June Meeting

This meeting called out to our creative side. We gathered at the usual spot with posters, paint, and passion. We were painting posters for our 2nd annual RAP day. This special day will be held in two locations: Ocean Beach at the Farmers Market and Patagonia in Cardiff. We will be distributing our new Rise Above Plastics reusable item. Please come out and show your support by stopping by or volunteering at one of our tables. How else are you going to find out what this new RAP item is?

These are just a few of the RAP artists hard at work:

Rise Above Plastics!

May Meeting

May's meeting was great! Here is everyone who attended starting top row clockwise: Haley (Our new Chapter Coordinator), Lonnie, Jon, Dan, Hugo, Jayoung, Chris, Sarah, Marisa, Scott, Walker, and Kate (not pictured).

We are excited to have a date picked for RAP Day: June 29th. This will be a great opportunity for us to get out there and educate others about how they can reduce their plastic use! Stay tuned for more information on this event and how you can help.

Hope everyone can make it to the RAP sponsored Chapter meeting this Wednesday the 18th at 7pm at UTC. Chelsea will presenting her research on plastics and marine life.

Rise Above Plastics!

CCEFS

Don't forget this Thursday April 28th, Rise Above Plastics will be screening Out There for the Cottonwood Creek Environmental Film Festival. We will also be showing a few short films by Surfrider. We hope that everyone can make it out to 687 S. Coast Hwy 101 and show their support. It starts at Sunset and ends at 9pm.

Hope to see you there!!!

Rise Above Plastics

'bag it' Screening

Looking for a great way to kick off Earth Week? Come check out a screening of 'bag it.'

This Thursday we will be hosting a FREE screening of 'bag it' at the family friendly La Jolla Brewhouse!!! La Jolla Brewhouse will have some awesome beer specials for the evening and following the screening there will be a Q&A session with Scott Harrison.

Just in case you miss out this Thursday, you can catch another screening of the movie on April 17th at Sea Rocket Bistro in North Park. Cost for the screening is $10 per person which includes your first drink- your choice of draft beer, happy hour wine, or other.

We hope to see you at one of the events!!

March Meeting

Last month's meeting had such a wonderful turnout! Every seat was filled and then some. Here we all are starting top row clockwise: Bill, Kyle, Bonnie, Kate, Alicia, Jon, Alexis, Scott, Chris, Maya, Kathy, Robbyn, Elizabeth, Sarah, Jayung, Chelsea, Marisa, Simone, Summer, Sarah D., and Paul.

Bill announced his transition from Chapter Coordinator to the national Rise Above Plastics Coordinator for Surfrider. We are eager to have him in this new role!!

We discussed some opportunities for recognizing local restaurants in Solana Beach that are Eco-friendly and how we can use them as an example for those that might need some guidance. One business that is leading the way, is the Albertsons in Alpine. This Albertsons is one of two that will stop offering paper or plastic bags to their customers. For more details, check out the article on http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2011/mar/28/alpine-albertsons-aims-eliminating-plastic-bags/.

We finalized the date for the 'Bag It' screening for April 14th at the family friendly La Jolla at 7pm. Don't miss out on this opportunity for a fantastic movie, great food, and wonderful company!

In April, Rise Above Plastics meeting will be held on the 12th at 7pm at the Encinitas Community Center. We will be reviewing a few PSAs for the CCEFS and would love your feedback. Look forward to seeing all you RAPers there!

February RAP Meeting

Rappers gathered for February's meeting in a LEED certified green home in Encinitas. The home was beautiful, Eco-friendly, and really inspired us to come up with ideas to support our mission. The hot items that were up for discussion were Kids for Clean Water and future screenings of the film 'Bag It.' We look to educate our youth because they can shape the future. We hope that we can screen 'Bag It’ at a location near you soon. Our biggest opportunity for 2011 will be working towards a Styrofoam ban and educating our communities on the harmful impact it has. Next month’s meeting will be held on March 8^th, location to be determined so stay tuned. We look forward to seeing you there!

RAP December meeting

Hey rappers,

Tomorrow we will be holding our monthly meeting a little differently! At 7 pm we will all join in on a conference call to discuss updates, events and future goals for the committee. Everyone and anyone is welcome to join in!
The phone number to dial is # 661-673-8600, code # 815199

DWB is fast approaching!

Rise Above Plastics will have booths and be handing out bags from 5-7pm on 12/16 at the Sunset Market in Oceanside, Jimbos in Escondido, the Seaside Market in Cardiff, and the Appletree Market in OB. 

Come join the fun!

