A Chance to Help our Beaches and Rivers
Posted by Chad Norman September 6th, 2007 .
Wanna get your feet wet with a little environmental cleanup? Check out the 2007 Sea Grant Beach Sweep/River Sweep on September 15, where volunteers from around the lowcountry remove aquatic debris from local beaches, rivers, lakes, and marshes.
Since launching in 1988, it has become South Carolina’s largest one-day volunteer cleanup event. And on top of that, it’s our local connection with The Ocean Conservancy’s annual International Coastal Cleanup. Since its inception, a global family of volunteers has collected over 100 million pounds of garbage from shorelines around the world. That figure makes me kind of wonder what it would be like if they hadn’t…wow.
Here in Charleston County, 11,500 pounds of garbage was collected last year by 951 volunteers - that’s an impressive turnout! So if you fell like getting outside, hanging with friends, and making a difference, check out the Sea Grant website to find a team captain in your area.
Loading ...
I have suggestions: Whether it is for the Highway litter pick up or the beach sweep. We have tried it with our littler pick up team and it works great.
For example: you have a stretch of beach or Highway to clean and you have one team. Divide the team in two teams. The first team is the recycling team. They walks the stretch of beach or road first and ALL they pick up are aluminum and steel cans and plastic bottles. They do not pick up anything else. Then the second team the trash team follows them and pick s up whatever is left. To simplify it in case recycling team overlooked an item the trash team will just add it to the trash. In the end you end up with two piles and you collect the recycling bags and take them to the recycling drop off.
I once suggested this to the beach sweep coordinator on Sullivan’s island and was told it does not work. I beg to differ we have tried it and it works . it is simple enough.
We also have contacted Charleston County to see if in the future they might consider handing out orange bags for trash and green bags for recycling. Iam not sure if they will.