Cigarette litter campaigns are popping up all over the world thanks to voices like yours! Contents: A flood of media coverage! Win free pocket ashtrays for your campaign Teaming up with Surfrider to clean Manhattan Beach Making a difference - individuals in action

Japanese workers suit up as cigarette butts to deliver their anti-litter message in Tokyo.[story]

Dublin, Ireland begins campaign to distribute 20,000 free pocket ashtrays to reduce cigarette litter. Read the article

Tokyo, Japan launches cigarette litter awareness campaign. Read the article

Halifax, UK begins fining butt flickers. Read the article

Douglasville, GA - Check out this public service announcement! View the PSA

British Columbia, Canada - Butt flickers a pain for firefighters. Read the article

Melbourne, Australia - Butt cops on the beat down under. Read the article

Atlanta, Georgia - Editorial on growing pile of butts. Read the article

Tybee, GA - Anti-litter group wants smokers to stop using the beach as their ashtray. Read the article

Louisville, KY - Brown and Williamson Tobacco finally adds a cigarette litter web page. View the page

Visalia, California - Editorial on growing pile of butts. Read the article

Richmond, UK - Plea to littering smokers. Read the article

Philadelphia, PA - Dear drive by smoker: Read the article

Venice, FL - Editorial on butt litter Read the article

BUTTsOUT, and Australian company that provides pocket ashtrays and comprehensive cigarette litter solutions, will give away 500 pocket ashtrays (300 first prize, 200 second prize) to the group or individual with the best plan for utilizing them. Pocket ashtrays are a key component of any cigarette litter reduction campaign. They make it easy to educate smokers about the negative environmental consequences of cigarette butt litter and provide smokers with easy alternatives to littering in a friendly, non-confrontational way. Because we understand how hard it can be to find funds these days, we've been providing access to free pocket ashtrays on our web site for three years.

However, we also see a great opportunity to reduce cigarette litter globally through the exploding retail pocket ashtray market. Here are some of the advantages of introducing retail pocket ashtrays into your community:

• Retail ashtrays tend to last longer and work better
• By paying for the ashtrays, smokers are reminded that cigarette disposal is their responsibility
• By selling the ashtrays, retail cigarette outlets are acknowledging their responsibility and making a profit
• Because there is now a revenue stream, businesses now have an incentive to promote proper cigarette disposal on an on-going basis

How to enter: Just send an e-mail to mailto:contest@cigarettelitter.org including all of the following:

• The name, address and contact information for your organization.
• The number of paid employees and active volunteers, your annual budget, and the size of the population your organization serves.
• Describe any past or existing cigarette litter awareness and reduction efforts.
• Describe how you would use the free BUTTsOUT pocket ashtrays for your program.
• Describe your plan for involving local cigarette retailers in advertising and selling pocket ashtrays on an on-going basis to achieve sustainable long-term success.

Proposals will be judged jointly by CigaretteLitter.Org and BUTTsOUT and judgment is final. Proposals are due by October 15th and winners will be announced by November 15th.

Manhattan Beach, California has been making a concerted effort to raise awareness and reduce cigarette butt litter on its world class beaches and in its downtown area. CigaretteLitter.Org had a presence at their Earth Day celebration, distributing pocket ashtrays and informative literature on the environmental effects of cigarette butt litter. In response, the Manhattan Beach City Council passed a resolution declaring June 21st Cigarette Litter Awareness Day. CigaretteLitter.Org teamed up with South Bay Surfrider to coordinate a beach cleanup to support the resolution. Despite poor weather, a group of residents and outside volunteers collected over 1,500 cigarette butts on a small stretch of beach in under two hours! Free BUTTsOUT pocket ashtrays were handed out to smokers who were very receptive. In October, a city environmental group will be distributing more BUTTsOUT pocket ashtrays at the Manhattan Beach hometown fair.

Event coordinators from South Bay Surfrider and CigaretteLitter.Org hold up their
BUTTsOUT pocket ashtrays with Manhattan Beach City Councilor Jim Aldinger.

Coordinating a cigarette litter awareness day in your own community is easy. Here some basic steps:

• Build a coalition: Teaming up with local environmental groups or even with church groups, schools, boy scouts and girl scouts, etc. will help make the planning of your event easier and will help increase turnout.
  
• Ask your city council to pass a resolution declaring the day of your event Cigarette Litter Awareness Day. If possible, request funding from the city council, explaining that cigarette litter costs the community in terms of clean-up costs, clogged sewage systems, degraded water quality, risk of fire danger, etc.
• Ask local businesses to contribute prizes and/or money to your event. Use the prizes in a contest for who can pick up the most butts or who can design the best poster for cigarette litter awareness.
• Contact BUTTsOUT (www.buttsout.net) or a similar company to purchase ashtrays for your event depending on your funding. Encourage local cigarette retailers to start selling pocket ashtrays in their stores.
• Promote your event aggressively! Send a press release to all local news outlets and follow up with phone calls until you get the media coverage you need. Stressing the participation of local groups, businesses and elected officials will greatly increase the amount of media coverage you will get.
• Be sure to have sufficient volunteers to help organize participants on the day of your event. You will also want to have disposable plastic gloves, trash bags, a medical kit, and refreshments for participants.

Kathleen Register and her organization, Clean Virginia Waterways, have been pioneers in the cigarette litter reduction movement. It is her groundbreaking research on the harmful toxins in littered cigarette butts that inspired CigaretteLitter.Org. Now, Katie and CVW have a brand new web site with special section dedicated to cigarette litter.

Thanks to Becky Durrett and the Oklahoma City Department of Public Works for dedicating two full pages of their newsletter "Down Stream" to cigarette litter education. You can view scanned pages of the newsletter in either MS Word (quicker download and better quality) or Adobe PDF (longer download and harder to read).

Search www.cigarettelitter.org or the entire web:

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