Day Without a Bag proclamation

Here are some photos from the event yesterday where the County of San Diego’s Board of Supervisors held a meeting to proclaim 12/16 as the Day Without a Bag. Chairwoman Pam Slater-Price recognized the efforts of Jacy Bolden as the DWB coordinator, Alicia Glassco from Coastkeeper, Sandy Atkinson from Solana Center for Recycling, Natalie Roberts from I Love a Clean San Diego, and Jon Severino from the Surfrider Foundation San Diego.

All of these volunteers spend many hours organizing events such a "Day Without a Bag" on top of their own priorities and they deserve some recognition for their hard work and dedication. Thank you all! Without you this event couldn't happen!

There is still time to sign up to volunteer at 4 different locations throughout San Diego for DWB! Volunteering is for 2 hours from 5-7pm in OB, Oceanside, Escondido, or Cardiff. With a week to go we could use a few more volunteers to help out at the Cardiff and Escondido site.
Contact me at rapsd@surfrider.org and let me know which location you would be available for.

Free Bag It Screenings SUCCESS!

As I promised you about a month ago, RAP would be hosting two free Bag It movie screenings and they were a huge success! The first was on Monday, earlier this week, at the San Diego Downtown Public Library. The founder of RAP, Scott Harrison, led the RAP sponsored event and our 70 attending audience members. The second event was yesterday, at La Paloma Theater in Encinitas. We had an amazing turn out of 200 people!!! Dudek, EDCO, Steele Realty, and the City of Encinitas sponsored this event.
After the film, speakers and Q&A sessions included: Jon Severino – RAP coordinator, Marty Benson – Surfrider volunteer, filmmaker and actor, Scott Harrison – Surfrider volunteer and founder of RAP, Liz Taylor – Chair of Encinitas Environmental Commission, Jacy Bolden – DWB regional Coordinator, Leigh Reagan – Bag It videographer.

Here are some pictures from the Encinitas event :) Thank you to all that took time to come learn about plastic consumption and its impacts on your own body and the environment!

La Paloma Theater 12/7/2010 

Marty Benson- Surfrider Volunteer

Scott Harrison- Surfrider Founder and appeared in Bag It

Heal the Bay’s 4th Annual ‘A Day Without A Bag’

'Day Without a Disposable Bag' will be held this year on December 16th from 5-7 pm in many locations in Southern California. It will bring early holiday presents to shoppers and provide an educational summit for policymakers. Nearly 20,000 reusable bags will be given away at more than 100 locations throughout California. San Diego's 4 hosted sites will be run by volunteers and committee members from the Surfrider Foundation. Our four locations will be in Ocean Beach, Oceanside, Escondido and Cardiff.

This event urges consumers to forego environmentally harmful single-use plastic or paper grocery bags in favor of reusable bags that will be handed out by the thousands during these two hours.

To read more please visit The plastic bag ban report website

For a Google map of all giveaway sites go to www.healthebay.org/nobagday Click on "Bag Giveaway Locations" to find a location near you!

 Let's make our bag monsters proud and grab a few disposable bags at the event. Use them! They are Free! They are yours to keep! Keep on rising above plastics!

Free 'Bag It' movie screenings!

Hey Rappers,
Bag It was recently a feature film presented in the San Diego film Festival in October. Some of our leaders in the Rise Above Plastics committee have organized a few movie screenings for you all! They are free and will be showcasing Bag It, a 79 minute film. So make sure you bring some snacks, your friends or family and enjoy this hilarious reality check. Is your life too plastic?

There are two locations where these screening will be taking place:
12/6 at the SD Public Library (820 E Street, San Diego)
12/7 at La Paloma (471 South Coast Highway 101 Encinitas, CA 92024-3530)

Bag It movie website

LA County's Bag Ban! and... Day Without a Bag on Dec. 16th, 5-7 pm

1.1 million residents living within the LA county area will be effected from now on by the recent feat for the environmental movement in California by passing the LA County Bag Ban JUST a fews days ago! Hooray!!

The Los Angeles Board of Supervisors voted on Tuesday, November 16th in a 3-1 vote to begin the process of eliminating these bags, setting an example for the rest of the state and nation. The ruling will be placed into effect in July 2011. So that leaves shoppers plenty of time to get their reusable bags ready for many trips to the grocery stores. If, however shoppers still want to use a plastic bag, grocers can only offer them for 10 cents a piece. This price is set in order to persuade the disuse of single-use plastics and begin to carry their own, reusable bags. These bags are avaiable from .99 cents- $1.99 at most grocery stores. Next time you go grocery shopping, and you pack your goodies in plastic bags, pay attention to how many bags the bagger gives you. If you think about it, a .99 cent reusable bag can be paid off in just one or two visits to the grocery store. In the long run, it is a very small, short-term investment, but smart, long-term payoffs. Plastic bags take hundreds of years to decompose!
LA County passes bag ban...

 Let's try to not let this....

 end up here....

 or here...

