- [D'Vaughn] Ah!
- [Elber] You got it, you got it.
- [D'Vaughn] Ugh.
- [Elber] Steel Reserve.
- [D'Vaughn] What, oh! It's got like--
It's been here for a while.
(upbeat music)
- I'm D'Vaughn and I've never done
a pick up in LA before, but I'm excited.
I guess we're going to be logging some garbage.
- I'm Elber, I'm from LA and I'm happy
to be a part of this cleanup as it's important
for me to keep my city clean.
- I really care about plastic pollution
and I really want to reduce it
because I grew up on beaches and I've just
seen enough of it.
I'm tired of it and I'm really excited
to be a part of the initiatives that are correcting that.
What are we gonna be doing here today?
- [Melissa] So today we're here
to not just pick up trash, but we're going to be
cataloging the types, materials, and brands
associated with every piece of trash
that we're finding out here.
We're trying to get really specific data
that we can take back to legislators,
to businesses, to the people that are making
the decisions to reduce plastic pollution
at the source and stop it from ever
making its way out into the ocean.
- What is the actual process?
- Well, one thing we've done is we've developed
a really cool web app that allows people
to track all of that as they go along.
- [Marina] It's able to catalog the type
of material a product is even if it's not plastic.
So for example, if I'm finding a plastic straw
and it's green, and I know that straw
comes from Starbucks, I'm gonna log
one straw, Starbucks.
And that's available for each item.
Once we're done collecting that data
it gives us an overview of what we found,
including brand and type of material.
We're gonna give you bags for the cleanup,
one glove, one of you will be collecting trash
in your bags and the other one will be
collecting the data through the app.
- Well, it's all pretty straight forward.
- [Melissa] Yeah. - [Elber] It's user friendly,
easy to use. - [Marina] No questions.
- Look at the turtles.
- [Elber] Wow, they have turtles here?
- [D'Vaughn] We're protecting them
from straws and other plastics.
- Big bad straws.
- All right, let's get started.
- Let's go for it.
- I already see something...newspaper.
This can be recycled at least.
- [Elber] Paper/wood products and newspaper.
- [D'Vaughn] A little cap, Miller High Life
so a beer cap.
There's a piece.
This looks like a chocolate wrapper.
Ghirardelli Caramel.
- [Elber] That one, just material...
I guess it would just go under plastic, right?
And done.
(chime)
- Plastic straw wrapper.
- [Elber] Food packaging, straws...
Material...uh, plastic.
(chime)
- [D'Vaughn] I see a Starbucks stick guy here.
- [Elber] Oh.
- [D'Vaughn] Straight up calling up
Starbucks right now, got the mermaid and everything.
(chime) Another little straw guy.
(chime) Straw wrapper.
- [Elber] Plastic. - [D'Vaughn] Candy wrapper.
Oh, no, straw wrapper again.
Starbucks straw wrapper.
Starbucks is everywhere.
It looks like somebody just missed
the trash can or maybe it fell down the side
when they threw it.
Yup, it's a Gatorade cap. - [Elber] Gatorade cap.
(chime) - Napkin.
- [Elber] There's some lids right here, too.
(chime) And some napkins.
- [D'Vaughn] Oh, yeah, more napkins.
Oh, yeah, lots of napkins down there.
Another napki-- lots of just crumpled up napkins.
- [Elber] Swisher Sweets.
- Some kind of cigar wrapper, it looks like.
- [Elber] Tobacco packaging wrap.
Plastic and one, all right gotcha.
- [D'Vaughn] And then we have this little
fruit cup.
- [Elber] Does it have any brand on there?
No?
- Um, the brand I can't see.
(chime)
Skor, I think that's a candy.
- [Elber] Skor?
- Yup. Yeah, S-k-o-r.
Candy wrapper, didn't even know these still existed.
- [Elber] Cigarette butts right here.
- [D'Vaughn] A whole little trio.
Mysterious dropper thing.
- [Elber] It's like eye drops, no?
- Maybe it's eye dr--yeah, it's eye drops.
- [Elber] Yeah, I almost said.
- Oh, I see another Gatorade cap.
- [Elber] A little Hennessy bottle.
- [D'Vaughn] Is it plastic or...?
- No, it's glass. - [D'Vaughn] It's glass.
- Yeah.
- Oh, there's a bottle down there.
- [Elber] Well, I don't wanna fall into the water.
All right. - [D'Vaughn] For nature.
- [Elber] Let's do it, let's do it.
I found a little--
- [D'Vaughn] Not all heroes wear capes.
(chime) - [Elber] A little bottle.
Please keep your plastic out of our lakes.
- What is that?
- It's a--
- [D'Vaughn] Is it another alcoholic thing?
- I don't know, alcohol.
Oh, I see a can down there, too.
For nature.
Let's go and get this out of the way.
Ah!
- [Elber] You got it, you got it.
- [D'Vaughn] Ugh.
- [Elber] Steel Reserve.
- [D'Vaughn] Oh, it's got like...
It's been here for a while.
- Seeing trash like this, I actually did
get me considering changing some options in my life.
Maybe like contribute less to waste
and actually get a reusable Starbucks cup.
- Seeing all this trash does make me wanna
try a little harder, maybe even
do more of these pickups.
Yeah, I definitely feel like I just wanna
gather more reusable things and just
actually put them to use instead of
forget about them.
(upbeat music)