Volunteer Opportunities

Join Riverkeeper’s Volunteer Team! At Riverkeeper we appreciate and depend on the ongoing support our volunteers provide us with. We believe in the necessity and the right of community members to play a primary role in protecting their local environment. To put that belief into action, we offer the following volunteer positions in which you can help Riverkeeper and act on your passion for a healthy Hudson River free of pollution and protecting the quality of drinking water for over 9 million New Yorkers!

Please review the below opportunities and fill out our required volunteer form and note if you are interested in a particular volunteer opportunity. Opportunities vary throughout the year and range from public education to administrative support to community science.

To see what to expect as a volunteer, check out this Overview of Being a Riverkeeper Volunteer >

Volunteer Form

 

Click the opportunity of your choice below for a complete description.

Please contact Katie Leung at 914.478.4501 ext. 256 or at [email protected] with any questions. Please join our Facebook group for Riverkeeper Volunteers.

• Lead or volunteer at a 2024 Riverkeeper Sweep Project Save the date for the 2024 Riverkeeper Sweep

  Our 13th Annual day of service for the Hudson River, the Riverkeeper Sweep is scheduled for Saturday, May 4, 2024. In 2023, we led 125 projects and 2,500 volunteers from Staten Island to the Adirondacks removing 31 tons of trash and hundreds of pounds of invasive species. For more information, visit the Riverkeeper Sweep page.

  Sweep Expansion. We are making Sweep a year-round program, and plan to organize several more projects per month. These projects will have a special focus on invasive species removal and tree planting. Do you have a vegetation project in mind or know someone who is interested in leading one? Please let us know of your interest on the Sweep Expansion Interest Form.

• Table at events and festivals Community Outreach

  Tabling is a critical Ambassador and volunteer opportunity. We rely on you to extend our reach across the estuary to farmers markets, festivals, fairs, and film screenings. Outreach can include sharing Riverkeeper’s mission and history, spreading the word of current action items and petitions, and gathering new memberships and donations. Check these tabling events below:

  Please check back for more opportunities this fall!

• Get your hands dirty River Stewardship Events

  Our single largest day of service, the Riverkeeper Sweep, falls under this category.
  We also plan for other hands-on activities such as invasive species site maintenance and tree planting projects in the late summer and fall when it is not too hot.
  The work can be dirty but is fun, rewarding, and educational!

  Tree Maintenance near Quassaick Creek (Little Falls)
  WHEN: Saturday, September 28, 10AM-1PM
  WHERE: 199-101 Walsh Ave, Newburgh, NY 12550
  REGISTER HERE

  BROOKLYN – Borough Park Neighborhood Cleanup, Sunday, September 29, 2024
  WHEN: Sunday, September 29, 11AM-3PM
  WHERE: Fort Hamilton Parkway Station, 11th Avenue & 62nd Street, Brooklyn, NY 11219
  REGISTER HERE

  BROOKLYN – Borough Park Neighborhood Cleanup, Sunday, October 20, 2024
  WHEN: Sunday, October 20, 11AM-3PM
  WHERE: Fort Hamilton Parkway Station, 11th Avenue & 62nd Street, Brooklyn, NY 11219
  REGISTER HERE

  ORANGE COUNTY: New Windsor – Trees for Tributaries at Moodna Viaduct
  WHEN: Saturday, November 9, 12AM-4PM
  WHERE: 220 Otterkill Road New Windsor, NY 12553
  REGISTER HERE

  BROOKLYN – Borough Park Neighborhood Cleanup, Sunday, November 17, 2024
  WHEN: Sunday, November 17, 11AM-3PM
  WHERE: Fort Hamilton Parkway Station, 11th Avenue & 62nd Street, Brooklyn, NY 11219
  REGISTER HERE

• Administrative

  Sometimes we need extra help with office work. Indoor office duties include mailing, document filing, data entry, and paper shredding. Opportunities in this category will be listed here as they are available.

• Legal

  Please check back for future opportunities!

• Host a screening host a film screening

  Host a screening of one or several of Riverkeeper’s short documentary films, including, One Dam At A Time, A Living River, Undamming the Hudson, and Source to Sea.

  One Dam at a Time (21 mins) highlights Riverkeeper’s dam removal work restoring free-flowing creeks and streams in the Hudson Valley. At least 1,600 dams fragment the creeks and streams of the Hudson Valley, most of them obsolete. By removing dams that no longer serve a purpose, we can reopen vital spawning grounds and allow the ecosystem to heal and flourish. Riverkeeper’s landmark success at Wynants Kill – a dam removal project by Riverkeeper, the City of Troy, and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation in 2016 – was just the start. It was the first dam removed along the Hudson expressly for the passage of fish. “One Dam at a Time” follows the effort as it extended to the Quassaick Creek in Newburgh and Furnace Brook in Westchester County in 2020, and shows how these streams are being transformed.

  A Living River (24 mins) chronicles the efforts of Riverkeeper, New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and others to restore the life and the ecosystem of the Hudson River.

  Undamming the Hudson River (16 mins) showcases Riverkeeper’s efforts to restore natural habitat by eliminating obsolete dams throughout the Hudson River Estuary. Many fish use tributaries to the Hudson River as pathways to move between feeding, nursery, and spawning grounds. Unfortunately, thousands of dams, many built in the 19th and 20th centuries are blocking those pathways and dramatically shrinking accessible habitat area, causing declines in fish and other wildlife. As the years have passed, these dams often no longer serve the purposes for which they were originally built and many have fallen into disrepair.

  Source to Sea (15 mins) is about our water quality monitoring program. Each year Riverkeeper, our partners, and 150+ citizen scientists take over 4,000 samples to monitor water quality on the Hudson River and select tributaries. This data provides insight into where and when it’s safe to swim, and informs our local and state advocacy for improvements and investments in our stormwater and wastewater systems.

• Water Quality Testing

  Riverkeeper began collecting and sampling water quality data from the Hudson River Estuary in 2006 and routinely monitors 74 locations between New York Harbor and Waterford. Our water quality study measures salinity, oxygen, temperature, suspended sediment, chlorophyll, and Enterococcus (Entero), a fecal indicator bacteria.

  Citizen science participation begins in April. Limited spots are available and volunteers must commit to 6 months of water quality sampling. For more information, visit the Water Quality Program page.