Friday, May 23, 2025
A new initiative led by Friends of the Bay aims to tackle litter along local beaches with the help of both infrastructure and community involvement.
Three new self-service beach cleanup stations — waste collection baskets with signs encouraging beachgoers to pick up litter — have been installed in recent months at Centre Island and Beekman beaches in Oyster Bay and, most recently, at Soundside Beach in Bayville.
The stations are the first step in a broader effort by Friends of the Bay to reduce pollution and inspire environmental stewardship year-round, according to the organization’s executive director, Christine Suter.
“We’ve been wanting to do this for a while,” Suter said. “There are other places on the island where they have self-service cleanup stations, and so we’re doing this in partnership with the Town of Oyster Bay’s Department of Environmental Resources and the Parks Department, as well as with the Village of Bayville and Mayor Steve Minicozzi.”
The first cleanup station was installed just before International Coastal Cleanup Day — last Sept. 21 — at Centre Island Beach on the Sound, which Suter said consistently needs attention during Friends of the Bay’s monthly cleanups.
The second station followed on April 8, at Beekman Beach, chosen for its location in a corner of the bay where wind, tide and human activity lead to an accumulation of debris.
“Also, it’s good to have it there just because we have our friends down at the WaterFront Center,” Suter said, “who can use it for educational purposes there and keep an eye on it.”
A third cleanup station was installed at Soundside Beach on Tuesday, the first in collaboration with the Village of Bayville.
“They reached out to us and said they would like to put one, with our permission, at Soundside Beach, which, at the time, we granted them the approval to do,” Bayville Mayor Steve Minicozzi said. “Once the signs came in, they provided the basket and the pole and the village installed it.”
Minicozzi described the process as “painless” and said the only cost to the village was the creation of custom signage.
“Every little bit helps,” he added. “And if the community could lend a hand by grabbing a basket and, you know, picking up various little bits of paper or bottle caps, etcetera, it’s a good thing for everybody.”
Each cleanup station includes a crate for reusable collection baskets, and signage designed by Friends of the Bay. The town and village governments produced the signs, and are responsible for emptying the pails where waste is deposited.
Installation costs have been minimal, according to Suter — just a few hundred dollars for materials. One of Friends of the Bay’s board members built the wooden crates that house the baskets.
“I am a trash collector myself,” Suter said. “It’s something I do almost every time I go down to the beach. It’s just nice to have something down there ready to go instead of always having to have a bag in your car.”
The cleanup stations are only part of the group’s broader mission. Friends of the Bay is also launching a new volunteer initiative called the Coastal Cleanup Crew, encouraging individuals or small groups to collect litter in their communities on their own schedules.
“We host monthly beach cleanups, but we obviously can’t tackle all of the garbage that collects around our parks, the sidewalks, the storm drains,” Suter said. “So we’re piloting the Coastal Cleanup Crew, which is going to be a volunteer-based cleanup program.”
After registering at volunteers@friendsofthebay.org, volunteers will receive a data collection sheet to record their cleanup efforts.
Participants are asked to document the location, time spent cleaning, and types of waste found, along with a photo of their collected trash and the completed data sheet.
Not only will this help with environmental data collection, but it also makes the program attractive to students seeking community-service hours.
Friends of the Bay offers certificates to those who provide proof of their work. To incentivize participation, the organization will offer a grand prize at the end of the year: a ride on the Friends’ boat, a research and education vessel used by the group. The trip will be awarded to the group that logs the most time collecting trash in the watershed.
“We just wanted to encourage that kind of behavior,” Suter said. “We’re hoping to put the idea out there and inspire people of all ages to get involved with this.”
Residents have already gotten involved, including a Bayville mother and daughter who spent several hours collecting litter. Suter said the initiative is flexible enough for anyone to get involved, regardless of schedule or mobility.
And there’s more to come. Suter said that Friends hopes to expand the cleanup stations to beaches throughout the Town of Oyster Bay and Bayville. Minicozzi noted that Bayville has only one other public beach — West Harbor — and would be open to a second installation.
Friends of the Bay is also inviting local businesses to get involved. Suter said the group would welcome donations of gift cards or other prizes to help reward volunteers for their time and commitment.
“We’re trying to incentivize it with prizes and getting people out on the boat,” she said.
To sign up for a cleanup crew, or to learn more about the organization’s work and how to support them, visit FriendsOfTheBay.org.
