Volunteers clean up parks in Little Rock

Historic flooding left debris, mud covering Murray dog site

Nancy Wyatt, a master naturalist, rakes floodwaters debris Saturday from the fencing at the dog park in Little Rock’s Murray Park. More photos are available at arkansasonline.com/623parkcleanup/
Nancy Wyatt, a master naturalist, rakes floodwaters debris Saturday from the fencing at the dog park in Little Rock’s Murray Park. More photos are available at arkansasonline.com/623parkcleanup/

More than 60 people gave up their Saturday morning to clean up Little Rock parks affected by last month's historic Arkansas River flooding.

High water and strong currents flooded Murray Dog Park last month, leaving fences plastered with mud and debris, and covering the grounds with silt and sand.

Karen Sykes, volunteer coordinator for the city of Little Rock, said dozens of people arrived early Saturday to clean up and restore Murray and Riverfront parks to a usable condition.

"There's not as much widespread damage as people would expect, but this park really took a hit," Sykes said Saturday morning as volunteers raked leaves, shoveled dirt and cleaned off fences behind her. "A lot of this is from Wednesday's storms, so it's really a double cleanup."

Members of the women's and men's basketball teams from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Athletic Department arrived to aid in the cleanup, along with the department's director, Chasse Conque.

Saturday would have been the team's day off, but instead, the players grabbed shovels and rakes, and signed up to work from 8:30 a.m. to noon, said Teal Battle, a forward for the women's basketball team.

"We are always willing to help out where we can," Battle said. "We're happy to be here."

Michael Shepherd, a former University of Arkansas, Fayetteville football player and a UALR season-ticket holder, said he was happy to see the athletics department volunteering in the community.

"This is a challenge to the boys, but the girls are really outworking them," Shepherd said, laughing. "It means a lot to me to see them out here, because, you know, I watch them on TV or at their games all the time. The real star of this is UALR."

Shepherd said he takes his dachshund terrier mix Nola to the park all the time, and when he heard about the volunteer day, he began inviting all of his dog-park friends to help.

"You know now that we're empty-nesters, we spend a lot of time down here," Shepherd said. "The way it was described to me was a 'community cleanup,' but I didn't know how people were going to hear about it, so I started telling everyone I saw here on Monday. There's probably going to be 100 names on that sign-up sheet by the end of the day."

Shawna Sizemore said she was one of the park-goers Shepherd invited when she took her dogs, Aloe, Garvin and Sawyer to the park last week.

"We're here as much as I can be -- at least three times a week," Sizemore said. "It's provided to us, so if we can help keep it clean, I want to do that."

By 9:30 a.m., the crew had already removed three dump-truck loads of leaves, dirt and limbs from the park and had piled more debris near the park's entrance to move on the next trip.

Ken Cobb said that although the park is looking much better now, it had standing water in it earlier this month.

"We were here last weekend when the park was still closed, and of course you couldn't drive past the roundabout, but there was still water out here," he said. "I guess it didn't have anywhere to go. It's really dried up since then."

Cobb was using a rake Saturday morning to knock mud and leaves from the park's black, chain-link fence. He gestured to a fence line farther away where volunteers had yet to clean. The 4-foot-tall fence was caked with mud, sticks, feathers and fluffy cottonwood seeds.

"It all looked like this when we got here," Cobb said. "And this is a really busy dog park. There's normally twice the number of people out here today on the weekends with their dogs. For people who have to work and keep their dogs confined during the day, this is a really great place to let them run."

Sykes said she was pleased with the turnout Saturday and happy to see so many people showing up to take care of their city parks.

"We have two dog parks, and this one has been here longer," she said. "A lot of people here actually use the parks, and you know, who doesn't love taking their dogs to the park?"

photo

Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/JOHN SYKES JR.

Nicole Hemphill and teammates on the University of Arkansas at Little Rock women’s basketball team help clear storm and flooding debris Saturday from Little Rock’s Murray Park. More photos are available at arkansasonline.com/623parkcleanup/

Metro on 06/23/2019

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