How To Organize Your Own Beach Clean Up

The health of the ocean depends partly on frequent San Diego beach clean ups. These are often organized by groups within the community. If you find out when a clean-up is going on, you can volunteer to help. However, you do not necessarily have to wait for someone else to organize it. If you want to be more proactive, you can put it together yourself. Here are some ideas to help you get started.

Identify a Site

You need to pick a specific area for your beach clean-up, and it’s probably a good idea to try to give priority to an area in particular need of help. A charter trip with Next Level Sailing San Diego can give you a broad view of the beach, but it might be more helpful to walk it for a close-up view.

Get Permission

If it’s a public beach, get the okay from the appropriate municipal office or organization before you get too deep into organizing your event. You probably won’t meet with too much resistance since you are doing something that is for the benefit of the entire community. Nevertheless, it doesn’t hurt to be upfront with what you are doing, and you might even get more help and support as a result.

If it is a private beach, get permission from the owner. Otherwise, even though your intentions are good, you could be guilty of trespassing.

Choose a Date and Time

While there’s never a bad time to help clean up the beach, you may want to consider holding your event after the busy season, so you can clean up after the crowds, or before, so you can get the beach ready for visitors. In either case, schedule the clean-up at the time when the tide is going out. This gives you plenty of time to clean up the trash while it is the most exposed.

Find Volunteers

Maybe you belong to an organization for which you are putting together the beach clean-up as a volunteer project. If so, you probably already have a pretty good idea of who is going to help out, though you might want to verify beforehand. Perhaps you are not part of an organization but just realize that the beach needs help. You can start by recruiting your friends and family members. Put up flyers to ask for volunteers and post on social media. Ask for support from community leaders or environmental groups in the vicinity.

Provide Supplies

You can ask volunteers to bring supplies, such as gloves, trash bags, and rakes. Some people are likely to forget, however, so you should have at least a few extra supplies available. You should also have a first aid kit on hand in case of accidental injuries, as well as water to prevent dehydration. You may also want to reward your volunteers with snacks at the end of the day.

Doing your part to keep the oceans clean helps ensure that people will be able to ask questions such as “when is whale watching season in San Diego?” for many years to come.