HABITS OF WASTE

Changing wasteful habits throughout society.

Today, our work at Crayon Collection has evolved to encompass more habits-of-waste including single-use plastics and many daily behaviors that most of us don’t even see because they are so engrained in our routines. We are proud to present H.o.W. habitsofwaste.org, which will house these efforts moving forward.

We created many movements for change with the students at Los Angeles High School using social media as the driver for change. Working together in the community to find solutions to reduce single use plastics.

Crayon Collection played an integral role in moving the City of Malibu closer to a single-use plastic straw, stirrer and cutlery ban.

Sheila’s leadership in organizing the “STRAWS” documentary film screening and panel discussion in partnership with the City of Malibu catalyzed the City Council and the community to charge forward on this issue. Sheila has an innate ability to inspire people to make a change for the better, whether it’s one straw or one crayon at a time. These collective actions add up, and we will see the full effect of these individual actions when an entire city chooses to protect our beloved coastline from plastic pollution

Casey Zweig

Environmental Programs Coordinator I City of Malibu

Habits of waste are everywhere

At Crayon Collection, we want to shine light on those habitual things we do each day without noticing anymore. The use of plastic straws are are a huge problem because we use 500,000,000 plastic straws per day in the US alone and discard them after a few minutes, without a second thought.

However, this seemingly benign habit negatively impacts our planet because single use plastics never decompose. Instead, they end up in our oceans, killing sea life or turn into micro-plastics that are now found in our water and food.

straws & Habits of Waste
WHy are STraws bad for the environment?

A shockingly short lifespan, used once for mere minutes.

Never biodegrade and take hundreds of years to break down.

End up in our oceans, negatively impacting sea life.

February 12, 2018 at 10:45pm history was made. The City of Malibu passed a ban on all plastic straws, plastic cutlery and plastic stirrers.

It all started last March when Crayon Collection founder placed a call to Casey Zweig, the Environmental Programs Director of the city of Malibu to try and find a solution to reduce the 500,000,000 plastic straws used and discarded EVERYDAY in the US. Our conversation ended with the understanding that while this was very important, it was challenging to get restaurants to comply without an official ban by the city. The seed of activism was planted!

I saw an opportunity when the executive producer of “STRAWS”, Andrea Arria Devoe, invited me to co-host a screening of the documentary film by Linda Booker.

Instead of screening the film in a theater I thought it would be the perfect time to go back to the City of Malibu and it’s sustainability team with a plan. So last September, we signed up for public comment at Malibu City Hall and made a request to City Council to partner with Crayon Collection in screening the film together.

On November 30, 2017 we had a full house at Malibu City Hall where we screened the film and educated the community on why straws are oh-so-bad. We hoped that this would get us closer to the next step for the city to create a new ordinance banning single-use plastic straws. It worked!

Featured Press

It’s always wonderful to see your work recognized in the news and printed in the paper. However, this time being newsworthy was different. The story about the plastic straw and cutlery ban in the City of Malibu was told and shared around the world.

Straws: one small swap,
one massive change for oceans

Join in by refusing single-use plastics! Ask your local restaurants to consider switching to paper straws and serving paper straws by request only. This will help offset the slightly higher cost of paper products. Remember there are 4 R’s: Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle!
Go to your city council meeting and request change. Our impact model was to inform the community about the reasoning behind for our ask for a straw ban. We first asked the city to help us inform the public about the issue at hand through a screening of the documentary film, STRAWS, in City Hall. We knew that once everyone watches the film, no one can “un-think” the damage single-use plastics have on our precious environment. That was when people were ready for the change, which the city voted for with a unanimous vote.

We believe that this ban is now being seriously considered in a city near you. This is your time to make the push.

Here’s how you can offer a screening of STRAWS in your city.

Step 1

To see the trailer of this film please visit www.strawsfilm.com.
If you would like to screen the film in entirety please visit here to download.

Step 2

Screen this film in your child’s school, or at an event at City Hall. This is a true testament about the power of film. Giving your community the chance to learn about an issue before requesting a change is so helpful in being successful.