Wood doing good

This is a guest post written by Nate Ivy, Coordinator of the Service-Learning Waste Reduction Project (SLWRP) -- a joint venture between StopWaste.org and the Alameda County Office of Education. Students at Wood Middle School recently organized their 2nd Annual Beach Clean-Up as part of their participation in the program. These same kids have also participated in Save The Bay field trips to learn more about their watershed and the ways in which their actions impact the health of the Bay.

Enjoy the post!

Wood Middle School 2nd Annual Beach Clean-Up

Wednesday, 26 May 2010

At first glance, Crown Memorial Beach in Alameda appears to be a clean, pleasant retreat highlighted by sweeping views of San Francisco. Unlike many other public shorelines along the San Francisco Bay, Crown Beach does not appear on a list of Trash Hot Spots. However, students from Wood Middle School in Alameda discovered that looks can be deceiving as they participated in their 2nd annual microscopic beach clean-up.

Designed by science teacher Jeannette Frechou, the microscopic clean-up focuses on small bits of plastic that birds and other animals often confuse for bite sized bits of food. A close examination of the high tide line reveals a smorgasbord of multicolored plastics that easily float on the surface of the water.

"People are jerks! Who would do something like this?" one student declares.

In fact, students found many bits of debris from products they themselves use. Data tracking sheets reported the collection of plastic forks, bottle caps, salsa packets, and even a small plastic army man.

"We all do it," replies another. "It's not like people come and throw this on the beach... every piece of litter that falls on the ground or out of our car door gets washed down to the beach. We all have to be more careful." As if to emphasize the source of litter, a storm drain outlet peeks out of the receeding tide- connected to a storm drain one block from school labeled, "No Dumping! Drains to Bay."

This year, students have been working to do more than just be more careful with litter they produce, they have been studying choices that help to eliminate waste before it is produced. Staff and students from Wood Middle School have engaged in a partnership with the Alameda County Office of Education and Save The Bay to address marine debris through a grant provided by NOAA.

Earlier this year, students wrote letters to the editor addressing the challenge of candy wrappers entering the ecosystem at Halloween. In a study of healthy eating, students observed that healthier food choices usually use less packaging and benefit both human and environmental health. In just 60 seconds, one participant picked up 13 soda bottle caps along the tideline highlighting the challenges to our health and our environment.

Frechou helped students make further connections at the beach as she pointed out a tar ball, likely a legacy of the Cosco Busan oil spill of 2007. "Plastic is made from oil. We use a huge amount of oil to transport so many of the things we buy from all around the world. To help avoid spills in the future, we need to use less oil and less plastic."

Ms. VerDuin, another participating teacher from Wood, plans to use the beach clean up activity as a starting point for a discussion on marine debris, oceanic currents, the Pacific Garbage patch and the impact of plastic on wildlife. "There is a disturbing series of photos from Chris Jordan taken at Midway Atoll that shows birds killed by bits of plastic just like the ones we are cleaning up today. The clean-up activity will really help students connect to this global problem."

Click here to see the original post, complete with photos!

Save The Bay does Coastal Cleanup Day

by Jocelyn Gretz, Community Programs Manager

Originally posted on September 26, 2008

Photo by Adrienne Miller

Last weekend Save The Bay hosted five Coastal Cleanup Day events in four counties ringing the Bay. Coyote Creek and the Guadalupe River in San Jose, Eden Landing Ecological Reserve in Hayward, the Martin Luther King Jr. Shoreline Park in Oakland and Mission Creek in San Francisco all got a little TLC from over 300 Save The Bay volunteers.

Coastal Cleanup Day started in Oregon in 1985 and California--with its sweeping coastline--was quick to join the following year, taking the lead ever since. Last year over 60,000 Californians volunteered out of an international total of 378,000! I suppose we could thank our long coastline and large population, but I think it might have more to do with the quality people of our state and their love for our aquatic resources.

I led 75 volunteers at Mission Creek in cleaning up trash from Giants fans, homeless encampments and runoff washed down from the watershed. We found plenty of the usual items like cigarette butts, needles and plastic bags, as well as unusual items like suitcases, car parts and electronic boards. I had to run around to keep up with the demand for bags and garbage bins, and not until the end of the three hours was actually able to pick up some trash myself. Our county coordinators at Literacy for Environmental Justice helped keep us stocked and indicated that all of their sites were maxing out on supplies--a good indicator that this year was much bigger than last year.

