Last week was very eventful!
First, Keep Durham Beautiful had our monthly Board Meeting, where we elected two new board members. Welcome Austin Moore and Diane Rupprecht!
Austin is a Durham native who works as a Project Manager and Co-Owner of Gateway Building Company. Austin is particularly interested in the effects of large scale multifamily recycling efforts, litter prevention from the increased commercial development and construction, and Durham neighborhood beautification projects.
Diane has lived in Durham for the past twenty years, and is excited to have the opportunity to connect closer to the community. She currently works as Staff Counsel for The Sunrock Group. Diane says that this opportunity to be involved with Keep Durham Beautiful will compliment her personal interest in the environment, waste reduction, and sustainability.
We are excited to be working with them! If you are interested in becoming a Board Member for KDB, please fill in an application at https://keepdurhambeautiful.org/join-our-board/
In addition to our successful board meeting, KDB also had our second meeting pertaining to a week-long event called Creek Week. Creek Week is a time to discover and clean up local streams. It has been celebrated by Durham since 2009. Since the beginning, there have been 1,937 volunteers who have collected 117,270 pounds of trash! It is a successful event in helping to rid trash from local creeks, as well as getting the community involved in their surrounding environment. This year, Creek Week is from March 16-23rd. Individuals can sign up for multiple events that occur during this week through our page: https://keepdurhambeautiful.org/creek-week/ We hope to see you there!
Did you know that the month of March is “no straw” month? Did you know that over 500,000,000 plastic straws are used each day? That is enough to circle the earth four times! Keep Durham Beautiful is leading a campaign that encourages individuals and restaurants to considerably reduce the use of plastic straws. Plastic straws can’t be recycled, so they wind up in landfills, litter streets, wash into streams, and cause 8.5 million metric tons of plastic debris in the ocean annually. By reducing the number of plastic straws one uses on a regular basis, we can help decrease the amount of litter that ends up in nature. Instead of using plastic straws, we recommend not using a straw or buying a reusable straw made of a material of your choice; metal, silicone, paper, just to name a few. We hope that you will take this pledge during March!
As of a couple of days ago, we started a partnership with Durty Bull Brewing Company. They are planning to Adopt A Street around the building, where there continually is trash. They will have one clean up every month, the “Second Sunday Clean Up.” Sign up to help through their website: http://www.durtybull.com/events/?view=calendar&month=January-2019 or through their account on Everbrite. Their first event is this Sunday from 11am-12pm. We hope you can join us this weekend or at another cleanup in the near future.