Alabama Coastal Foundation Cleans Beaches for World Sea Turtle Day

The Alabama Coastal Foundation (ACF) was honored to partner with Restore America’s Estuaries and CITGO to implement the World Sea Turtle Day Cleanup project as part of the 2023 Caring for Our Coast Gulf Region Grant Program. While inclement weather impacted much of the original project’s plans, the staff of ACF were still able to adapt the plans to achieve a successful cleanup of Alabama’s coastal environment both on Fort Morgan and on Dauphin Island.  

After months of planning and preparing to coordinate two major cleanups on World Sea Turtle Day (June 16), ACF staff and partners made the determination to postpone the event due to severe weather. It was a very hard decision to make, but the following screenshots taken that morning indicate that we made the correct call for everyone: 

We reset the cleanup date for the next Friday (June 23), and are delighted to report the following overall results from this project: 

*Fort Morgan had several pieces of large debris. 

In addition to those statistics, the public was educated not only about keeping litter out of the Gulf of Mexico, but also about disorientation issues created when people use white flashlights instead of our Share the Beach flashlights. Also, ACF ensured that implementation of the World Sea Turtle Day Cleanup Project met all state and federal environmental laws and federal consistency requirements. 

Furthermore, ACF ensured that all safety regulations were followed, and is glad to report that there were no accidents related to this project.  

This project was funded through the 2023 round of the Caring For Our Coast Gulf Region Grants, a partnership between RAE and Citgo. For more information, click here.