Port Tampa Bay, Propeller Club and Keep Tampa Bay Beautiful to host award-winning ‘Great Port Clean-up’

Port Tampa Bay, Propeller Club and Keep Tampa Bay Beautiful to host award-winning ‘Great Port Clean-up’ for the second time in celebration of Earth Day

April 8, 2022

Tampa, FL –Port Tampa Bay and the Propeller Club of Tampa Bay are proud to be the presenting sponsors of Keep Tampa Bay Beautiful’s second annual, Great Port Clean-up. This year’s event will take place on Earth Day, Friday, April 22, 2022, around the waters of Tampa Bay. Last year, the first-ever Great Port Clean-up won the American Association of Port Authorities’ Lighthouse Award of Excellence for Environmental Enhancement and served as a model for seaports throughout the Western Hemisphere. During this inaugural event, nearly 350 port partners and other dedicated community volunteers safely removed more than 19K pounds of trash and marine debris from 23 sites in and around our port.

While the majority of this debris originates from outside of the port, we recognize our daily connection with our local waters and are dedicated to doing our part to eliminate marine debris and support trash-free waters in Tampa Bay. This event is a call to action for the port community to support the ongoing efforts to keep Tampa Bay a beautiful place to live, work, and play.

“Port Tampa Bay has been a committed leader on environmental and sustainability issues, as evidenced by last year’s award-winning Great Port Clean-up. We are honored to bring together the maritime community and volunteers from the public. Living and working alongside Tampa Bay is a privilege and we remain deeply committed to the health of our area’s waters. We hope to build on the outpouring of interest and support from last year’s event to continue to have a substantial impact on our community for years to come,” explained Paul Anderson, President and CEO of Port Tampa Bay. "Keep Tampa Bay Beautiful is proud to host the Great Port Clean-up and looks forward to seeing the community come together for a common goal. This event truly amplifies our environmental impact as part of our Trash Free Waters Program,” explained Debbie Evenson, Executive Director of Keep Tampa Bay Beautiful. “The Propeller Club – Port of Tampa takes great pride in ensuring our marine environment remains clean and beautiful. We are proud to be partners with Port Tampa Bay and Keep Tampa Bay Beautiful with this annual initiative that allows the maritime community to come together and give back to preserve and sustain our environment.” Chris Chambers, President of the Propeller Club – Port of Tampa.

The clean-up will take place at several waterside locations near Port Tampa Bay from 9 to 11 a.m. on Friday, April 22, with registration beginning at 8 a.m. Members of the media are invited to a clean-up site at DeSoto Park (meet at the North end of Bermuda Blvd. NOT IN PINELLAS COUNTY), Located at Corrine St, Tampa, FL 33605, where organizers of the Great Port Clean-Up will be available for interviews.

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