The Ocean Star

FRIDAY, MAY 17, 2013 PAGE 25

OBITUARIES 28HOUSES OF WORSHIP 28CROSSWORD 28STREET BEAT 32

BREANNE MCCARTHY THE OCEAN STAR

Seventh-graders Gwen Attridge [from left], Lily Brouder, Meg Leahy, RachelPausz and Jackie Kluxa of Memorial Middle School volunteered for the day.

BREANNE MCCARTHY THE OCEAN STAR

Toney Dodson, a water supply data analyst, cleanedup trash at the lagoon on Bayberry Lane.

BREANNE MCCARTHY THE OCEAN STAR

A handful of students from Joe Bruno’s [third from right] freshman biologyclass at Point Borough High School volunteered their time for the blitz.

BY BREANNE MCCARTHYTHE OCEAN STAR

Thousands of people participat-ed in the fourth annual springBarnegat Bay Blitz this past Friday— the first blitz aimed at cleaningup the Barnegat Bay watershedsince Superstorm Sandy hit in lateOctober 2012.

The blitz was started as a part-nership event spearheaded by theNew Jersey Department ofEnvironmental Protection[NJDEP] and the New JerseyClean Communities Council in aneffort to bring together citizens,students, businesses and local gov-ernment to clean up and foster agreater appreciation for theBarnegat Bay and its 660-square-mile watershed, according tonj.gov/dep/barnegatbay.

Hundreds of volunteers partici-pated in the spring blitz frommany parts of the state, and eachof the 37 municipalities in thewatershed, which encompasses 33municipalities in Ocean Countyand four in Monmouth County,hosted a cleanup.

DEP Commissioner Bob Martin,who joined the volunteers at theblitz, said he was overwhelmed bythe amount of support.

“The spirit of volunteerism andstewardship that has been builtthroughout the Barnegat Baywatershed since the first blitz hastaken on even more meaning thisyear as these same communitiesrebound from the devastation ofSandy,” Commissioner Martin said.“I am truly moved by the amazingresponse from our volunteers con-sidering all the challenges thisregion has faced over the past sixmonths.”

Being the first blitz sinceSuperstorm Sandy, this spring’sfocused on the removal of stormdebris and dune restoration proj-ects in addition to typical litter anddebris cleanup.

POINT PLEASANT VOLUNTEERS Each of the 33 municipalities

encompassing the Barnegat BayWatershed approach the cleanupin their own way.

The groups are all run by cap-tains who are DEP workers thatorganize the events in a specificmunicipality.

Locally in Point PleasantBorough, Jennifer Feltis, a regionalplanner at the DEP, was the cap-tain who led a team of more than100 volunteers around the boroughto clean up debris.

The volunteers consisted ofother DEP employees, local resi-dents who showed up in theirworkboots, and 100 students con-sisting of middle- and high-school-ers.

Everyone met at CommunityPark at 9 a.m. Friday, May 10, tobegin the cleanup there.

The DEP workers handed outplastic bags along with safetysheets and “talking points” for thevolunteers to follow.

Ms. Feltis said the participantswere going mark everything theyfound to keep track of the debris,“especially after Sandy.”

The groups were all given achecklist to mark the items theycollected — anything from bagsballoons and bottles, to fishing

nets, car parts and cigarette butts.A handful of high-schoolers

from Frank Joseph Bruno’s fresh-man biology class at Point PleasantBorough High School were outbright and early helping to cleanup the bay.

Mr. Bruno, who lives in Brickbut grew up in Point Pleasant, saidit is important for the young stu-dents to understand how theyaffect the Barnegat Bay watershed,and vice versa.

“This is just to help to clean upthe community especially aftergetting hit with Sandy,” he said.“We’re in ecology right now and soit’s such an important subjectwe’re covering based on where welive and based on how we are justdependent on this whole waterwaysystem and watershed, so I’m try-ing to help them see how it allrelates to them, their families andcommunity.”

Ryan Griffith, a freshman in Mr.Bruno’s class, said he did itbecause “it was something to helpout the community.”

Holland Collianseach, also afreshman, said “we live here, so wemight as well help to keep itclean.”

Also in attendance were morethan 80 seventh- and eighth-gradestudents from Memorial MiddleSchool’s National Junior HonorSociety.

Lauren Mangiafico — a languagearts teacher who took over theposition of running the honorssociety as the current advisor ofthe group, Ellen Keelan, is out onmaternity leave — said the middle-schoolers have participated in theblitz since the beginning of lastyear. The students are both indi-vidually responsible for volunteerwork and have to complete a cer-tain amount of hours as part of thehonors society.

Ms. Mangiafico said the studentsreally enjoy volunteering to cleanup as part of the blitz.

“They know about it by word ofmouth. They’ve heard about theirupperclassman talking about; it’ssomething they look forward to,especially when we have a niceday,” she said. “They’re especiallyexcited because it’s the first tripafter Sandy, so they’re really look-ing forward to if and what theyfind at some of the different loca-tions we go to today.”

Both the middle school and highschool students were planning tospend the entire day helping toclean up the watershed area begin-ning in Community Park, thengoing to Dorsett Dock, RiverfrontPark and Beaver Dam Park.

