San Diegans answered the call of environmental organizations San Diego Coastkeeper and I Love A Clean San Diego when droves of volunteers turned up for the 22nd annual Coastal Cleanup Day on Saturday, Sept. 16.
An estimated 5,500 people gathered at nearly 65 coastal and inland sites to help protect and restore the health of San Diego’s waterways.
“In the San Diego community involvement is huge, and without that participation from the volunteers and the site captains, this event wouldn’t be possible,” said Danielle Miller, San Diego Coastkeeper spokeswoman.
Coastkeeper coordinated the coastal sites, while ILACSD organized the inland locations. Together, with 75 percent of sites reporting, the two groups estimate that volunteers removed more than 150,000 pounds of trash and 5,000 pounds of recyclables at this year’s event.
Some of the most unusual items found included a coin from the Netherlands, vampire teeth and a Mickey Mouse watch.
Data from last year’s cleanup indicated that the top five items found during land and underwater cleanups were cigarettes, food wrappers, caps and lids, dining ware, and straws and stirrers.
Complete results from 2006 Coastal Cleanup Day should be available mid-spring of 2007, according to Tom McCann, spokesperson for the Ocean Conservancy.
The conservancy aims to release results before Memorial Day, he said.
There is no word yet on whether the recent beach smoking bans enacted by many cities, San Diego included, resulted in less cigarette butt litter.