Parks and Greenways Problems Our goal with this project is to help make the environment a better place. We are looking to go out and clean up a park or greenway. As you can see in the graph to the right most of the litter left around in our area is styrofoam, and paper. Our goal is to pick up 20 bags of garbage.There is lots of littering pollution throughout parks in our North Carolina area. This issue is affecting all of the living things in the community. Littering can seep into the ground and then into the groundwater and then you have groundwater pollution. Some other effects of littering are more littering, fire hazard, breeding ground for bacteria, and just the cost to remove the litter (Conserve Energy Future). I personally am a nature person. I love being outside in the fall in the cool weather and the leaves. Unfortunately the litter that is just being thrown on the ground at any place and time is ruining the nature. I want to to keep the nature to be as nice as it can be to preserve the nature and keep the community enjoying the outside. The regular things that are littered are things like glass, paper, plastic, and fast food (JB Green Team). This is a big issue that everybody should know about. Littering is an illegal thing to do and if caught you will be charged. In North Carolina the first offense of littering is $250 with a maximum fine of up to $1000 (NC Public Safety). The community should also be aware of this issue so that we can keep North Carolina looking clean and nice, and so that we can be in the in the best possible health. Body Paragraph: The Problem Littering affects everyone in a community that is littered in. Littering has been an issue ever since people started becoming lazy enough to dump their trash in small amounts in other areas. Littering can also be accidental. Like if an uncovered dump truck full of debris drives down the road and scatters litter everywhere. Littering is a problem because it attracts vermin and creates a place for bacteria to multiply. Also, when litter gathers and becomes dried out, it becomes a fire hazard. It also becomes a danger to animals if they eat it or get stuck in it. Littering is a problem in our community because many people have become lazy and thrown their trash all over the place. After many, many, too many people do this, it begins to look regular and even more people disregard it, and then they end up littering, too. The effects of littering are that communities become less appealing. It also creates a fire hazard, attracts vermin, and provides a place for bacteria to multiply. If the littering problem is not solved, the world could become unlivable as a planet. It would be like the WALL-E movie, except we can’t fit the whole of people on Earth onto a spaceship. The more people litter, the more other people litter, and eventually it becomes a habit that no one cares about. It also encourages people to be more wasteful. If they keep throwing their trash everywhere, they don’t care about reducing, reusing, and recycling because they aren’t going to waste their time putting recycling where it belongs, if they already throw their trash everywhere. Body Paragraph: The Solution Many people in our community and other communities are helping to reduce and get rid of pollution with varying solutions. The two ways to prevent pollution are to prevent the pollution in the first place and to clean up the pollution that is already there. The first way, preventing pollution in the first place can range from recycling a soda can to using wind turbines and solar panels as alternative energy sources. The other way (and the way we are using for our project) is to clean up the pollution that there is now. It is hard to use this way to get rid of things such as air pollution and water pollution but you can pick up trash by hand and that is not hard to do at all. It is very accessible because all you need are yourself and a trash bag and you can get rid of a lot of litter and make a difference. There are many organizations in Raleigh and other cities that take volunteers to go pick up litter in parks and along streams and paths.The City of Raleigh and Wake County take volunteers to parks and greenways to clean up and do maintenance work. There is a need for help with this issue because despite many people wanting to help out and get rid of pollution there are many people that don't care and a lot of pollution ends up where it shouldn't be accident. Luckily in our community people want to help out and we are fortunate enough to have landfills and recycling. If everyone pitches in and helps these organizations then we can live in a community where pollution is hardly a problem at all. What can you do to help? The Plan In response to the high levels of parks and greenways, we propose to have a park cleanup. The 8th grade students could come together to clean up a park to help animals in their habitats and to reduce pollution levels. Small donations could be collected to help provide trash bags and litter sticks/ trash pickers. We could come together and ride over to Laurel Hills Park and pick up the trash around the area. There would be no cost to go cleanup the area but we will need to provide our own trash bags and trash pickers ( and maybe gloves). We could set up a donation table outside of the lunchroom to collect small donations to be able to provide the needed accessories. The transportation would be by a bus which we could ride there and back from. We would be participating this activity most likely on June 6th,2018 but if not that day then it would be June 7th. 2-4 weeks before we participate we can contact Laurel Hills and inform them on the specific information involving when we would be cleaning, and to make sure we have their permission. ( Laurel Hills Park Information 2018) This activity of cleaning at Laurel Hills could be an entertaining and interactive way for many Martin 8th grade students to come together and help reduce the pollution in our parks. We could have several students participate as buses have the capacity to fit many students. June 6th or 7th would be the day we participate, driving over to laurel hills in a short 15 minute drive (Google Maps 2018). The participation part would become very easy as the drive is so short. We would participate for about an hour or a little longer. We would have plenty of time to participate in the other activities that martin is doing. Our goals for this project is to help out the pollution status of laurel hills drop, as it is one of the most polluted parks in wake county. We believe that we could help clean a majority of the park as hopefully we could fill up as many bags as possible. The main goal though is to pick up at least about 20 bags of trash, but hopefully we can overachieve it. Bibliography: Laurel Hills Park Website: https://www.raleighnc.gov/parks/content/ParksRec/Articles/Parks/LaurelHills.html http://www.wakegov.com/parks/lakecrabtree/Pages/volunteers.aspx City of Raleigh volunteer program: https://www.raleighnc.gov/parks/content/ParksRec/Articles/Programs/Volunteer/VolunteerProgram.html Wake County volunteer program: http://www.wakegov.com/parks/att/Pages/volunteer.aspx J. B. Green Team Litter Pickup: https://www.jbgreenteam.org/litter-preventioncollection/ Pictures sources: Littering Graph Littering Picture
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