University of Oregon investigating after lake island trashed by partiers

REDDING, Calif. – The University of Oregon is investigating whether other campus fraternities and sororities were responsible for a half-mile-wide swath of trash left behind at a California lake after one fraternity was suspended, a university spokesman said Wednesday.

The investigation won’t be easy given the apparent large number of people involved in the weekend outing on Slaughterhouse Island in Lake Shasta and the participation of groups from multiple schools, university spokesman Tobin Klinger said. Fraternities and sororities from schools all along the West Coast take trips to the area each year, Robin Holmes, vice president for student life at the university, said in a statement.

Holmes said the mess was “disgraceful.”

“We are working with authorities to learn all we can and determine who is responsible,” she said.

The National Forest Service said workers cleaned up a half-mile-wide swath of trash left behind by about a thousand campers. It took about 25 workers five hours to clean up the mess on Tuesday, Shasta-Trinity National Forest spokeswoman Phyllis Swanson said.

Pictures on social media showed some of the mess, including several items branded with University of Oregon logos and a cooler with the Greek letters Lambda Chi Alpha.

The national Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity suspended the activities of its University of Oregon chapter, Holmes said.

The chapter is cooperating with the university’s investigation and will hold the people involved accountable, it said in a statement posted on the university’s fraternity and sorority life Facebook page.

The group also said it had reached out to the forest service to help with the cleanup.