Online registration now open for 2016 Delaware Coastal Cleanup volunteers

DOVER – Online volunteer registration opened this week for the 30th annual Delaware Coastal Cleanup, to be held from 9 a.m. to noon on Saturday, Sept. 17. Sponsored by the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control, the cleanup spans the First State’s 97-mile eastern coastline and includes river and ocean shorelines as well as wetland and watershed areas. This year, more than 50 sites in New Castle, Kent and Sussex counties are targeted for volunteers to scour and make cleaner.

Volunteers are strongly encouraged to preregister at the Delaware Coastal Cleanup webpage on the DNREC website to ensure enough supplies are packed for each site. Preregistration will close at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 6.

At last year’s Coastal Cleanup, 1,492 dedicated volunteers from civic organizations, youth groups, businesses and families collected 7.8 tons of trash from 50 sites along Delaware’s shorelines and tributaries. About one-quarter of that trash – mostly aluminum cans and plastic bottles – was recycled. Volunteers’ more unusual finds included a raincoat, a hair dryer, a wig, a perfume bottle, a can of Sterno, a tent, two propane tanks, a bow and arrows, a bike pedal, a dog leash and more than 20 bags of dog waste, a smoke detector, a recliner, a metal bed frame, light bulbs, a paint roller and paintbrush, ceiling tiles, a mop head, trash cans, a sink, a toilet seat, carpet pieces, batteries, a rusty fire pit, a microwave, plastic and wood fencing, a teacup, chopsticks, tiki torch holders and four shot glasses, one of which was still full.

Delaware’s Cleanup is part of the Ocean Conservancy’s International Coastal Cleanup, the world’s largest annual clearing of trash from coastlines and lakes by volunteers. Hundreds of thousands of people all over the world help each year to rid the environment of marine debris and collect detailed information on the types and quantities of refuse they find. This information is recorded on data cards and forwarded to the Center for Marine Conservation, which compiles data for all of the cleanups held in the country and around the world. This information helps identify the source of the debris and focus efforts on eliminating or reducing it.

For more information about the Ocean Conservancy and the International Coastal Cleanup, visit www.oceanconservancy.org.

For more information about the Delaware Coastal Cleanup, please call Joanna Wilson, Delaware Coastal Cleanup coordinator, at 302-739-9902.

Vol. 46, No. 273