnahan said.
Homemade booms reuse plastic water bottles to aid water cleanup
Using reclaimed materials such as empty plastic water bottles stuffed into small black plastic culvert pipes, the boom is designed to break away if there is a catastrophic buildup of material. By placing his homemade booms at strategic choke points, Carnahan and his network of volunteers have collected nearly 5 tons of trash out of Summit Lake alone.
“Instead of chasing trash up and down the creek for miles, we can collect it in one place and remove it,” Carnahan explained.
Carnahan has worked closely with organizations such as the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, Summit Metro Parks and private property owners to seek permission and coordinate efforts.
He said he has found that he can move in ways that much larger organizations can’t.
“The Metro Parks has actually reached out to me in a couple areas where they’re not able to go in. They’re limited by jurisdiction, especially along the towpath,” he said. “I can approach property owners and go into those spaces and do the work.”
Currently an LLC, River Guardians Ohio is exploring becoming a non-profit, though Carnahan is trying to be as deliberate as possible with this transition.
“If you get too bureaucratic or too structurally organized, then suddenly somebody reaches out with a problem and I have to go through four different layers just to respond,” he said.
“In my situation now — and what we’ll do as a 501(c)(3) — I want to be able to respond and just say, ‘Yeah, I’ll be there tomorrow. Where do you want to meet?’”
