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Shoreline clean up set for Brentwood Bay area

Tim Collins/News staff
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Volunteers comb the beach for garbage during a Great Canadian Shoreline clean-up.

Tim Collins/News staff

Imagine a pile of nearly a half million cigarette butts.

Add about 80,000 food wrappers to the pile. Then add 43,000 plastic bottle caps, 31,000 plastic water bottles, 25,000 beverage cans, 22,000 plastic bags and a literally tons of other waste items.

Now imagine taking all of that garbage and strewing it along our coastline.

It’s an image that Rachel Schoeler, manager of Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup, wants people to consider as the program enters its 23rd year of operation.

“Those figures for garbage are just what our program took off Canadian shorelines just last year. It’s enough to make you want to get out there and keep working; making our world a little bit better place,” said Schoeler.

The idea began in 1994 when employees and volunteers at the Vancouver Aquarium decided to clean up a beach in Stanley Park. The idea caught hold and, by 2002, it had become a national conservation initiative with cleanups appearing in every province and territory in Canada. By 2010 the Vancouver Aquarium began delivering the program in partnership with the World Wildlife Fund and the sponsorship of Loblaws Canada.

“What’s amazing is that these numbers, as much as they are really shocking, don’t begin to capture the tons of garbage taken off the beach every year by people who love the oceans and walk along the beach daily, picking up trash as they go. I do believe there is a core of people out there who really are doing the best they can. What we provide is a way to organize that effort and involve your friends and neighbours in the effort,” said Schoeler.

She added that the cleanup events play an important function in educating people and raising awareness about their own habits.

“When you see a mass of granola bar wrappers, and you had a granola bar for breakfast, or you see plastic water bottles and you know you buy water that way occasionally, it makes you reconsider what your doing in your own life,” said Schoeler.

“It’s a great way to create understanding and cause changes in lifestyle.”

Clean-up parties generally are open to anyone who wishes to join in, but Schoeler said that some people choose to organize a private initiative for friends and family, or an employee group form a specific workplace.

“Either way it’s a chance to get close to nature and make some very good friends as you work toward a common goal. The events tend to have a strong social component and lasting friendships form,” she said.

To join the thousands of Peninsula residents who have participated in a shoreline cleanup (1,199 in 2016 alone), or to initiate a cleanup party of their own, residents need only visit the organization’s website and follow the links.

Two cleanups, open to the general public, are already planned for Sidney.

The first is being hosted by the Brentwood Bay Power and Sail Squadron on Saturday, September 16 and the second by the B.C. Nautical Residents Clean-Up group on Saturday, September 23. Interested parties can register for either (or both) clean-up initiatives by visiting the on-line site.

editor@peninsulanewsreview.com