The Greenport Gazette calls upon members of the North Fork community to “put their plastic where their mouth is” with the third annual North Fork Beach Clean Up Competition. Held every September, the International Month for Coastal Clean Up, since 2020, the competition invites teams to sign up and collect trash littered across North Fork beaches. Each week, teams bring their collections to the weigh-in checkpoint to be weighed, counted, sorted, and tallied.
The year of the competition’s inception, teams collected a grand total of 1,670 pounds of trash over the course of the month and last year, teams collected a total of 2,478.5 pounds. The 2022 competition is sponsored and supported by Surfrider Long Island, Atlantic Marine Conservation Society, and Mattituck Environmental. Data collected from the competition will be provided to Atlantic Marine Conservation Society and Surfrider Long Island for its environmental research efforts.
There will be one grand prize awarded to the team that collects the most trash and additional prizes for teams that come in second through sixth place. The grand prize is a two-hour sail for up to six people with Layla Sailing.
The competition kicks off on September 2. Official teams are announced online and competitors pick up their burlap bags for collection, swag, and information packets at this year’s weigh-in check point, Matchbook Distilling Co. in Greenport. There will be four weigh in, count, and tally sessions that will take place on September 9, 16, 23, and October 1. On October 1, winners will be announced and an after party will be held at Little Creek Oysters in Greenport.
We caught up with Estefany Molina, the event organizer, to find out more about her effort to make Greenport more green.
How was the concept of a community wide beach clean up competition born within Greenport Gazette?
Many things came together conceptually before the idea of the North Fork Beach Clean Up coalesced. At the time, just before the pandemic, Greta Thunberg was trending with all her environmental activism, and thus inspiring people all over to hold their own strikes “against climate change.” One happened in Riverhead at the Long Island Aquarium where a bunch of kids and their parents drove in and held their signs and whatnot. It was really incredible to see how much of an impact Thunberg had on these children and the awareness it brought forth. However, I had one thought that just kept nagging me: how many people actually car pooled to the climate protest? Who took the bus? How many people actually made an effort to mitigate their own carbon emissions? And how much of this was just more preaching to the choir? I got frustrated because life isn’t just about going outside and holding up a sign and siding with a particular cause because it aligns with your brand. There needs to be action as well as some follow through and continuity. While all of this was happening, I was reading “We Are The Weather” by Jonathan Safran Foer, in which he talks about climate change so personally and brings such urgency to this global dilemma that it had me low key panicking.
This was all in late 2019 heading into the pandemic in 2020. Everything shut down, and everyone was stuck at home. The George Floyd protests began. The air was metaphorically thick. People weren’t really driving too much, so that was great in terms of carbon emissions, energy, and this metaphorically thick air. But people were bored, disconnected, and anxious. We couldn’t be in close proximity to one another and the isolation started to really weigh in, so everyone started spending a lot more time in nature, which you think would be a beautiful thing. Yet, suddenly, so many other people started posting pictures and complaining on Facebook about the volume of trash they’d find on the beaches throughout that pandemic summer. More people held up their signs, now online, and, again, aired their grievances. What could we do about this mess? That’s when it all came together for me.
The first North Fork Beach Clean Up Competition was held in September 2020. What inspired you to launch this project in the middle of a global pandemic? What were the challenges of launching the project at this time? Were there any benefits of launching it at this time?
Anxiety and frustration breeds inspiration? (Laughs). Possibly even the desire to connect with people. I have been producing events for several years now as Greenport Gazette, mainly parties and poetry slams. Our last event was The Poetry Jam at the Lin Beach House on February 15, 2020, a month before shut down. It occurred to me that maybe I could create an event that could be done outdoors over a longer period of time without too much risk.
