[two_fifth margin_top=”20px” class=”acb-img-container float-right-container” ] Project Clean Stream volunteer Shalisa Hutt poses with her daugher and nephews during cleanup of the Coty Cox Branch of the Wicomico River in Salisbury, Md. Photo courtesy of Chesapeake Bay Program.Project Clean Stream had an amazing turnout for 2014! This year 7,500 volunteers helped restore over 260 sites in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed. What is even more amazing is that over 425,000lbs of trash was collected from all of these sites! In all, over 250 partner groups helped make Project Clean Stream a success. These groups include non-profit watershed organizations, military groups, local and regional businesses and youth groups like scout troops. It is these organizations that help keep Project Clean Stream growing each year.
Sponsoring businesses are a key piece to Project Clean Stream, providing more than financial assistance, but also energy and love of the outdoors that spreads to their friends, family and other volunteers. A case study: Perdue has wholeheartedly embraced the Project Clean Stream mission. For seven years now, Perdue employees and volunteers have been engaged in the restoration and health of their neighborhoods and the Chesapeake Bay watershed. This year 900 of their employees and families volunteered at 52 sites on the Delmarva Peninsula and more throughout the country. Many partners and sponsors, including Dominion Energy, enjoy the flexibility of Project Clean Stream dates and locations to allow for participation at multiple events, including a company cleanup and cleanups in the neighborhoods of their employees. MOM’s Organic Market, as a first time sponsor this year, is excited to bring their company mission to Project Clean Stream. MOM’s supports employee community engagement through store environmental representatives whom we look forward to working with to help branch Project Clean Stream into the store’s communities.

Our nice infographic below shows how important businesses are for Project Clean Stream.

Project Clean Stream needs our partners, new and old, to continue to discuss the importance of restoring the Bay to their friends and family to actively engage new volunteers. It is often the employees who volunteer at a Project Clean Stream event one year with friends and then choose to start a company cleanup the following year as a testament to the power of the Project Clean Stream mission.

Project Clean Stream is a useful tool in connecting the community to on-the-ground projects that showcase the dedication companies and volunteers have towards the environment. Company-wide cleanups do more than involve employees, they bring family members into the Project Clean Stream pool. This helps foster a sense of curiosity in children and creates a connection with the outdoors and respect for the environment. It is truly a community effort to restore the Bay; this includes working with friends, family, neighbors and businesses to make streams and parks safer and healthier.

Project Clean Stream is just one way the Alliance is working with businesses to be stewards of the Bay. Businesses for the Bay is returning this year and will provide a platform for companies to work together on initiatives and discuss opportunities for enhancing business sustainability.

We want your business to become an annual sponsor and partner with Project Clean Stream. For more information on how you can become a sponsor and start a business cleanup with Project Clean Stream, please contact Joanna Freeman at jfreeman@allianceforthebay.org or 443-949-0575.