As editor of A group of 30 California college students used part of their spring break to clean up the beach in Santa Clara, Calif. -- and advocate a ban on polystyrene foodservice products.
The Santa Cruz Sentinel has a story about the students today. Reporter Romain Fonsegrives wrote that the cleanup was part of something called the Wave of Change Tour 2010, organized by California Public Interest Research Group.
"Students wanted to spend their spring break making a difference," said Coreen Weintraub, statewide oceans campaign coordinator for CalPIRG.
Today the students plan to hold a press conference in Sacramento and meet with legislators to push for three bills: a ban single-use PS take-out containers, and bans on smoking and the use of plastic bags in California state parks and on state beaches.
The group is taking a David vs. Goliath attitude toward the effort.
"There are full-time lobbies from the chemical and plastic industry over there to tell them to keep polluting," said Sean Caroll, an organizer for the research group at UCLA, told the Sentinel.