I think everyone wanted to feel a sense of purpose, and the clean up was definitely purposeful. Because here’s the thing: environmental justice is human justice. It’s civil justice, it’s economic justice, it’s racial justice. It’s kindness. During a time when everyone was seriously considering their own mortality and relationships to one another, this was an opportunity to take action alongside each other for each other. This is how we take care of one another. We all live here. We all swim here, we all eat here, we all breathe here, we all enjoy the same sunrises and sunsets, and we feel the wind. The thing about nature is that we are nature. Even when a corporation buys a big parcel of property for an inconceivable amount of money, that waterfront or forest or field or what have you still feels a part of you because you are, in turn, of that nature. So doesn’t it make sense that the first step in being kind to one another, would be to be kind to nature first?
The only real challenge was trying not to get sick. Looking back, the benefit of starting something in midst of the pandemic was that no one else was doing anything, so people were going to notice what you were doing a lot more. But that also meant the stakes were higher if you failed. Luckily, I’m pretty good under pressure.
What have you found are the most common plastic items/pollutants found on local beaches?
Teams have brought in a lot of big things over the years like water trampolines, nettings, tires, weird cages, PVC pipes, toys, and such. Lots of party favors and decorations too. But the most pervasive is the small stuff: so many caps, so many bottles, so many wrappers, so many tiny little unnamable plastic pieces. And while those things don’t necessarily weigh a ton, that’s what really needs to be picked up because microplastics and microfibers and just the general shedding and breakdown of these materials are the biggest problem, aren’t they?
The catchy and bold tagline of the event is “put your plastic where your mouth is.” What does this phrase mean to you and the mission of the clean up?
The phrase came to me at the same time as I conceived the competition. There’s definitely a sense of accountability behind that message as well as an edge — some George Carlin inspired humor from yester years. He has a skit about pollution and the Earth. And as Rihanna said sometime in early 2020, “Tell your friends to pull up.” It’s a challenge to do something. If you’re going to talk the talk, you have to walk to walk, right?
What steps can members of the North Fork community take to live a more environmentally conscious life beyond the clean up event?
One of the great things about the North Fork is that so many people who live here year-round are conscious and appreciative of our environment. It’s integral to our collective survival, and we feel it. Tote bags abound. But aside from plastic alternatives where it’s not necessary? Honestly, drive less, bike more, walk more, move differently. I’m not anti-car, but I am pro “don’t drive if it’s unnecessary.” Don’t get me wrong, I drive, and I also understand that peoples’ knees hurt, we are often in a rush, and we sometimes have to carry heavy things. But there should be more bicycle share initiatives out here. The North Fork is so beautiful and easy to adventure through on bicycle.
In Medellín (I’m Colombian), every Tuesday and Thursday night, as well as Sunday morning, the main highways are closed down for “Ciclovia,” so pedestrians can walk, bike, roller blade, skateboard, and just chill and enjoy their city. It’s meant as a form of free exercise, but think about how many cars that takes off the road. People are forced to use an alternative form of travel, if they need to travel at all. It’s a people thing. It’s just part of the day to day culture. Culture is everything.
After the clean up event, Greenport Gazette invites artists, creators, and makers to “dumpster dive” in the collected trash to claim items to use in their art, combining conservation with creativity. Can you speak on the significance of incorporating environmentalism and sustainability across disciplines?
For the past two years, we have been tallying our collections for local organizations like AMSEAS and now this year the Long Island Chapter of Surfrider because this numerical data essentially provides proof of the problem to help justify legislative initiatives on bigger legislative levels to create broader solutions. We had also been sorting out certain plastic materials for Upsculpt, a nonprofit that aims to empower action against the crisis of plastic pollution by engaging the public through art. However, this year they cannot commit to taking our collections because they are so overwhelmed with material, which in turn really demonstrates on a micro level how big of a problem plastic pollution already is. So this year, we want to invite anyone who is an artist, creator, or maker to dumpster dive the collections during the month of September while the competition is happening.
Where else are we going to put it? There is just so much stuff in the world, and it can’t all necessarily be disposed of. The only solution is to reuse these materials. There is no other choice but to be creative and innovate.
Are there any other upcoming events that Greenport Gazette will be hosting, environmentally focused or otherwise?
Many things are incubating, but you’ll have to follow @greenportgazette to find out!