With such a wide swath of shoreline and no regular cleanups, Boca Chica Beach today remains clean through efforts from non-profits, like Keep Brownsville Beautiful, which holds biannual cleanups to rid the beach of trash.
And volunteers are needed again for a cleanup Saturday.
A cleanup after Memorial Day weekend earlier this year removed 1,600 pounds of litter from the beach, but this weekend’s cleanup — scheduled to coincide with the aftermath of Labor Day weekend — will be just one of many along the GulfCoast happening simultaneously.
Eli De Leon, program director for Keep Brownsville Beautiful, said what began as a beach cleanup at Boca Chica half a decade ago has grown into a binational cleanup effort that will see volunteers from Galveston to Vera Cruz, Mexico, collecting litter to beautify the shoreline.
“We invited Matamoros to take part, and then it just started growing,” De Leon said of the runaway growth of the event, now in its fifth year.
About 200 people have signed up for the Boca Chica cleanup, he said, noting that organizers are expecting as many as 400 to show up for the rain-or-shine event.
Individuals, families and organizations are invited to take part in the event, De Leon said, adding that the organization will be shuttling volunteers to the cleanup site from the Home Depot at Boca Chica Boulevard and Padre Island Highway.
For more information about registering or taking part in future cleanups, call De Leon at (956) 459-1631.
