I have said it many times: people of green and sustainable thinking are the best kind of people. For a while now, I have been trying to find a youth, someone that I can share my column with, to give space to share their green story. I was at an event at Hurley, this kid in front of me introduces some great questions with youthful energy. Bingo! Ladies and gents of Newport Beach, here is one of your own. I hope you are as inspired as I am.
My name is Jason Crane and I have been a surfer ever since I was 6 years old, surfing out front of my grandma’s house at the River Jetties.
Ever since, I have always been concerned about our polluted ocean and beaches, so at age 13, I finally decided to do something about it when I organized my first beach cleanup at the River Jetties, after a big rain.
After that I just kept getting more and more worried about beach and ocean pollution. That got me more involved in taking actions against preventing ocean pollution. At age 13, I got involved with the Surfrider Foundation’s Newport Beach Chapter. At 14 I have started my own Surfrider Foundation Club at Corona del Mar High School to educate the youth about beach and ocean pollution, and about the different ways they can prevent it.
To the present day I’m one year older and still pursuing my passion to protect the world’s oceans and beaches. My future goal would be to create a program that educated third-world countries about ways to prevent ocean and beach pollution.
Anybody can make a difference in what they believe in. I couldn’t watch the death of our oceans. So I decided to take action.
The second beach cleanup I organized, I encountered the most trash I have ever seen on the beach. The initial thought was to go surf, but then I called some of my friends and said, “The beach is going to be trashed it just rained so after we surf let’s clean the beach.” We went surfing for an hour, I got out mostly because those terrible sewer smells brewing in the lineup. The walk out of the water was just as bad as that smell. It felt like I was navigating an I.E.D. mine field, instead of I.E.D.’s there was all kinds of trash. We finally got our massive black bags and started cleaning. We ended up getting five trash bags full of all sorts of trash, from shoes to Coke cans.
People probably are wondering how they can make a difference. There are so many different things you can do. They don’t have to be major – they can just be little things, such as trying not to use single-use plastics, picking up your trash after you are at the beach, and so many more.
If you really want to make a difference you can attend beach cleanups, clean out gutters leading to storm drains, and spreading awareness about our dying oceans and beaches. The biggest part of ocean pollution is urban runoff (storm water from city streets and adjacent domestic or commercial properties that carries pollutants of various kinds into the storm drains that ends up in the ocean).
One of my goals is to decrease urban runoff in general. People inland don’t think they have to do anything about ocean pollution. They are dead wrong! For example the Sana Ana River starts 75 miles from Newport Beach in the San Bernardino Mountains. Think about that. How lucky are we to get all their trash and pollutants from their storm drains in our “backyard”? Well it sucks!
It would be very difficult to control their actions, but we can make change in Newport. We could be the role models for our surrounding cities. It would be great if Newport Beach installed more catch basins in city storm drains, and be more strict about not dumping waste in gutters and not littering.
The Surfrider Foundation CDM club is going to have a great year. Hurley has decided to sponsor the club. They are going to help with fundraising, help organize large events, and support us in whatever we need. This year we have a lot of new members and hope to get them involved in cleaning up our beaches and spreading awareness.
I’m looking forward to this great year!
Who is with Jason? Who can help this youthful energy? Stay tuned for updates.
Have your green story to tell? JimFitzEco@gmail.com