Our volunteers varied in ages, with high school students to octogenarians cleaning up their neighborhood waterways. Many groups like Building With Books, The Eden United Church of Christ, Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts, UC Berkeley's Circle K Community Service club, and even employees from the Hard Rock Café joined our Bay-wide cleanups!

In total, we had 319 volunteers contributing 957 hours of service to the Bay collecting 11,000 pounds of trash and over 1,000 pounds of recycling. Statewide preliminary results indicate that 60,000 volunteers collected 635,000 pounds of trash and over 100,000 pounds of recycling. Thanks to all who showed up for the event! We're looking forward to another successful Coastal Cleanup Day event next year!

In the meantime, Save The Bay hosts monthly cleanup and restoration events at several sites around the Bay. And we are just about to start our winter planting season! Sign up to volunteer today!

Bay Trash--Threatening Damon Slough and shorelines near you!

by Amy Alton, Communications Associate


Originally posted on September 17, 2008

If you’ve ever taken BART to an event at Oracle Arena or McAfee Coliseum, you have crossed over it. If you’ve ever traveled in or out of the Oakland Airport, you’ve flown over it. And if you live in East Oakland, your neighborhood storm drain connects right to it. I’m talking about Damon Slough. A thriving habitat flowing around the Coliseum and running alongside the Nimitz Freeway, Damon Slough in Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline Park opens up to Arrowhead Marsh and is home to several species of native plants, including pickleweed and arrowgrass, and endangered wildlife like the California clapper rail and the salt marsh harvest mouse. It’s also home to unsightly masses of trash and debris.

At Save The Bay, we call it a “Bay Trash Hot Spot.” In fact, for the last three years we have compiled a list of some the Bay Area’s trashiest waterways to call attention to this problem and Damon Slough has been on the list for three years running. One of the few, three-time repeat offenders, Damon Slough in its current state is particularly disturbing given it has all the makings of the proverbial Cinderella story.

In the 1980’s, crews from the Port of Oakland began dumping fill into the northeast side of the marsh. Fortunately the commotion caught the attention of East Bay Regional Park District staff and they contacted the authorities. After a successful lawsuit headed by the Golden Gate Audubon Society, Save The Bay, and the Sierra Club, $2.5 million dollars were allocated for restoration of this 72-acre wetland.

Since 2000, Save The Bay has partnered with East Bay Regional Park District to work with schools, community groups and corporations to restore wetland habitat along Damon Slough. Part of that effort includes shoreline cleanups to pick up trash and debris from urban runoff, litter, and dumping. To date, our volunteers have removed over 20,000 pounds of trash and recyclables!

Even so, Damon Slough is repeatedly inundated with plastic bags, Styrofoam cups, cigarette butts, bottle caps, car batteries, shopping carts, industrial waste, and old electronics.

While Damon Slough is of particular concern, trash accumulates in massive amounts all over the Bay, choking wetlands, poisoning and entangling wildlife, and harming water quality. A 2005 assessment by the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board (Water Board) found an average of three pieces of trash along every foot of streams that lead to the Bay. And this trash also has global ramifications; it flows out the Golden Gate to form part of the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch”—a floating island of trash the size of Texas.

So what can we do? The good news is that because we create this pollution, we have the power to diminish it. We can:

Reduce the amount of trash we generate and make sure our trash doesn't end up in the Bay.

Dispose properly of hazardous waste, switch to reusable bags, and recycle and compost when we can.

Advocate for tougher policies and regulations to reduce trash flowing to the Bay. In fact, the Water Board has the opportunity to stop trash from fouling the Bay as they vote this fall to renew the storm water permit. Save The Bay is working to ensure that the permit limits the amount of trash cities and counties discharge into the Bay.

Volunteer to clean up and restore the Bay shoreline. Save The Bay hosts monthly cleanup and restoration events at several sites around San Francisco Bay. This Saturday, nearly 100 Save The Bay volunteers will clean up hot spot Damon Slough at the Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline in Oakland, as part of the Coastal Commission’s 24th annual Coastal Cleanup Day.