Jess Sponaugle, who recentlygraduated as a marine biologymajor from Monmouth Universityand interned with the DEP,brought a few of her friends to theborough to help out with thecleanup.

“We try to give back,” she said.“From everything I learned inclasses about the importance ofthe bay and everything, it’s good toclean it up and help out as much asI can.”

Point Pleasant Beach residentChantale Taurozzi attended theblitz, as well. She said she wantedto help clean up and to get someextra credit for her environmentalscience degree at Ocean CountyCollege.

“I’ve cleaned up since the storm— it’s like no matter where I turnaround, [there is debris]. Youknow, my kids have done beachcleanups and I’m also getting extracredit for a class, and there’s justso much to clean up,” she said. “Ilike to do my part and to teach mykids by example.”

After the groups finished clean-ing up Community Park around 10a.m., they spilt up into smallergroups traveling to different areasof the borough including BeaverDam County Park, Seagull Terrace,Dorsett Dock, Bayberry Lane and

the Point Pleasant Canal fishingarea.

BAY HEAD VOLUNTEERS George Nicholas, supervising

geologist with the DEP, was thecaptain for volunteers in the BayHead area.

He said because of the effects ofSandy, he did not want to lead vol-unteer activities in Bay Headdirectly, but brought a handful ofvolunteers to Traders Cove Marinato clean up trash on the southerntip of Herring Island and parts ofthe Forsyth Wildlife Refuge.

He said Towboat US provided awork boat and two Towboat USstaff members to help the volun-teers in their cleanup. The captainfor the day was Christian Zimny,18, who is a Bay Head ElementarySchool graduate and Point PleasantBeach High School graduate, alongwith Mike Sonta and Sarah Hurst,who is also a Point PleasantBorough High School graduate.

During the cleanup, Mr.Nicholas said the group recovereda one-half-full, 5-gallon bucket ofchlorine powder, a 5-gallon bucketof paint, three gallon containers ofpaint, several containers of house-hold cleaner scattered across themarsh, 10 large trash bags with col-lected trash and plastic debris.

Mr. Nicholas said all the volun-teers and staff at Towboat US did agreat job.

“Everyone involved worked hardand it was a beautiful day to be onthe water,” he said. “The TowboatUS staff were absolutely awesomeand we greatly appreciated theirhelp. The NJDEP staff were alsoimpressive in their efforts as theyhappily navigated the marsh, andnever complained about the mudor the emerging gnat populationthat were happy to see them. All inall, it was a great day on the waterand I think we had a positiveimpact on the ecosystem of thebay.”

WHY IT IS IMPORTANTThe team of volunteers in Point

Pleasant found everything fromtires to glass and plastic bottles toan iPod while at Community Park,while the Bay Head team on thewater found everything fromchemicals to garbage bags andpaint.

Jane Kozinski, assistant commis-sioner for DEP who was responsi-ble for all of the waterway debrisremoval for the state of New Jerseypost-Sandy, was on hand at PointPleasant’s Community Park loca-tion.

She said it is important for theDEP workers to show their sup-port of Gov. Chris Christie’s planto improve the health of theBarnegat Bay, as well as show sup-port for the communities in thewatershed areas that were soseverely affected by Sandy.

“We’re fully supportive of thegovernor’s initiative to restoreBarnegat Bay and to underscoreour support, and that’s whyCommission Martin encouragedDEP workers to come out here andto show our support for the com-munities that live in the BarnegatBay watershed,” she said.

Ms. Kozinski said the cleanuphas been going really well, andraising awareness is important.

“The Barnegat Bay Blitz is aboutraising awareness of our impactson the quality of the water for theentire Barnegat Bay watershed andpart of that is, of course, the litter,”she said. “It remains an unfortu-nate fact that people litter — wesee improvement but events likethis are very helpful in gettingyoung kids and the middle-schoolers and high-schoolersaware of all the litter around themso, hopefully, they will be goodenvironmental stewards as theyget older.”

Keeping the watershed cleanF O U R T H A N N U A L B A R N E G AT B AY B L I T Z

““AAllll iinn aallll iitt wwaass aa ggrreeaatt ddaayy oonn tthhee wwaatteerr aanndd II tthhiinnkk wweehhaadd aa ppoossiittiivvee iimmppaacctt oonn tthhee eeccoossyysstteemm ooff tthhee bbaayy..””

GEORGE NICHOLAS Supervising Geologist, Department of Environmental Protection

10 POINTS Of The Barnegat Bay ActionPlan

The IdeaThe action plan spearheaded by theChristie Administration includes a planto address the Barnegat Bay watershed.

The FundingGov. Christie has made available $28.8million for stormwater managementprojects with a pledge of $100 millionover the next 10 years.

The 10 Points 1.] Close Oyster Creek Nuclear PowerPlant 2.] Fund stormwater runoff mitigationprojects 3.] Reduce nutrient pollution from fertil-izer 4.] Require post-construction soilrestoration5.] Acquire land in the watershed6.] Establish a special area manage-ment plan 7.] Adopt more rigorous water qualitystandards 8.] Educate the public 9.] Fill in the gaps on research 10.] Reduce watercraft impacts

PEOPLE