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Iowa boy, 4, helps clean up damage from devastating derecho

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DES MOINES, Iowa (NewsNation) — Two weeks after a devastating derecho ripped across Iowa, a four-year-old Des Moines boy is spending all his time picking up the leftover trash and debris.

Four-year-old Enzo walks around his southside Des Moines neighborhood with his mother and grandmother every day, decked out in his neon-yellow safety vest, while cleaning up trash.

His mom, Candace Alvarez, said since Enzo was young, he was particularly fixated on garbage that he would see lying around — just about everywhere.

“He said ‘why is it there?’ and ever since then he’ll say ‘Mommy there’s trash, we gotta go get it now,” she said.

Alvarez and her mother, Dena Wallace, said even though he has an unusual passion for picking up bottles and straws he sees in the street, they try to teach him that he should not have to because people should properly dispose of their garbage.

Nonetheless, each day, Enzo walks around the neighborhood, cleaning up whatever he can find and putting a smile on others’ faces while doing so.

“We would have never thought it but he just absolutely loves it. He gets so happy and excited and tells all the neighbors about it,” Wallace said. “He’s just been a sweetheart from day one.”

NewsNation affiliate WHO contributed to this post.

Midwest

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