Empty beverage bottles, straws and take out containers are among the myriad of plastics and other trash found scattered across shorelines during clean ups time and time again—a crisis that community members in Coronado continue raising awareness about.
This trash is all similar in nature. Since the straws, bottles and containers could be tossed out after one use, they are considered “single-use” plastics. And they are the very thing that the Coronado-based environmental group, Emerald Keepers, has been working to eliminate since 2019.
Through a pilot program in their first year, Emerald Keepers helped some restaurants and businesses move towards single-use plastic reduction and elimination, and are now looking to expand this effort.
This year, the group is pushing for the city to pass two plastic reduction ordinances.
According to the Emerald Keepers Plastic Ban White Paper shared with The Coronado News, the ordinances together would prohibit the sale and distribution of: plastic foam food containers, coolers and packing materials; single-use plastic straws, stirrers, and utensils; plastic beverage bottles under two liters, balloons, and plastic bags across Coronado.
One ordinance looks to expand upon the statewide ban on single-use plastic bags “with a city law that bans single-use plastic bags at all city retail shops and restaurants.” Another ordinance would “reduce the distribution of disposable single-use plastic” that includes polystyrene (EPS) and fluorinated (PFAS) by enforcing reusable foodware and packaging.
“To protect our ocean,” Emerald Keepers says, they are urgently petitioning for Coronado to enact ordinances that will reduce the use of plastics by banning what they consider are non-recyclable single-use items, and enforcement will be up to the city.
In a statement to The Coronado News, Mayor Richard Bailey said he believes advocates of restrictions on single-use plastics in Coronado are promoting a much broader application of restrictions than the narrow prohibitions on use of plastics in some other coastal cities.
Although a single-use plastic ban is contemplated as an option that is part of our climate action plan, the city has not begun work to consider such a ban.”
Mayor Richard Bailey
“Although a single-use plastic ban is contemplated as an option that is part of our climate action plan, the city has not begun work to consider such a ban,” wrote Bailey.
Starting a petition
To move this forward, the organization began the “Petition to Keep Our Sea Plastic Free” to gather support from locals to join their call in proposing city-wide reductions in waste and plastic pollution. The organization needs 1,000 signatures and currently has just over 350 people who have signed as of late-January.
“We plan to do much more with this petition during Earth Month (April),” said Amy Steward, founder and president of Emerald Keepers. “I would say we are off and running.”
As the petition, which opened last fall, continues, Emerald Keepers has begun working on program development for eventual outreach, education and resources to support the public in what they hope will be phased enforcement.
Plastic…is a health crisis, something that we need to pay attention to and something we can do something about.”
Amy Steward, Emerald Keepers President
“Everybody’s focused on the sewage in our ocean. The water quality is something that Emerald Keepers has been publishing for a while now,” said Steward. “The plastic, you see it swirling in the water sometimes, but what you don’t realize is how much microplastics and…nanoplastics are being ingested by all of the sea animals…It’s just a very, very bad cycle for all of us. It literally is a health crisis, something that we need to pay attention to and something we can do something about.”
Effects of microplastics
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) defines microplastics, deriving from larger plastic debris, as being “less than five millimeters in length (or smaller than a pencil eraser).”
In an article published in 2020, Professor Paul Anastas at Yale University said there are primary and secondary microplastics. Anastas, who is also the Director of the Center for Green Chemistry and Green Engineering, added that primary microplastics can be plastic microbeads found in exfoliating face washes and larger secondary microplastics are often used in building materials, and yet both can be found everywhere including oceans, soil, air and food.
Anastas suggested then that in order to bring solutions to the phenomenon of microplastics and reduce them in the environment, avoiding single-use plastics and shifting towards new plant-based, biodegradable products should be the new norm.
A 2016 study submitted to the National Academy of Sciences examined the effects of microplastics ingestion and impacts to filter feeders in the ocean, such as oysters, showing that a diet involving styrofoam microparticles led to impacts in offspring.
2024 Goal: Push for plastic reduction ordinances
Microplastics are a nationwide concern, which is reflected in the fact that over 1,000 plastic reduction laws have been adopted and implemented in more than 30 states across the U.S., according to data compiled for a Plastic Reduction Policy Map by the Surfrider Foundation in 2021.
“We’d like to have the Plastic Reduction ordinances passed in 2024,” said Steward. “You really need to stop it at its source… There’s a lot of waste…Certainly we’ll have cleaner beaches and hopefully less plastic in our oceans, which is really what it’s all about, the less plastic we have in our oceans, the less we’re going to have in our bodies.”
