The Santo Domingo Municipality, the Ministry of Public Health and the National Council of Private Enterprise (CONEP) joined forces to carry out a weekend three-day effort to put out as many people and vehicles as possible in service of cleaning up the streets of Santo Domingo of all the fallen trees, debris and scattered trash. Also joining the effort were the Association of Industries, the Armed Forces (who are already engaged in such work in some parts of the DN), the Santo Domingo Firefighters Corps, Metropolitan Transport Authority, the Boy Scouts of Santo Domingo. CONEP organized a pool of 50 trucks for the effort, and hopes that along with participation from varied individual companies, to have a force of 150 trucks active in the collection effort each day. As part of the operation, more than 1,500 persons participated in the clean up of the Mirador del Sur park alone. The park is over eight kilometers long and half a kilometer wide, and suffered from the fallen branches of its thousands of trees. One company, Helados Bon helped finance the restoration of the trees of the Colonial City, contracting a large crane that lifted monumental trees near Mercedes and Carmen churches over several days of work. The Mayor of Santo Domingo, Johnny Ventura expects the city to be able to put behind it the headaches left by Georges in a month and a half time. He praised the way city residents and companies have integrated in the clean up operations. He called the attention that garbage not be burned and that residents be confident that brigades will pass to pick up the debris.
