La Jolla residents are willing to get dirty to polish their community as about 30 volunteers have been proving on the second Saturday of each month since January at the La Jolla Town Council’s Nell Carpenter Beautification/Streetscape Committee local cleanups. This month’s event will take place June 12 from 9 a.m. to noon, and will target Pearl Street from Girard Avenue to La Jolla Boulevard. Participants will meet at the intersection of Fay Avenue and Pearl Street to fuel up with donated Starbucks coffee and refreshments, then arm themselves with gloves, pickers, brooms, trash bags and other tools necessary to leave the street sparkling clean. Volunteers will sweep sidewalks and gutters, remove weeds and tend flowerbeds, marking Pearl Street’s first official cleanup since April 2007. Esther Viti, chairwoman of the committee, initiated the switch from three to five annual cleanups to monthly ones five months ago. Since then, she said, the tradition has been met with enthusiasm and has made strides in keeping La Jolla pristine. “Many residents come out to participate, in addition to visitors from all over,” Viti said. “We have participants of all ages, from three to 85. They are all just so happy to help.” Viti added that everyone’s contribution matters, from a small child with a trash picker to college students able to wield more powerful landscaping tools. “Every month we get new people, and it’s very exciting,” she said. “We are noticing a difference in La Jolla, despite all the construction that’s going on,” she said, referencing the water and sewer replacement work on Prospect Street. Viti hopes to eventually increase attendance to 50 volunteers on a regular basis. “We limit these events to three hours because we don’t want people to get burnt out,” she said. “The more people we have, the more we can get done in that amount of time.” Luckily, she said, the volunteers keep coming back. “It’s an extremely fulfilling experience,” Viti said. “When people are able to pick up trash and sweep debris into a dustpan and carry that bag away, it makes them feel good, like they’re a part of the community and their help matters.” Viti, who has chaired the Nell Carpenter Beautification/Streetscape Committee for the past six years, selects the location for each cleanup based on which areas need attention and which have not been attended to recently. Next month’s clean- up on July 10 will tackle Herschel Avenue from Prospect Street to Torrey Pines Road. Past events have targeted Girard Avenue, Prospect Street, Silverado and Wall Street. “I know everything that’s going on the community,” Viti said. “I know what needs to be done, and it’s amazing because people are thrilled to provide help where it’s most needed.” Viti also urged local residents and business owners to take initiative by “sweeping the sidewalks and picking up trash in front of their homes and stores,” she said. “That alone would make a huge difference on a day-to-day basis.” Junk MD, a junk removal and hauling company, donates its services to remove the collected debris each month at the committee’s cleanups. Parking for the June 12 cleanup will be available at Iron Stone Bank. Visitors are asked to sign in at a table located in the parking lot behind the bank. Those who are unable to attend can make tax-deductible donations by sending a check to the La Jolla Town Council Foundation, earmarked to Nell Carpenter Clean Up, P.O. Box 1101, La Jolla, CA 92038, attention to Esther Viti.