Alliance for the Great Lakes
For Immediate Release
Thursday, Feb. 12, 2009
Adopt-a-Beach™ Ushers in Tidal Wave of New Volunteers
The final results are in and show participation in the September Adopt-a-Beach™ cleanup swelled by 56 percent from the previous year’s event.
All totaled, 6,721 volunteers in four Great Lakes states took part in the one-day event, an increase of 2,415 volunteers from the 2007 cleanup.
Participants removed 26,271 pounds of trash from 209 cleanup locations in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin.
“The Alliance’s Adopt-a-Beach™ team would like to thank you for giving to the Great Lakes through your gift of participating in the September Adopt-a-Beach ™ event,” said Jamie Cross, acting manager of the cleanup program. “Your participation not only improved the health of the Great Lakes through litter removal but also helped raise awareness about the problem with litter along our shorelines and in our waterways.”
For one day on Sept. 20, volunteers combed shorelines and waterways from the tip of the Keweenaw Peninsula in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula to Detroit, and along the Indiana and Chicago coastline to Cheguamegon Bay in Wisconsin. The previous year saw more than 4,100 volunteers in four states participate.
Cigarette filters, food wrappers and containers, and beverage straws and stirrers topped the list of trash items, information that has been added to the Alliance’s Adopt-a-Beach™ database to further the organization’s continuing campaign to educate beach-goers about the most prevalent sources of beach litter.
The cleanup coincides with the Ocean Conservancy’s International Coastal Cleanup Day, with cleanups taking place in more than 70 countries.
State-by-State Participation:
Illinois: 3,160 volunteers, 10,513 lbs of trash, 48 sites
Indiana: 611 volunteers, 6,927 lbs of trash, 18 sites
Michigan: 2,423 volunteers, 7,258 lbs of trash, 119 sites
Wisconsin: 527 volunteers, 1,573 lbs of trash, 24 sites
For more information, contact the Alliance's Jamie Cross at 616-850-0745 x12, jcross@greatlakes.org; or Frances Canonizado at 312-939-0838 x228, fcanonizado@greatlakes.org
Susan Campbell
Communications Manager
Alliance for the Great Lakes
Visit http://www.greatlakes.org