One year from now, a nonprofit group based in Turner plans to hold an enormous garbage cleanup along 102 miles of the Androscoggin River from the New Hampshire border to Merrymeeting Bay.

The Communities Getting Involved effort is slated for the week of Aug. 8-14, 2005. Most work will take place on Aug. 13 and 14.

The cleanup will include 20 different sections along the shores in 21 different towns, and will require 300 people and 140 boats to complete.

Eric Goodwin, CGI’s executive director, said the group’s goal is to enlist the participation of area organizations and individuals from river communities. He called the cleanup vital to the economic and recreational future of the Androscoggin River Valley.

The group has already sponsored cleanups of the Nezinscot River in Buckfield and Turner. The Nezinscot is a tributary of the Androscoggin.

“Our Androscoggin cleanup will be our first truly large-scale cleanup,” Goodwin said. “We expect to need the full year between now and then to plan the cleanup, gain support for it and raise money to pay for it. It is a very exciting project for us.”

The program has four mandates:

• To directly improve the health of waterways by cleaning garbage from them.

• To hold volunteer-based cleanup events with a purpose of including as many local people as possible to highlight conservation and community enhancement in general.

• To support ongoing scientific and conservation research.

• To create and support local, long-term conservation efforts when appropriate.

CGI will ask corporations, businesses, governments and individuals to support the cleanup with volunteers, funding, marketing and logistical support.

“The Androscoggin flows through many communities with people that care about the river,” Goodwin said. “It is very hard for many of these people to get involved with the river because they live on or near the river and they also work in the mills. They are torn (by the sometimes competing interests involved). The Androscoggin River cleanup is a way for anyone who wants to be involved to … make a measurable difference without sacrificing their individual beliefs.”

He said the Androscoggin has become a battleground for environmentalists, state regulators and paper mill officials. The environmentalists are fighting to improve the quality of the river and the mills and government are trying to maintain financial stability and jobs.

“Our approach to this event will … be an atypical voice within this conflict,” Goodwin said. “We are not committed to one side or the other. … We will be working over the next year to include all parties in our operations. We will ask the mills and environmental parties alike to support us and the cleanup. We hope to get volunteers from all sides and from the general public involved.”

Goodwin added, “We want to do what we can to bring both sides together to work to a common purpose, if only for one day. The Androscoggin River cleanup will not be a political event, it will be a venue for people to set aside their differences for the common good of the river.”

If all 20 sections are not reached during the cleanup week, Goodwin said volunteers will return to finish the remaining sections over the rest of the summer.