Tidying the tides

Girl Scout Troop #44585 cleans up Redondo Beach on July 3.

By Olivia Sullivan • July 13, 2019 6:30 am

Superheroes and Girl Scouts Troop No. 44585 have one thing in common: both want to save the world.

Thirteen troop members — a range of ranks including Brownies, Juniors, Daisies and Cadets — spent an afternoon cleaning up litter at Redondo Beach and Wooton Park in Des Moines on July 3.

“We’re doing it to help the environment,” said 11-year-old Alinea K., a Girl Scout Cadet. “We want to help save our planet because trash is terrible to all plants … and trash around the water can harm ocean animals.”

The Federal Way troop brainstormed ideas for a community service project at a recent meeting, and unanimously decided on a beach clean up because: “This is where we live and there’s a beach close by,” said 11-year-old Kendall S., another Cadet.

Troop members scouted the shoreline and nearby park for wrappers, cans or any other discarded garbage, and were pleasantly surprised to find almost spotless spaces.

The lack of trash in public places is a good problem to have, agreed some parents of the group.

“It’s our community and it’s our job to protect it,” said 11-year-old Girl Scout Cadet Evelyn K.

Taking the time to clean up a space on the earth, whether it is near the water, in public spaces, or even in your front yard, will help save the planet, Evelyn K. said.

“We would like to send the message that helping our planet is not out of our grasps; it is something that anyone can do,” said Alinea K.

The beach clean-up should be an encouraging start, not an end to action, said Alinea K.

“People shouldn’t just read it and think, ‘oh that’s just a news story,’” she said. “They should actually go out and help. If only a few people do it, it helps. If more and more people do it, we get steps and steps closer to helping our environment.”