The volunteer street steward program, begun in Ocean Beach recently, has spread out to include Pacific Beach and now Point Loma.
Street stewards are the brainchild of Aaron Null, a 10-year Obecian, who recently created a Facebook page asking residents to fill in the gaps in beautifying OB by adopting a street/block to clean every week.
“I was so inspired that I contacted Aaron and asked for help in expanding this to Point Loma,” said Joan Kegler. “He has been very helpful and has set up a Facebook page for us. Now we want to get the word out so that we can get our community focused on signing up for a street or streets in their neighborhood.”
The newly forming Point Loma Street Stewards have a map on their Facebook page, like OB and PB, showing streets and blocks that have been “spoken for.” Their map, however, has more gaps at present to be filled than the other two beach communities.
“We have it (stewards program) going from Liberty Station down to the end of the point,” said Kegler. “It’s a pretty large area.”
To be a street steward, volunteers need is a bucket, a pair of gloves and a trash-grabber. “We can keep our community a lot cleaner by picking up as a group,” Kegler said.
Kegler is teaching by example. She ventures out once a week in the wooded area of Point Loma with her bucket and grabber and collects whatever trash she runs across. The amount — and type — of which can be surprising. “There’s a lot of cigarette butts,” she pointed out adding her “haul” has also included liquor bottles and beer cans and plastics including copious amounts of leftover Halloween candy wrappers.
To become a Point Loma volunteer street steward, all people need to do is go to their Facebook page and join up.
“It’s a very casual program,” said Kegler. “They can just pick out their own street or block in their own neighborhood, or one that that’s convenient and not taken. You don’t have to report in. Just do it on your own time.”
Kegler said it also might not be a bad idea for volunteer street stewards to “take their kids with them to teach them about community service and doing random acts of kindness. It would be good for people to get the younger generation, any age group, involved.”
“It never ends,” said Kegler of the tase of beautifying the community, which extends to the ocean and bays.
“We went down to Shelter Island and it was horrible, with trash floating up near the dock,” said Kegler.
“We’re getting much closer to our goal,” concluded Kegler. “But we have a long way to go. This is a big territory.”