Litter Cleanup around Station Ave., Langford – November 4, 2023

Highlights From The Day

• 34 diverse members of the community joined us and contributed over 108 hours total! We engaged all ages, backgrounds, and experience levels including families, newcomers, students, retirees, working professionals, returning Green Team volunteers, and first-timers!
  • Thank you so much for your hard work and enthusiasm: Joan, Logan, Marianna, Annie, Sherry, Marguerite, Maria, Vince, Christabel, Honoka, Jeff, Yan Wah, Kerry, Jesus, Gladys, Valeria, Manny, Aaron, Jimjee, Evelyn, Atousa, Wes, Christina, Elle, Mark, Keito, Mimi, Rena, Dalton, Kimberley, Sage, and Mary!
• 25 people cleaned up litter for the first time!
• Our Green Team brought together people from all over the Greater Victoria region!
• Thank you to members of the Westshore Rebels Football Team for joining us!
• Thank you to Jeff of the Langford Residents Association for joining us and helping spread the word about our activities!

• Together our team:
  • Removed about 105. pounds of litter of all shapes and sizes (about as heavy as an adult male wolf!) from areas surrounding Langford Station to keep litter out of our streets, waterways and ecosystems!
  • Cleaned up about 4,800 square metres of City of Langford streets!
    • The weight of large/heavy items unable to be bagged and carried is not included, the City of Langford has scheduled pickup of these larger items

In Action Photos!

• Chris, one of our awesome volunteers with the Lower Mainland Green Team, has been helping us develop an app to track our litter data (click here to view it!) easily using our phones. This was our Greater Victoria Green Team’s first time piloting it and we were very pleased with the results! Thank you Chris!
  • Over 5,580 items were tracked and removed by our volunteers:
    • 3,688+ cigarette butts, a tiny but deadly piece of plastic, toxic litter. This was the most common item found!
    • 1,070+ pieces of plastic
    • 437+ pieces of paper
    • 139+ pieces of metal
    • 135+ pieces of glass
    • 14+ pieces of clothing
    • 28+ pieces of styrofoam
    • Additional items found included: a plastic skeleton hand, a diaper, a venetian blind, a measuring tool, a floor mat, headphones, a pineapple, glowsticks, balloons, a tennis ball, a suitcase, and more!
• We want the tracking of litter data to add to our volunteer’s experience, not take away from it. Given the difficulty to track every piece, we estimate the total pieces of litter removed from the day to be over 8,000!
• Thank you to everyone for tracking and sharing what they found!

• City of Langford Engineering Department’s Director, Katelyn Balzer and Engineering technologist Kaitlyn Shypitka joined us at this activity to clean up litter and thank our volunteers for coming together to care for the Langford community and environment
  • Thank you for your support of our work and partnership with the City of Langford!

• City of Langford councilors Kimberley Guiry and Mary Wagner joined us at this activity to help us remove litter, explore, and connect with the community! Thank you to the support of the elected officials of the City of Langford whose support has been integral to the development of our partnership!

• Our Community Investment Partner, the City of Langford, provided direction and funding to make this activity possible!
  • Special thanks to Katelyn, Kevin, and Kaitlyn in the Engineering Department for their contributions before, during and after this activity to make it so successful!

• This was the very first litter cleanup the Greater Victoria Green Team has ever run, in partnership with the City of Langford Engineering Department!

Why Do We Do This Work?

The Greater Victoria Green Team organizes hands-on educational activities that have a positive environmental impact to empower people. Through activities such as invasive plant removals, plantings, litter cleanups and more, we are fostering connections with others and nature so that health and well-being is prioritized, lifelong environmental stewardship is promoted, and community members are enabled to take care of themselves, each other and the places they live. We all have the power to make a difference!

We all experience mental and physical health benefits from spending time in nature, including reduced stress and anxiety, and improved mood, focus, memory and more. While doing so, we can also have a positive impact on the environment as demonstrated through this activity!

Partner For This Activity

This activity was made possible thanks to financial support and direction from the City of Langford Engineering Department. Thank you Kaitlyn and Kevin!

Through this partnership we are combining our strengths to achieve our common goals – a win for all! Thank you City of Langford for investing in your community and environment through the work of our charity. We are much stronger when we work together, as demonstrated through our success at this and past litter cleanups!

This was our first partnered litter cleanup with the City of Langford. We are excited to continue to build on this partnership and offer more opportunities for community engagement in Langford in the near future!

What Volunteers Said

“I enjoyed how interactive and helpful everybody while picking up litters. It can impact the well being of an individual to go and do something outside, as well as the environment. We won’t guarantee that we cleaned all the litters that there are in Langford but other people may be inspired to do things like this on their own or they can just reflect on their acts and be a responsible community member”

– Vinice

“The impact of this activity is: removing litter so that animals don’t eat it, it doesn’t end up in our waterways and show pride in our town/city. “

– Evelyn

In-Kind Supporters

Thank you to the following local businesses for their support and contributions to this activity:

• Big K Clothing for donating high visibility vests to keep our volunteers safe
• Tru Earth for donating Laundry Detergent Strips to reward our amazing community
• LUSH for donating Ro’s Argan Body Conditioner and Karma Kream Body Lotion to reward our amazing community

Group Leaders

A huge thank you to our group leaders who led teams of volunteers in areas around Langford Station:

• Kaitlin the Greater Victoria Green Team’s Program Manager
• Severine, the Greater Victoria Green Team’s Program Coordinator
• Ashton , the Lower Mainland Green Team‘s Program Manager
• Lyda , Green Teams of Canada‘s founder and Executive Director who also founded the Lower Mainland Green Team in 2011
• Andrea, the Lower Mainland Green Team‘s new Program Coordinator

THANK YOU!