HOUSTON, Nov. 21, 2008 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- What a difference 365 days make!
To celebrate the first anniversary of the highly successful Clean & Green Port of Houston Program, 365 volunteers planted 365 trees along Buffalo Bayou in Tony Marron Park at 808 North York, just east of downtown.
Photos accompanying this release are available at http://media.primezone.com/poha/
The 365 volunteers were recruited from the partners involved in the Clean & Green Program: the Port of Houston Authority, Shell Oil Company and the Buffalo Bayou Partnership. Representatives from Fountain of Praise Youth Group, Project S.T.A.R. (Students and Teachers Achieving Results), Rice University, Emory University, STAR Drug Court and 150 eighth graders from Youth Education/Employment Services (Y.E.S.S., Houston Police Department-DARE Program) planted the 365 trees along the banks of Buffalo Bayou. The new trees not only beautify, but also help to stabilize the bayou. The "Clean & Green Team" also picked up trash and litter at the location.
In just one year, 1,845 cubic yards of trash have been removed from the banks and waters of Buffalo Bayou. This much trash could fill 74 garbage truckloads or the equivalent of 12,454 30-gallon trash bags. This is nearly double what the skimmer boat Mighty Tidy alone captured during the year before Clean & Green began (1,022 cubic yards). The bulk of the trash collected is plastics, and all of the trash, including plastics, paper, metal, glass and electronics, is being recycled.
The Clean & Green program is a public-private partnership utilizing community service workers to keep Houston's Buffalo Bayou clean and green. The year-round initiative is managed by Buffalo Bayou Partnership and funded by Shell Oil Company and the Port of Houston Authority. Additional agency partners are Greater East End Management District, Harris County Constable Precinct 6, Harris County Community Supervision and Corrections Department and the Harris County Flood Control District. Other program partners are Vista Fibers Company and Williams Brothers Construction Company.
The goal of Clean & Green is to restore Buffalo Bayou to a cleaner, safer, pristine waterway through removal of trash and debris. Trash in the bayou ultimately floats into the Houston Ship Channel and Galveston Bay.
Joining Port of Houston Authority Commissioner Elyse Lanier and Buffalo Bayou Partnership President Anne Olson for the tree planting were Judge Caprice Cosper, 339th Criminal District Court, Judge Brock Thomas, 338th Criminal District Court, Judge Mike Wilkinson, 179th Criminal District Court, Diane Schenke, executive director of The Park People, and Hedy Wolpa, interim president and program director, Greater East End Management District.
You can learn more about the Clean & Green Port of Houston Program by visiting the Buffalo Bayou Partnership's Web site at www.buffalobayou.org or contact the Port of Houston Authority public affairs office at 713-670-2630 or visit its Web site at www.portofhouston.com.
The Clean & Green Port of Houston program logo is available at http://www.globenewswire.com/newsroom/prs/?pkgid=4121
CAPTIONS:
#25: 365 volunteers celebrated the first anniversary of the highly successful Clean & Green Port of Houston Program by planting 365 trees.
#45: A Boy Scout volunteer plants one of the 365 trees.
#58: Mike Barnes, Buffalo Bayou Partnership, PHA Commissioner Elyse Lanier; Judge Mike Wilkinson; Judge Caprice Cosper; Jude Brock Thomas; Grace Moolchan, PHA Community Relations Manager; Kim Ogg of The Ogg Law Firm; Hedy Wolpa, Greater East End Management District and Deputy H. Alaniz.
#67: Representatives from Fountain of Praise Youth Group
#74: Eighth graders from Youth Education/Employment Services
#85 and 89: Volunteers were treated to some bright green cupcakes arranged to say "365."
The Port of Houston Authority owns and operates the public facilities located along the Port of Houston, the 25-mile-long complex of diversified public and private facilities designed for handling general cargo, containers, grain and other dry bulk materials, project and heavy lift cargo, and other types of cargo. Each year, more than 7,700 vessels call at the port, which ranks first in the U.S. in foreign waterborne tonnage and second in overall total tonnage. The port authority plays a vital role in ensuring navigational safety along the Houston Ship Channel, which has been instrumental in Houston's development as a center of international trade. The Barbours Cut Container Terminal and Central Maintenance Facility are the first of any U.S. port facilities to develop and implement an innovative Environmental Management System that meets the rigorous standards of ISO 14001. PHA is the first port authority in the world to receive ISO 28000:2007 certification for Port Police and the perimeter security operations at both the Barbours Cut and Bayport Terminals. Additionally, the port is an approved delivery point for Coffee "C" futures contracts traded on the New York Board of Trade's Coffee, Sugar & Cocoa Exchange. For more information, please visit www.portofhouston.com
To access the port's Web site photo gallery, please visit http://www.portofhouston.com/publicrelations/publicrelations.html and click the link for PHA Photo Gallery.
The photos are also available via AP PhotoExpress.
