Make Trash Extinct! Volunteers Needed for Coastal Cleanup Day

If you want to protect the dolphins that swim off the beaches in Santa Cruz, consider volunteering this Saturday to help eliminate trash in local creeks.

The Santa Clara Valley Water District invites community members to volunteer in their annual Coastal Cleanup Day this Sept. 21 from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. at one of their 44 sites throughout the county. The volunteers help to clean trash at the creeks with the goal to prevent the refuse from winding up in our bays and the ocean, landing on California’s coastline, the SCVWD explained in press statement.

Here's a list to their sites. In Mountain View, the volunteers will focus on Stevens Creek from the end of Central Avenue to El Camino Real. However, according to the site they've reached their volunteer maximum. However, in Los Altos, they still need volunteers to help clean a three-block stretch of Permanente Creek near St. Francis High School. Palo Alto still needs volunteers efforts for the San Francisquito, Adobe and Matadero Creeks. 

A special interfaith cleanup on Sunday will take place in San Jose. The Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Silicon Valley, the Muslim Association of America and the Muslim Community Center Teens are joining together for a special cleanup on Sunday, Sept. 22 from 2 to 4 p.m. This cleanup of a section of Guadalupe River will begin at 696 Palm St.

According to the SCVWD 1,748 volunteers in 2012, covered more than 77 miles of waterways, collected 34,803 pounds of trash and 9,774 pounds of recyclable materials.

The most commonly collected items have been fast food cups, plastic bags, aluminum cans, Styrofoam packaging and snack food wrappers. The most unusual finds include a fire extinguisher, a safe door, a fireworks mortar launcher, a truck rack, a voodoo doll, a blonde wig, a propane tank, a convertible 1962 Dodge, an exercise ball and a set of dentures.