Jill Schramm/MDN Kenneth Bitz stands next to a Souris River deadloop in southeast Minot Wednesday. He has formed a nonprofit focused on cleanup along public waterfronts.

Navy veteran Kenneth Bitz has a passion for protecting the beauty of the outdoors for future generations.

“It gives you a great appreciation for the outdoors when you spend 300 days a year underwater for several years in a row,” said Bitz, who was assigned to submarines during his service from 1983-89.

What has appalled him and driven him to action has been the litter and trash that has become embedded in America’s most scenic locations. Having lived in 11 states and witnessed the trash accumulating in the environment around heavily populated areas and tourist attractions, Bitz is committed to protecting his adopted state, North Dakota, from a similar fate.

He assesses North Dakota to be one of the cleanest states, behind Maine, but still in danger of having its public lands and waterfronts severely polluted by garbage.

Also, while North Dakota may appear on the surface to be a clean state, a lot of embedded trash can be found by those who look closely, Bitz said.

“But we’re not bad,” he said, indicating the problem can be solved. “We can do it in a few years, but here’s the deal. It’s expensive to pick up trash and it’s complicated.”

Bitz recently formed the nonprofit Shore Line Project ND. The organization’s aim is to organize cleanup efforts and become a resource should emergencies threaten a state waterway.

Even before forming the nonprofit, Bitz had undertaken cleanups in areas where he has lived or enjoyed the outdoors.

In North Dakota, he has led cleanup projects at Souris Wildlife Refuge and has organized crews that have cleaned around Lake Sakakawea boat ramps and recreation areas at Douglas Creek, Deepwater Bay and Parshall Bay. Crews collected 60 pounds of trash at Parshall Bay alone.

Bitz said his goal is to complete cleanup of the entire lake system in the Garrison area. Steinke Bay is his next target.

Bitz, 60, has lived in Minot for four years. Born in New York, he moved in middle school to Texas, where he was living when he underwent heart surgery during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. For health reasons, he isolated in the Grand Tetons of Wyoming until wildfires sent him on the move.

He said divine intervention brought him to Minot. He had never heard of Minot, but it was the only place in the region at the time with an available hotel room. Once in Minot, he was charmed, and he and his wife decided to stay.

The state now is his focus for environmental cleanup.

“I’m trying to design a system that identifies fixes and then maintains control of it. I think it can be done,” Bitz said. “I know the logistics of how to get it done – the physical part of getting it all picked up and planning and plotting it out. … But financially and legally, it takes a lot of people to do it.”

He is looking for individuals to serve on a board for Shore Line Project ND (SLPND) and would like to get other veterans involved. Individuals who can provide administrative support in managing finances or the organization’s website would be helpful, he said.

His nonprofit is set up to take donations to assist with costs such as travel, water safety training for workers and acquiring harnesses to keep workers safe in more hazardous locations.

Bitz also pays his workers because volunteers, while welcome, cannot always commit the time. He has hired unemployed individuals holding signs in parking lots indicating they want to work and sees potential to hire people coming out of treatment or incarceration programs who need help getting started.

He said environmental cleanup is beyond the scope of what current tax dollars cover.

“You’re not going to be able to have government agencies keep up with the problems,” he said, noting it takes a dedicated organization.

He estimates 60 people stationed in teams across North Dakota could clean the state waterways in a couple of years, and 30 people could maintain it. Through SLPND, he said, he hopes to make that cleanup happen and to encourage outdoor enthusiasts to do their part to ensure public waterways stay pristine.

“What are we going to leave the kids?” Bitz said. “There’s no excuse to enjoy the area and the water and all of that and not take care of it.”