Over the past two and a half years, The Great Raleigh Cleanup has been working to remove litter around Raleigh one piece at a time. We're talking more than 90,000 pounds of trash picked up by 800+ volunteers.

Preston Ross III started the nonprofit in 2020 after he noticed more litter around the city than he remembered. "I thought, 'I'm going to pick some of it up,'" he said. "But it was a lot more than I could handle alone." So he asked the community for help. And since then, volunteers have shown up to collect trash with Preston every week.

This spring, we're teaming up with The Great Raleigh Cleanup to give back to the City of Oaks — and you're invited. Join us for a community clean up on Sunday, April 16 from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. Preston and City Editors Anne and Cat will lead the group for a fun cleaning sesh.

"It can be as adventurous as you want it to be — you can walk along the greenway and not even touch a blade of grass, or you can crawl up the side of a hill and jump down into a creek," Preston said. "You just have to bring a good attitude and we can make a significant impact."

Where is the clean up, you ask? That's up to you. In honor of NC's Year of the Trail, we want to help tidy up a local trail. Help us decide where to go by nominating one here.

We will reveal which trail received the most nominations in our newsletter on Friday, April 7. Sign up to volunteer and let's get picking.