St. Paul’s School Key Club members joined forces with Keep Covington Beautiful and the Osprey Initiative installing Litter Gitters, a patented, in-stream litter collection device used to trap floating litter from stormwater runoff.
The devices were installed along 28th Street in Covington, and students will continue to monitor the area to maintain them. Items trapped in the Litter Getters will be removed, the data compiled and all possible litter recycled.
The Osprey Initiative team and Keep Covington Beautiful representative Mark Richards, a retired St. Paul’s School environmental science teacher, worked alongside the students during all phases of the cleanup, offering instruction on collecting, analyzing, and recording data. The long-term goal is to create an abatement program that will eventually stop the litter at its source.
Through this joint effort, the team hopes to help convince the community the value of keeping a clean waterway.
Osprey Initiative, a foundation born in 2017 from a deep appreciation for the environment, has Louisiana roots. Its programs and the origin of devices, such as the Litter Getter, started with a goal of designing the easiest and most effective solutions to care for it. Osprey programs are designed to produce environmental ambassadors, such as the St. Paul Key Club members, who will continue the work and mission of the foundation “to be the worldwide leader in providing solutions in reducing humanity’s impact on the environment.”
This article originally appeared on Nola.com. Read the original story here.
