Saving the Bay
Hayward is doubling down on its regional leadership in teaching and investing in protection of San Francisco Bay.
Last week, the city installed the second of two large, storm-water, trash-capture devices to sift and collect garbage from sewer mains before it flows into the bay. The first was put in place in 2012 at the intersection of Tyrell Avenue and West Tennyson Road. The second was installed on Patrick Avenue south of Schafer Road on June 7.
The new equipment, designed to snag litter smaller than a cigarette butt, is part of an inventive partnership of the City of Hayward, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Hayward Unified School District. Backed by a competitive $800,000 grant from the EPA awarded in January 2015, city Utility and Environmental Services staff members are not only engineering trash collection facilities but also have written and are delivering an educational curriculum for first through 12th graders on watershed and trash pollution awareness.
Called the Hayward Youth-Based Trash Capture, Reduction and Watershed Education Project, the partnership is proving instrumental in keeping Hayward on pace to meet a state mandate of 100 percent diversion of storm-water trash by the year 2022—one of the few Bay Area cities to be doing so.
On June 7, sophomore students from Hayward High School took a field trip to Patrick Avenue to witness the installation of trash-capture device. You can read more about the city’s performance when it comes to protecting San Francisco Bay www.hayward-ca.gov/your-environment/green-your-community/creeks-bay.
