Murrysville-Export club join international Rotary effort to 'End Plastic Soup'

After growing up in Ireland, Noreen Hill-Olszewski was surprised to find how comparatively little recycling was happening in the United States.

“We’re used to separating our trash, our different types of recyclables, our ‘compostibles,’” Hill-Olszewski said. Local recycling has taken a step back in recent years, with several regional haulers eliminating the recycling of glass and cutting plastic recycling back to only No. 1 and No. 2 varieties. Hill-Oszewski and fellow members of the Murrysville-Export Rotary Club hope to bring about more awareness of the amount of waste generated each day and what can be done to “End Plastic Soup.”

“Plastic soup” is a reference to the thousands of tons of plastic that end up in local, regional and ultimately international waterways. Some of it ends up in massive floating trash piles in the middle of the world’s oceans. Some of it breaks up into smaller pieces and is consumed by animals, one of several ways it ends up in the human food chain.

The “End Plastic Soup” initiative took root in 2017 in the Netherlands, where Rotary chairmen began drawing attention to the issue and ultimately organized volunteers to fish plastic junk from Amsterdam’s canals.

With 1.2 million Rotarians across the globe, small-scale environmental action like that can have a real impact.

That’s what Rotarian Ellen Cruse is hoping, and the Murrysville-Export club will get started by way of a publicity campaign.

“Our first plunge is an art contest for fourth and fifth graders at Franklin Regional and Mother of Sorrows School,” Cruse said. “Entries are due April 12, and we’re planning to take the top 12 and create a calendar to sell as a fundraiser.”

The fundraiser will go toward local “End Plastic Soup” initiatives such as a display at the Completely Booked store in the Blue Spruce Shoppes and the creation of kits aimed at reducing single-use plastic. The kits come equipped with a reusable shopping bag, water bottle, straw and cutlery.

“Even if we sell the kits for a dollar above our cost, it’s worth it just to get people thinking about it,” Cruse said.

Hill-Olszewski agreed.

“It’s a mentality, because it seems like the harder you try, the more plastic you come up against,” she said.

For Cruse, that means making a conscious decision to reduce the amount of plastic she uses.

“It’s not just ‘reduce-reuse-recycle,’ it’s also ‘refuse,’” Cruse said. “We don’t think about how often we take a piece of plastic that’s only going to get thrown away.”

The club is planning to have a presence and information about the initiative at spring and summer community events, and committee members such as Cruse and Hill-Olszewski are planning neighborhood clean-up dates, particularly for World Clean-Up Day on June 3.

“It’s important for our kids and grandchildren,” Hill-Olszewski said. “The next generation are the ones who’ll have to live with this.”

For more, see EndPlasticSoup.org.