The Friends of Kickapoo Creek: Peorians Taking Watershed Preservation Into Their Own Hands
By Lucas D. Myrna, Secretary, Friends of Kickapoo Creek.
The Friends of Kickapoo Creek (Officially, F.O.K.C., NFP) is a Peoria, Illinois, nonprofit founded in 2023 by the cousins Jackson Myrna, Lucas Myrna, and William Ewers. The cousins had been canoeing, fishing, camping, and traipsing the Kickapoo Creek their whole lives. When the pandemic hit in 2020 and outdoor activities became one of the only ways to escape the drudgeries of everyday life, the boys decided that they should become more serious about cleaning up and protecting their city’s long-neglected creek. While it’s always been beautiful, the Kickapoo very visibly suffers from the sins of our region’s industrial past. There are landfills, junkyards, and industrial waste sites that pollute the creek and many decades’ worth of detritus that have been dumped in her once-pristine waters. Even today, the amount of trash that people – whether through ignorance, malice, or apathy – actively throw into the creek is shocking and appalling.
As such, around about 2020, the three cousins were determined to become a part of the solution to the problems plaguing Kickapoo Creek. It started out with just bringing a couple trash bags to fill when they went fishing. And then they started towing a designated “Trash Canoe” when they paddled the creek. It didn’t take long for other friends and family to start getting involved and the trips to the county landfill and tire disposal places were getting expensive. So they decided it was time to incorporate as a non-profit and then went through the bureaucratic, labyrinthine process of getting registered with the State and the IRS. With help and advice from The Friends of Rocky Glen – an established nonprofit in Peoria with a similar mission of natural preservation and protection – the Friends of Kickapoo Creek was incorporated in August of 2022.
Since their humble origins, the organization has grown to include the board members William Schefelbein, Alex Reed, Andrew Runkle, and Troy Faley, all of whom bring their unique skillsets and expertise to help the Friends of Kickapoo Creek grow and thrive. With the help of countless volunteers, donors, friends, and other interested parties, the enterprise that started as just a couple of dudes with trash bags and a dream has managed to grow into a fully-fledged trash removing, community educating, ecosystem advocating, creek protecting operation. To date, The Friends of Kickapoo Creek has removed over twelve thousands pounds of trash from the creek, dug out and recycled over two hundred tires, hosted dozens of land- and water-based creek cleanups, participated in multiple water quality studies, informed the public about the plight of the Kickapoo, and fostered myriad relationships with other like-minded organizations in their struggle to restore the Kickapoo’s watershed to its former glory. And the work is far from finished.
More info:
Our website is friendsofkickapoocreek.org where we post all of our upcoming events, floats, and cleanups in the Events tab, sell FOKC apparel and accessories, and maintain a creek access map, among other watershed-related information.
The first creek float and clean up this year is on Saturday, May 3rd from 12:00pm – 5:00pm. You can RSVP using the link below www.friendsofkickapoocreek.org/event/may-cleanup-float/
Donate to our cause on the website (www.friendsofkickapoocreek.org/donate/). 100% of the proceeds go to caring for Kickapoo Creek.
Finally, if you live in Central Illinois, PLEASE fill out this environmental survey (CLICK HERE FOR SURVEY) regarding the Kickapoo Creek Watershed Study