Almost 800 volunteers helped to clean up trash from the state’s waterways and Long Island Sound as part of International Coastal Cleanup Day.
Advertisement
– International Coastal Cleanup Day is conducted in various parts of the world in September every year under the aegis of United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and under the aegis of South Asia Co-operative Environment Programme (SACEP) in the South Asian Region. The event is expected to draw more than 70,000 volunteers who will combat marine debris at over 800 locations throughout the state by removing the trash that has accumulated on California’s beaches and inland shorelines over the past year.
On Saturday, from 9 a.m. until noon, thousands of volunteers will be back for the 32nd annual event.
Cleanup Captain Louise Fabrykiewicz has been participating in such events since the early 1990s, and organized the Ocean Beach cleanup for years. Other commonly collected items on Coastal Cleanup Days are plastic beverage bottles, food wrappers, plastic bags and plastic bottle caps and straws. People are shocked the beaches already look so clean when they arrive, but it’s the smaller pieces that matter. They explain that cigarette butts contain chemicals which can resist in the environment for years, and they are most likely to end up on the beach, or in the ocean. “We want to prevent items from making their way into the ocean, and educating people about preventing waste”.
Numerous participants locally this year were first-timers who came out to support their favorite beach or state park.
With 70% of the cleanup sites reporting, the statewide count stands at 51,895 volunteers.
“They are slowly getting less and less, but I don’t think people are getting neater”, Franck Schmid said.
“They picked up 150”, she said. They said they usually go to Lakeport State Park. You may also host a cleanup with our help. “I really appreciate everything that our volunteers, site coordinators and partner organizations have done to make this happen”.
Advertisement
Erreanna France with Franklin Middle pushes a cart filled with trash collected along White Slough behind the EcoThrift store on Redwood Parkway at one of the California Coastal Cleanup spots throughout Vallejo. Jerry Brown, is considering whether to ban the most common type of litter picked up every year, cigarette butts.