 

 

2007 saw San Francisco's bag ban, the first city to do such a thing in California. Since then many cities in California have joined in force against the ACC (American Chemistry Council) to fight the war against chemicals and plastics - banning the use of plastic bags. According to NPR, San Francisco's ban reduces the amount of plastic bags used in just San Francisco alone by 5 million bags.
Some words from NPR on S.F.'s ban...

With LA county jumping on board, we now have two of the biggest cities in California participating in creating change for our environment. Malibu, San Francisco, Palo Alto and Fairfax have also banned bans on single-use plastic bags. Other California communities such as Santa Monica, Marin, San Jose and Santa Clara also are considering bans this year. We can surely expect to see great reductions of waste being generated and many more cities joining the cause.

We can all do our part! It takes the smallest efforts in each of us to generate some big results. Buy a re-suable bag, or come out to Surfrider's Day Without a Bag on December 16th, 5-7pm. Surfrider will be hosting booths in OB, Oceanside, Cardiff, and Escondido giving away free re-usable bags to promote the switch away from single-use plastic bags. www.NoBagDaySD.org

Day Without a Bag now has 100 locations and 30,000 bags! Surfrider needs volunteers still to help hand out all of these bags! Contact me if you would like to volunteer and be an instrumental part in creating change for the rest of the country and world to see! lanning.michelle@yahoo.com

"Scripps plays Role in National Research of Sea Trash"

Chelsea Rochman, is one of our very own Surfrider members and a third year PhD student in a Joint Doctoral Program with University of California, Davis and San Diego State University in the fields of Marine Ecology and Environmental Toxicology. Her dissertation work is focused on the trophic effects of adsorption of persistent organic contaminants (PAHs, PCBs, OCs, and PBDEs) to plastic debris in the marine environment as well as desorption of contaminants from plastic debris (BPA and phthalates) into the marine environment and its inhabitants. She has been to the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre as part of the SEAPLEX science crew with Scripps Institution of Oceanography and will very soon journey to the South Atlantic Gyre to explore toxicological questions regarding plastic marine debris with the 5 Gyres non-profit.

NOAA, or the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has funded researchers, like Chelsea, from UCSD from Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla to study plastic particles. These plastic samples were collected from an October voyage in the Pacific, by scientists studying the impact of debris on marine creatures and humans. The secondary cruise which will travel from Rio de Janeiro to Cape Town, South Africa to collect data from the Southern Pacific Gyre, is being hosted by the 5- Gyres Institute.

By traveling in a different part of the ocean, and with confident predictions of their projected findings, they plan to expose the reality that you can no longer cross an ocean without finding plastic pollution in it.






What they are looking for besides the amount of plastic that is actually in the water are toxins such as BPA and DDT, commonly found chemicals pertaining to plastic and pesticides respectively. Why would a scientist looking for plastic be concerned about a chemical pesticide all the way out in the Pacific Ocean? Plastics act as magnets for highly persistent toxic chemicals, such as DDT, in the ocean. As the volume of plastic increases, so does the adsorption of these organic compounds. If you now are wondering why this would matter to us?Why should we care about the increase in the amount of plastic in our oceans and the chemicals that become concentrated in them? Well, these plastics become highly concentrated particles floating around the water in small sizes ready to be eaten by fish- thus entering the food chain at a level that may immediately effect our food supply.



Ultimately, the aim of this research is to show a relationship of cause and effects on how toxic plastic when ingested or come into contact with will effect marine organisms and humans alike.


Click here to read the full article
From the San Diego Union Tribune
Wednesday, November 3, 2010

"Hawaii beach garbage recycled as vacuum cleaner"

Electrolux AB, a Stockholm based company, has decided to create a vacuum that not only can perform its traditional duties of cleaning, but also act as a conversation starter. It is a vacuum made from little bits of plastics collected from one of Hawaii's dirtiest beaches, Kahuku. Here many different sizes and kinds of plastics wash up onto the beach, mixing with sand and other natural debris.

Vice president for sustainability and environmental affairs at Electrolux's floor care and small appliances division, Cecilia Nord, pointed out that the problem of plastic washing up on beaches keeps growing because  plastic products are increasingly used without being recycled properly afterward. Often times we might learn about an issue such as plastic waste in the ocean and give it a few moments of thought before returning to our own relevant issues in our lives. This problem may not be relevant to everyone's life at the moment, however if continued to be ignored, it may easily become in the near future a very real problem that effects us all. By creating a vacuum cleaner out of plastic pieces collected from the source of the problem is a creative way to clean up the waste and bring the issue into our homes on a very real level.

This is indeed a very accurate reflection of how we use plastic products today and do not properly dispose them in ways that they may be recycled and re-used. As our plastic bottles, bags, and other single-use plastic items are disposed of, many end up in our oceans where there are now 5 world ocean gyres, circulating plastic in high concentrations. Remember, plastics do not biodegrade, so they remain true to their form for many, many years.

