Residents across the Hastings came together for the good of our local environment and helped remove rubbish from our beaches and waterways on March 4.
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In Lake Cathie school student and eco-warrior Shalise Leesfield co-ordinated the clean up effort to the south.
Dozens of environmentally-minded residents turned up to clean up the lake foreshore and surrounds with Shalise sharing her message about marine pollution and the impacts on the local habitat.
Shalise is currently seeking funding for the installation of more discarded fishing line boxes for North Haven.
The boxes at Lake Cathie have proven to be a success.
In Port Macquarie, The Westport Club, Marine Rescue and Suba Haven teamed up to target the shoreline from Lady Nelson Wharf to the Westport Park boat ramp and the Coastal Warriors – Mid North Coast held a beach clean up at Town Beach.
Meegan Stephens from the Coastal Warriors – Mid North Coast said the clean up morning had been a success.
“Coastal Warriors hold a beach clean up every month and we thought it would be great to tag on Clean Up Australia Day and hold our monthly beach clean up at Town Beach,” Ms Stephans said.
“We picked Town Beach because it is such a central location in Port Macquarie and this morning along with our fantastic regular rubbish collectors, we have also had new people sign up to become rubbish collectors which is great.
“Our beaches are gorgeous and the Coastal Warriors are all about ensuring our great big ocean stays clean for generations to come.”
Ms Stephens said the rubbish collected at the beach clean up will all be categorised and disposed of correctly and responsibly.
“When people bring back the rubbish they collected we sort and record all of it before disposing of the rubbish correctly,” she said,
“In the first hour of our clean we had recorded 897 cigarette butts people had picked up.”
Community and sports manager at The Westport Club, Jenny Edmunds, said their Clean Up Australia Day event really well with lots of rubbish collected.
“There was a great buzz this morning and to be working in collaboration to strengthen our ties with Marine Rescue has been great,” Mrs Edmunds said.
“Today is so important because our waterways and shoreline is our greatest asset here in Port Macquarie and we want to help ensure they stay clean and beautiful for future generations.”
Unfortunately Mrs Edmunds said that there had been lots of rubbish they had picked up.
“It is sad that we have to hold events like this because we all love living near the water and the rubbish is only doing damage,” she said.
“However we have had our volunteers and Marine Rescue in the water, on the water and on the shoreline to make sure as much rubbish as possible could be removed.”
