Who are the River Rangers?

The WRWC River Rangers are a team of year-round and seasonal professionals who sustain, improve, and expand the multi-use Woonasquatucket River Greenway. Each Ranger joins for their own reasons and gains professional, technical, and personal skills along the way.

River Rangers act as stewards of the Greenway and the wider watershed. They help maintain urban gardens and wild plant life along the river, and they teach community members how to care for local parks and natural areas. Rangers support cleanups, plantings, and recreational programs, and they often partner with local artists to bring color and creativity to the Greenway. While working on the water, Rangers learn canoe and kayak skills and help protect the watershed from the river level. They also work with certified contractors to build both green infrastructure and public shade structures. Because the Woonasquatucket River supports diverse plants and wildlife, Rangers gain hands-on experience with local ecosystems, helping them become stronger environmental advocates.

Ranger work along the Greenway corridor includes invasive plant management, installing and caring for plantings, mowing and trimming, maintaining stormwater systems like bioswales and tree wells, removing trash, coordinating public cleanups, supporting community events, and contributing to art installations and civic space improvements. The River Ranger team collaborates with Police Departments, Parks Departments, Public Works, Housing Authorities, and many local partners, organizations, and residents to maintain the parks and bike path. Their work helps educate and empower the watershed community.

The WRWC River Rangers are our pro team, working from spring through early winter. They play a key role in keeping the parks and bike path along the Woonasquatucket River safe, healthy, and welcoming for everyone. Their impact is visible throughout the watershed as they teach, learn, and grow together.

Beyond physical stewardship, Rangers support responsible use of outdoor spaces, develop and lead volunteer projects, and help educate neighborhood youth along the Greenway. River Rangers remain some of our strongest advocates for the Woonasquatucket River.

A Brief History

In 1999, the Woonasquatucket River Greenway Project (now WRWC) hired the first River Rangers, giving local teens summer jobs as river and park stewards—long before several parks were even transformed. Their early goals were to:

• Give youth living along the river a chance to improve their neighborhoods and environment
• Build community capacity by teaching residents how to be active stewards
• Make on-the-ground improvements to riverbanks, green spaces, and parks

As the Greenway grew, so did the Rangers’ role. In 2014, WRWC partnered with the Rhode Island Department of Transportation, which began funding bike path maintenance. This one-of-a-kind partnership in Rhode Island allowed WRWC to hire professional River Rangers to care for the growing Greenway and protect decades of improvements.

Because this funding is not permanent, support from donors and sponsors remains essential to keeping this team of dedicated stewards working for the community.