Click here! for a link to the article to read more

Mushrooms As a New Plastic Alternative?

Follow this link to learn about how mushrooms are being designed and repurposed as a packaging alternative to styrofoam. http://tinyurl.com/2fvbzpj

Eben Bayer, designer, reveals his product for a new, fungus-based packaging material that protects fragile items and the environment.

RAPS Meeting TONIGHT!

Hi All,
Just a quick reminder of our meeting TONIGHT:
Tuesday, Oct 12
7 - 8:30 pm
Encinitas Senior & Community Center
1140 Oakcrest Park Dr.
Encinitas, CA 92024

Plastics Are Forever Youth Summit

Hey Rappers,
There is a great opportunity right now for high school students to get involved in creative solutions to our growing plastic problem in our very own backyard. The Pacific Garbage Patch lies thousands of miles off the western coast of the United states in the Pacific Ocean(although it is only one of 5 that exists on our planet), where plastics ranging in size from large floating food containers to small particles that wildlife such as fish and birds mistake for food. With the birth and boom of the chemical industry in the 1950s, the way we have produced plastic for the last 60 years is finally ending up in disaster. The planet is big, but soon enough all of our wastefulness and single-use items will show up in our backyards- our oceans, our rivers- to a point where we cannot deny that it isn't a problem anymore.

 Algalita Marine Research Foundation has organized an event for youth to become involved in this issue by getting together in groups to generate ideas on how to solve this problem. Their four main goals for this gathering are: 1. To learn about plastic pollution, 2. to come up with a solution, 3. to submit a project, 4. to attend the summit. If the solution is one of the chosen, that entire group is then able to travel and participate in the summit, all expenses paid.
Not only is this a highly inventive approach to solve this global issue, but is a really unique experience for young people to get to participate in solving such an issue amongst scientists and their peers.

Click here  for more information from the website!

Tell your kids or sign up today!

Elena Buenrostro

Elena, our very own local activist, visual artist, and volunteer with Surfrider Foundation's Rise Above Plastics campaign...

In Surfrider's most recent attempts to help push California on becoming the first state in the U.S. to ban plastic bags, we ventured out to the communities of San Diego- getting signatures and speaking with California residents about AB 1998. Although the Senate ultimately failed to pass this law on vote Aug 31(14-21), our efforts were not in vain. They were just the start of a continuing battle from Rise Above Plastics.

Elena volunteered much of her free time raising awareness and getting companies and citizens alike to show congressmen that Californians wanted the ban passed. She got well over 300 postcards signed and around 20 businesses to write letters for Senator Ducheny's district here in San Diego. Elena was a great part of the success Surfrider had in showing our government that we the people have a strong will to move our economy one step further into the sustainable future! Thanks Elena!

Aside from volunteering with Surfrider's Rise Above Plastics efforts, Elena is currently in her last year as an undergraduate student at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). There she is majoring in Media Studies and minoring in Theatre and Film Studies. She explained how plastics caught her eye and became the focus of her artistic passions in order to represent the need for a life without these synthetic materials.

While attending the UCSD, Elena began to learn more about the plastic debris accumulating in the North Pacific Gyre, also known as the North Pacific Garbage Patch. This is where her quest began in creating visual awareness about plastic pollution and more specifically about plastic bag pollution as a contributor to a larger environmental issue; The Garbage Patch. Elena continues to spread the word about the ever growing plastic that accumulates in the Pacific Ocean as well as creates art pieces out of her own households plastic intake. 

Here are a few of her most recent projects:
The Global Tumbleweed 
A 20 minute documentary focusing on plastic bag pollution in the city of San Diego, as well as creating awareness about AB 1998, the California plastic bag ban.
Click Here to Watch

The Plastic Bag Dress
A dress created from 400 plastic bags, about the amount one person uses per year, (400-700 to be exact). The dress was worn by Elena to create visual awareness about plastic bag pollution in her city.

A Trip to the Grocery Store
Created with recycled plastic from a trip to the grocery store. Plastics included packaging from food items bought at the grocery store anywhere from cheese wrappers, bread bags, vegetable packaging, chip bags etc. Each recycled plastic was cut up, divided by color, and tied into a bow. The plastic bows were then installed onto a wall in a gallery. This is an ongoing project as Elena continues to collect all of her households plastic intake and transforming them into small creations.

October 12 Meeting

Just a quiet reminder that our next RAP meeting is October 12th. (Seriously, can you believe October will be here in 2 days?)

RAP MEETING
Tuesday, Oct 12
7 pm
Encinitas Senior &
Community Center

~ We may have lost a battle, but we haven't lost the war!

Getting support for AB 1998

Michelle Lanning and Jonseverino at Imperial Beach