Sidmouth Plastic Warriors: inspiration from younger warriors

A lovely recent posting on the Plastic Warriors site:

Jessica’s clean up – 9th March 2019

Posted on March 13, 2019

A post went up on Sidmouth Plastic Warriors’ Facebook page by ‘Roger Lou’, as follows:

“My 8 year old daughter is organising by herself a litter pick around the football and rugby pitches along the Sidford end of The Byes. If anyone would like to come and support it would be great. She has no litter grabbers, but is asking everyone to bring their own gloves etc. She has already helped with beach tidy ups and wants to clean up near to where she lives too.

Thank you.”

Of course I said I’d take the equipment along [remember anyone can borrow it for an event if they like, I’m just looking after it] and shared the information.

On the day, Jessica turned up in plenty of time and took charge, and we gave a quick safety briefing and got on with it. It was really nice not to be in charge for once, so I could get on with clearing up. The quite small group of us that turned up did an outstanding job and managed to get 7 very full bin bags (including 3 recycling – glass/tins/plastics) for Pete (EDDC/Warrior) to take away.

Mum Louise said “Well today in one hour Jessica and her amazing friends and their families managed to collect 7 bags of rubbish from around the football and rugby pitches along The Byes.

Jessica also took the opportunity to put up her first poo bag dispenser for anyone who may not have a bag to pick up the dog poo.

Thank you again to all.”

Here’s the poo bag dispenser – what a great idea. Please keep it stocked up if you see it running low!

It’s so great to see our younger town members taking such an interest and really getting it. Children like Jessica (8), and 5 year old Brody who we have recently featured on the Facebook Page really do inspire me to carry on with this huge effort to change things in the town (and globally!)

From our Facebook page: A huge thank you to 5 year old Brody  (and mum Clare) – it is awesome to see how our younger warriors get it totally!

“I took Brody across to the football cage last week after school. We were shocked at how much rubbish had been left in and around the cage.

Straight away Brody wanted to go get his “grabber” and “tidy” it up!

How could I say no!?! He got a whole bag full of rubbish (and not just a little bag!)

I emailed his teacher to share how proud of him I am and he came home from school on Friday with the Values Cup.  I thought you might like to see how much he collected.
Clare x”

This is the area that I’ve gone on strike about in my sidmouthplasticwarriors.org/adopt-a-spot as it keeps coming back. The police went to have a look last week – I will send these pics to them too. I hope the very small minority of 15-18 year olds who treat our planet like this might see Brody and be inspired… You never know 

I’ve now come off my strike about the Manstone area – I’m not leaving it to Brody to do. We can keep an eye on it but also work on the teens to change them. I cleared up 2.5 bags again from there just yesterday, after the storm (a lot of it was recycling though – don’t get me started on the bags… they are not fit for purpose during weather like that).

Dx

Jessica’s clean up – 9th March 2019 – Sidmouth Plastic Warriors
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