City communications officer Andrea McCullough said Coronado’s contracted waste hauler, EDCO, reduces plastics in the landfill through the collection of plastic (and other items) in its residential and business recycling program.
In 2022, EDCO reported that they diverted more than 1.1 million tons from the landfill through recycling efforts, according to the EDCO 2022 Sustainability Report. The company website also features an “End Plastic Pollution” information sheet that breaks down how to reduce plastic use.
That same year, the Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act, Senate Bill 54, was signed into law on June 30, 2022 to incrementally reduce plastic pollution in California by 2032 by moving towards recyclable and compostable packaging. Through Senate Bill 270, California became the first state to enact legislation imposing a statewide ban on single-use plastic bags at most retail stores eight years earlier in 2014, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Since its start in 2019, Steward said Emerald Keepers has also been advocating for the appointment of a municipal sustainability officer to help bring all environmental issues forward and seek available grants and funding.
“They have someone on staff who is working with businesses on recycling and organic waste,” added Steward. “It is obvious what is being sold or distributed.”
The City of Coronado declined to comment on the prospect of hiring a sustainability officer.
Local bans in the works
Effective as of April 1, 2023, the City of San Diego’s Single Use Plastic Reduction Ordinance prohibits the distribution and sale of polystyrene foam containers, single use plastic straws and utensils.
Meanwhile in a small jurisdiction like Imperial Beach, the staff wears many hats as they prohibit plastic food packaging and other materials through their Marine and Beach Protection Ordinance, which was adopted and enforced in 2019.
Chris Helmer, Environmental and Natural Resources Director for the City of Imperial Beach, said new policies like a single-use plastic ban, don’t necessarily require a new dedicated position but rather require utilizing existing staff and updating existing city programs.
It also takes support from council and senior management for these changes to occur.”
Chris Helmer, City of Imperial Beach Environmental and Natural Resources Director
“It also takes support from council and senior management for these changes to occur, which we are fortunate to have in our city,” added Helmer. “As of now, …all the groundwork has already been done, all the alternatives are already there, all the fight against accepting this seems to be gone.”
The Marine and Beach Protection Ordinance is one example of how many divisions play an important role in implementing change, Helmer said.
“We have changed the way we permit and inspect special events, we seek opportunities to educate and inform businesses and the public through the Parks and Recreation department and business license program, and we incorporated awareness and enforcement through our existing commercial business inspection program under the Stormwater Division,” wrote Helmer.
Violations of the ordinance may be punishable by fine, not exceeding $1,000, and or imprisonment, according to online code materials published by the City.
“In our stormwater program we use progressive enforcement of warning letter, then NOV (notice of violation), then fines that increase without compliance, and the option of citation and additional civil penalties if there is still willful violation of the law but that option is rarely needed in IB,” added Helmer. “For single use plastic ban the farthest we ever needed for enforcement was use of NOVs.”
Educating to transform the environment
Last year, Irvine City Council stopped short of declaring a city-wide single-use plastic ban while still voting to eliminate single-use plastic and polystyrene items from city operations and city-sponsored events, according to media reports.
Meanwhile, Emerald Keepers hopes for city-wide regulations across all retail shops and restaurants.
“I think it is embarrassing that Coronado doesn’t have a plastic ban; we’re surrounded by water…we’ve got the bay and we’ve got the ocean,” said Steward. “Every beach community from Imperial Beach to Oceanside, except for Coronado, …they’re taking responsibility for the ocean. They’re saying, ‘This is our mess, we need to do something about it’,’’ said Steward.
In August, Oceanside City Council voted unanimously to ban single-use plastic products and is currently allowing businesses to make changes to comply with the new law that prohibits polystyrene foam, beginning July 2024, and single-use plastics, beginning on the first day of 2025.
Steward said Emerald Keepers hosted a Coronado conference in October and “one hundred percent of people who attended our conference supported plastic reduction ordinances.”
In December, Emerald Keepers made the 2023 Coronado Community Conference Final Report available to The Coronado News.
Emerald Keepers is scheduled to partner with the U.S. Navy on Saturday, Feb. 3, from 10 a.m.-12 p.m. to clean up Delta Beach.
“We really need your help cleaning up this stretch of beach along the bay after the month’s
storms and high tides,” read a January Emerald Keepers newsletter.
The organization claims close to 1,300 newsletter subscribers and more than a dozen Coronado High School interns who lead environmental projects, added Steward.
“If everybody stopped picking up trash in Coronado, all of the service clubs that do it, …for a month, it would be horrifying the amount of trash that’s out there,” said Steward.
