By CHERYL ROMANO/YachatsNews.com
Steve Cook is nobody’s idea of a wuss.
He was a professional firefighter for 12 years. He became a certified scuba diver at the age of 16. His business – Dry Building Diagnostics — investigates water and mold intrusion in buildings.
But just walking along the beach can sometimes bring a tear to his eyes. Blame trash.
Cleaning up cigarette butts, scraps of food wrappers, doggie poop bags and detritus from fishing boats is a self-confessed obsession of the Tidewater resident, and one he has no interest in losing. About three days a week, he brings his “pick stick” grabber tool and trash bag to Gov. Patterson State Recreation Site just south of Waldport, plucking up the bits and pieces that don’t belong. Along the way he often finds interesting rock specimens, but his primary mission is cleaning.
“Most of what I’m finding is plastic,” says Cook, 66. “From what I’ve read, fish will eat anything small in the water — especially the ‘micro plastics’ we know are such a danger to sea life — and this gets into their systems. Then the little fish get eaten by bigger fish, and it (plastics) works its way up the food chain to sea lions and bigger animals. It definitely kills in many cases.”
Other lethal pollutants: cigarette butts and their concentrated deposits of nicotine; shotgun shells that float downriver from duck hunters; pieces of broken beer bottles, and, when fireworks are “in season,” hundreds of the plastic barrels that house the pyrotechnics.
“I picked up over 600 pieces of fireworks after one Fourth of July,” he recalled. “Sometimes I get a little sad when I find so much crud; I find myself tearing up every once in a while.”
That woe is nowhere in evidence, though, when Cook is working his “favorite job” as a musician. Diners at The Drift Inn in Yachats get to see him at his happiest, playing acoustic guitar and singing ballads and blues from the 1960s and ‘70s. He sometimes pairs with his drummer friend, Curtis Colt, to play as the Cook-Colt Duo.
So far on the beach, however, Cook’s cleaning obsession is a solo act. He isn’t a marine biologist or eco-scientist. He’s just a guy who used to live across from Patterson beach, when he, his wife, son and daughter moved to the area 21 years ago. Cook started picking up plastic in 2008 when he rock-hunted along the shore.
“The more plastic I picked up, the more rocks I found,” he said.
And his obsession was born.
Big clean-up drive April 17
That obsession is right in line with a statewide anti-litter group that will join forces with Cook this month.
Last year, Cook posted a notice on the Waldport Community Facebook page about his efforts, and heard from several dozen people who wanted to be involved. Not an organizer by training, Cook contacted SOLVE (Stop Oregon Litter and Vandalism, with the “E” added to create a call to action). The Portland-based group musters tens of thousands of volunteers in every county in Oregon for litter cleanup, tree planting, and invasive removal projects. And they’re making Cook’s one-man crusade into a community effort by including it on its signup web page — and hoping for 100 volunteers.
On Saturday, April 17, SOLVE will help Cook conduct a group clean-up from Patterson Park to Wakonda Beach in Waldport as part of its “Oregon Spring Cleanup” drive. The Portland group will provide bags for trash, and handle dump fees. The event is scheduled to run from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., depending on the number of volunteers that turn out.
“I’d like to go all the way to Yachats, if we get enough people,” Cook said. “I want the beach to be absolutely spotless.”
Even those who don’t feel up to walking and cleaning a big stretch of beach can volunteer as captains to help get participants registered and organized. Cook plans to post messages about the event on the Waldport Facebook page, and urges people interested to contact him through that social media.
SOLVE is helping organize at least eight other beach cleanups that day in Lincoln and Lane counties.
“It’s just so important that we start respecting the ocean and start taking care of it — especially here on the coast. We need it, and we’re hurting it.”
- Cheryl Romano is a Yachats freelance reporter who contributes regularly to YachatsNews.com. She can be reached at Wordsell@gmail.com
