ASHLAND, Ore. — Christmas may be over but the clean up is still ongoing.
That’s what brought a local scout troop around Ashland today picking up old Christmas trees.
Since 1986 Boy Scout Troop #112 has gone around the streets of Ashland collecting old Christmas trees after the holiday.
Girl Scout Troop #8112 was able to help out this year as well.
“Behind Mount Ashland there’s a place people used to just dump their trees and there was just sort of a graveyard of old Christmas trees, it was a fire hazard, and they said hey, this this should be a service project and we pick them up,” said committee chair of troop #112, John Ourant.
Collecting the trees fulfills part of the scouts requirement for ranking up. It also helps them with community service hours.
“It’s a good experience for them and it builds good character, it’s really good to be contributing. It’s really encouraging to see that they really have fun with it,” added Ourant.
The troops aren’t alone in this project. Ashland Parks Department along with the Ashland Lions Club joined in to help make the event happen.
The old Christmas trees are brought from Ashland sidewalks to the senior center, where they are put into a chipper.
“They bring them to us, we chip them, and then we re-use the chips and we put them in the different beds of the parks, we put them on the trail systems,” said Ashland Parks Department worker, Joe Hyde.
The tree pick up consists of multiple teams.
In all, 64 people in total were out collecting Saturday.
As Ourant said, the scouts do have fun with it.
“I’d say we’ve gotten tons of trees, everybody is generally just really positive about everything,” 2nd class Boy Scout, Kaden Calkins, said.
“It was also really fun going up to the doors, meeting the people and actually talking to them,” added tenderfoot Girl Scout, Molly Budge.
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