Modeled on Adopt-a-Highway, the program’s goal is to help keep waterways and oceans clean with help from cities and businesses.
By Brittany L. Turek/Special to The Malibu Times
Residents and tourists alike driving through Malibu on Pacific Coast Highway will notice new signs popping up alongside the road over the next few months.
In the spirit of Adopt-A-Highway, which, for nearly two decades has succeeded in removing tons of trash from our roads, a new clean-up program is coming to town. Adopt-A-Stormdrain, launched last August in Redondo Beach, defines itself as a “national organization dedicated to raise funds to clean up pollution of the nation’s waterways at the source-our storm drains.”
The Malibu City Council gave the go-head recently to implement the program here and the first Malibu business to become a sponsor was PC Greens. The organic foods market signed with Adopt-A-Stormdrain in March.
“It’s a worthy cause,” said PC Greens manager Michael Osterman. “It appears to serve several needs. It’s a good project, the money goes to the city to bring everything up to code, and it’s good advertising, which is a by-product of a good deed.”
Paul Polizzotto is the president and founder of Adopt-A-Stormdrain.
“The ocean is a precious resource and it’s time to take care of it,” he said.
Polizzotto, 38, ran his award-winning Industrial Environment Cleaning Company up until last year in Lawndale for 12 years. He’d grown up as a surfer in Manhattan Beach and later began participating in task force meetings to better understand what needed to be done in order to clean up the ocean he loved so much.
There were a variety of tasks that needed to be done from filtering and cleaning the storm drains to educating the people. The problem? All of this costs money.
“Cities wanted cleaner water quality,” Polizzotto said, “but they couldn’t fund it.”
Polizzotto’s solution was to create Adopt-A-Stormdrain. Major corporations and local businesses alike have the opportunity to “adopt” storm drain systems and urban watersheds. As participants in the program, businesses provide the funding needed for the cities to adhere to government requirements and clean up pollution in oceans and waterways that’s caused by contaminants such as vehicle fluids and household chemicals flowing into storm drains. Consequently, these companies will receive affordable outdoor advertising, thanks to the signs bearing its sponsors’ logo, and can contract for any number of signs they desire. The signs will be placed in high-traffic areas with the message “Cleaner storm drains, cleaner oceans.”
“The purpose is not to flood the city with signs, but place them strategically,” said Melanie Irwin, the Malibu Engineering Department Specialist and Clean Water Coordinator. “We’re trying to educate the public. The signs will help do that because they will be a constant reminder as people will identify them with the program.”
Malibu began discussing Adopt-A-Stormdrain with Paul about a year and a half ago. In March, the Malibu City Council gave the go-ahead with the program. As in all of the participating cities, 80 percent of the advertising revenue goes to the city for cleanup and improvement projects, with the rest for outreach and education.
“I’m just asking the city to take the funding,” Polizzotto said, “and spend it exclusively on the campaign and tangible solutions.”
For their part, there has been enthusiastic support from businesses and corporations.
“Paul’s just getting started talking to everyone,” Irwin said. “[Adopt-A-Stormdrain] is great for Malibu because it’s very proactive.”
Adopt-A-Stormdrain hopes to educate people that the pollutants flowing through our storm drains and directly into our waterways not only harm us all, but it can be prevented.
“We can make a difference,” Polizzotto enthused. “Through cooperation and communication, we’ll see improvement.”