LA Team Effort Hits the Streets of LA

L.A Can’t Do It Alone: Team Effort Campaign Calls Us to Action

Team effort goes a long way and it certainly shows here in L.A.

The upcoming Stormwater Program’s Team Effort ad campaign displays this message of collaboration, as city departments, non-profit organizations, businesses and residents come together daily to make Los Angeles a more enjoyable place to call home. The headline of the ad, “Clean Water: It’s a Team Effort”, expresses this rapport, and follows up with a call to action for pollution prevention. The Stormwater Program’s mission for the campaign is to empower communities and residents to improve their local environment and build partnerships throughout the City. From downtown to surrounding neighborhoods to the beach, all areas are affected by the choices we make when disposing of trash, chemicals and other toxins harmful to our wellbeing.

Everyday trash is an important focus of the campaign, and the City addresses this with a message from children asking L.A. : “Please Don’t Litter, Thank You!”. The pictorial account shows that children are a major motivation of the team effort, because they are the most affected by current behaviors of littering and illegal dumping. Two additional campaign photos tell the story of City employees who have separate tasks but unified goals, as they monitor water quality both inland and on the coast to ensure public health and thriving marine habitats.

Taraneh Nik-Khah, a featured City employee, hops on a pontoon boat three times a week to sample the waters of Machado Lake at Ken Malloy Harbor Regional Park. The Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board has identified the lake as a contaminated water body for such toxins as pesticides, DDT, trash and even odor. Taraneh takes these samples to a lab to monitor harmful materials and asses how they affect the surrounding habitat. In the near future, Taraneh and her sampling team will also be monitoring the benefits of the City’s Proposition O restoration project aimed at cleaning up Machado Lake and its adjacent park.

Northwest of Machado Lake, David Bond cruises the coast in the bright yellow Environmental Monitoring truck to sample the shorelines at the Santa Monica Pier. Results of these samples, taken at 20 different coastal locations, are reported daily to the Los Angeles Department of Health who immediately use the data to determine if it meets water quality standards. The data are also reported to the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board on a monthly basis and are used by the environmental group Heal the Bay to produce their Beach Report Card.

The campaign, which will be highlighted through L.A. in the forms of bus shelters, newspaper and magazine advertisements will kickoff in April. The Program hopes to inspire residents to become part of the solution and play a major role in the preservation of their neighborhoods.