Celebrate Earth Day in Ocean City

Eight years ago, the Maryland Coastal Bays Program and the Ocean City Surfrider Chapter received a proclamation from the Ocean City mayor and City Council encouraging “an annual Ocean City celebration of an Earth Day Clean Up where residents, businesses, and our local government celebrate and advocate for the preservation of our ocean dunes and bay wetlands.”

As we gear up to celebrate year eight, we’d like you to know that over the last seven years, Earth Day volunteers have picked up more than six tons of trash on our beaches and in our marshes. This year, we plan to add to that number.

We hope you will join us as we celebrate the nationwide observance of Earth Day (just a couple weeks early!).

Five months before the first Earth Day, The New York Times published a lengthy article by Gladwin Hill reporting the astonishing proliferation of environmental events: “Rising concern about the environmental crisis is sweeping the nation’s campuses with an intensity that may be on its way to eclipsing student discontent over the war in Vietnam … a national day of observance of environmental problems … is being planned for next spring …when a nationwide environmental ‘teach-in’… coordinated from the office of Sen. Gaylord Nelson is planned.”

It is estimated 20 million people took to the streets, vastly exceeding even the most optimistic expectations. Republicans, Democrats, school children, college students, labor unions, housewives, doctors, religious leaders, bankers, retirees, farmers and everyone in between participated in thousands of local marches, rallies, parades, protests and other “happenings”.

The first Earth Day was deemed a blazing success. The event was front-page news almost everywhere, and coverage was overwhelmingly positive. The event cemented in people’s minds the importance of environmental issues as a community concern and an international political priority.

READ MORE: We should keep our Shore beautiful​

For many participants, Earth Day marked a turning point in their lives, when reckless consumption and unfettered industrial waste suddenly came under harsh scrutiny.

In December 1970, seven months after the first Earth Day, President Richard Nixon and Congress established the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in response to the growing public demand for cleaner water, air, and land. The EPA was tasked with the challenging goal of repairing the environmental damage already done by past generations and to establish guidelines that would help create a cleaner and safer environment for all.

Sen. Nelson felt Earth Day worked because of the spontaneous response at the grassroots level. He had neither the time nor resources to organize 20 million demonstrators or the thousands of schools and local communities that participated.

That was the remarkable thing about Earth Day; it organized itself.

Forty-eight years later, grassroots efforts to keep environmental awareness in the forefront continually evolve. The Maryland Coastal Bays Program is a nonprofit partially funded by the Environmental Protection Agency, whose purpose is to protect the bays behind Ocean City and Assateague Island. Every year this program works to engage the community through clean ups and outreach programs on environmental awareness, by partnering with citizen-based groups to government entities.

Maryland Coastal Bays works hard on continual outreach programs to raise awareness about pollution problems and inspire science-based solutions to prevent it at the source.

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For those whose inner environmentalist speaks loudest, on Saturday, Apr. 8, Maryland Coastal Bays, OC Surf Club, OC Surfriders and the town of Ocean City invite you to make a public commitment to take on environmental action with us – and to join us for a morning of picking up trash and debris.

You may register by calling 410-213-2297, ext. 106, or sending an email to sandis@mdcoastalbays.org.

The clean-up group will meet up Saturday morning at 10 a.m. at Ocean City’s Town Hall parking lot. Form a team or come by yourself; you will be given an assigned clean-up area, gloves, trash bags and a free Earth Day T-shirt while supplies last.

A team can range from one to 24 people. As a team or individually, you’ll feel great knowing you’ve helped keep our coastal waterways clean in honor of Earth Day. And this is a great event to commit to adopting a street through the MCBP Adopt Your Street program.

This is a simple way to become an environmental steward. Your commitment is agreeing to pick up litter at least four times a year.

For more information on this program, go to www.mdcoastalbays.org and click the “Adopt Your Street” button.

Sandi Smith is the development and marketing coordinator for the Maryland Coastal Bays Program.