Sunday will find Mifflin Street disheveled and coated with countless beer cups and waste from Saturday's annual bash, but the Mifflin Street Co-Op, 32 N. Bassett St., is ready to act.
This is the 10th year the co-op will aid with the block party, providing trash and recycling bags as well as free coffee donated by Just Coffee, 100 S. Baldwin St.
Mifflin Co-Op Outreach Coordinator Lauren Miller said participating in the Sunday cleanup is a way to participate and take pride in living and doing business in the area.
\It's just a way to get people going,"" she said. ""It's going to be a very rough morning for some people I'd imagine.""
Miller said the Mifflin residents are very good about waking up early to clean up the neighborhood.
UW-Madison junior Erin Brodhagen has lived on Mifflin Street for the past two years, and agrees with Miller that the cleaning process is a cooperative effort.
""The day after, the street is completely trashed and all the residents go and clean up together, so it gets cleaned up pretty quickly,"" she said.
Brodhagen said the trash is essentially just beer cups and the usual garbage, so the time spent cleaning is minimal if everyone works together.
Capitol Centre Foods, 111 N. Broom St., is also involved in the post-party cleanup, and according to owner John Leemkuil the store has participated for many years running.
""[The] party's been going on as long as we've been here, so we've always been a part of it,"" he said.
For a big part of the party cleanup, the Mifflin Street Co-Op traditionally plants flowers.
This year, however, because of the confusion surrounding the date of the party, the annual flower planting will not happen until the following weekend.
Miller said the UW-Madison Horticulture Club will assist with this year's planting.
""We have two community garden plots where we plant decorative and food herbs and those are for everyone in the community to utilize,"" she said.
In previous years, the co-op went door to door offering people flowers to plant in their yards, but this year, the co-op plans to plant flowers in their plots and then offer the leftovers to Mifflin residents.
Miller said the co-op enjoys making the neighborhood look good for the residents.
""It's a good way to have us connect with a neighborhood and the street too,"" she said. ""We want a way to deal with the constructive side of the block party.""
Sunday's cleanup is scheduled to start at 9 a.m. and will go until all the trash is off the street.
