By Danielle Bongiovanni, LRWP 2025 Science Communication Intern

The Lower Raritan Watershed Partnership (LRWP) is overwhelmed with gratitude for everyone who helped raise over $3,500 at the “Run Off” 5k on Saturday, March 29 at Washington Memorial Park. Whether you were one of the 108 registered racers, bought tickets for the gift basket raffle, or simply came to learn the importance of keeping the Raritan Watershed clean, we were happy to have you there.

The “Run Off” would not have been possible without sponsorship from NJ American Water, Crunch Fitness of Green Book and the Borough of Dunellen. The Middlesex County Office of Emergency Management, Dunellen crossing guards, and volunteers from SEWA Central New Jersey and the LRWP ensured the event’s safety. 

Grant funding was provided by the Middlesex County Board of County Commissioners through a grant award from the Middlesex County Cultural and Arts Trust Fund. For information on events, go to MiddlesexCountyCulture.com.

“The Lower Raritan Watershed Partnership has been a grantee of ours through our program grants for arts, history and culture for years, doing either an arts project or a history project and intersecting that with the environmental issues they work on through their nonprofit. They’re one of a few environmental groups that receive arts, history and culture funding, so we love getting involved with them,” said Manda Gorsegner, the Division Head of Visual and Performing Arts at the Arts Institute of Middlesex County.

The Institute assisted with event planning by rallying visual and performing artists to bring attention to conservation through creativity. Gorsegner said, “Using arts, history, and culture to engage the public in environmental and social issues is really impactful and a unique way to talk about these stories and the importance of how we all intersect culturally and socially.”

Such conversations abounded as attendees visited tables set up by event partners. Spectrum for Living, a non-profit serving people with developmental disabilities, provided googly eyes, fake feathers and colorful paper squares for decorating wood cutouts of green herons. Crafters took home a reminder of who else depends on clean watersheds.

Independent artists Kate Eggleston and Lisa Bagwell repurposed litter into art supplies. Eggleston created plates for collagraph printmaking, while Bagwell used it as filling for a sculpture of a glass eel, a juvenile stage of the American eel.

Bagwell was in her element. “I do a lot of cleanups on my own, so making a sculpture out of collected trash is what I do,” she said. The completed sculpture will be toured across schools by the Hudson River Foundation’s NY-NJ Harbor & Estuary Program to raise awareness of waterway pollution.

Music poured from the pavilion, courtesy of the talented New Jersey Brass Band, part of the New Brunswick Jazz Project, and by jazz vocalist Audra Mariel.

One performer took his music to the streets instead. Dave Seamon, better known as the Trash Troubadour, performed his song “Miracle Mile” as he led attendees favoring a slower pace on a “Trickle” from the park to the Green Brook. There, LRWP Board Member Anton Getz and LRWP Community Outreach Coordinator Dr. John Meyer discussed the litter trap and the eel monitoring program.

The litter trap, nicknamed Bandit, was installed in the Green Brook as part of the Cornell-Dubilier Electronics Natural Resource Damage Assessment and Restoration (NRDAR) Restoration Plan. The Cornell-Dubilier NRDAR Plan is an example of how the nation’s strong Superfund Laws truly hold polluters accountable for environmental damages in our communities. Cornell-Dubilier Superfund Site Trustees include the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the US Fish and Wildlife Service and the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection. The location of the litter trap, almost exactly at the intersection of Union, Middlesex, and Somerset Counties, is a pertinent reminder of how polluted water flows without regard for man-made borders. When the Dunellen Department of Public Works empties Bandit, Dunellen is not the only community benefitting.

The beneficiaries are not limited to humans! Getz recalled discovering a three-foot-long American eel hiding inside a tire during a cleanup of the Green Brook. “Those chemicals are leaching into its water, leaching into its environment, so it needs to find a better hideaway,” he said.

Meyer assured attendees that the litter trap did not hinder migrating eels. Bandit’s buoyant arms catch floating trash, but fish can easily swim beneath.

Back at the park, Green Brook Middle School students presented posters created in collaboration with the LRWP and New Jersey Watershed Ambassador Brianna Casario. They shared facts about the American eel’s life cycle and discussed the importance of citizen science.

The event concluded with the winners of the gift basket raffle, whose prizes were generously donated by local businesses. Congratulations were also awarded to the fastest 5k runners.  Dunellen residents took first in the male and female divisions, with Matthew Clemente recording a chip time of 21:27 and Lisa Shultz recording 27:16.

At the core of the “Run Off” 5k was the theme of connection. Attendees from across New Jersey supported conservation through the arts, sciences, and athletics. It proved how, regardless of your preferred discipline or your location, there is an opportunity for you to fight for healthy watersheds, and the LRWP would love to help you find it.