Butts.....Pick Yours Up

Audience: Beginner and environmentally conscious tobacco control advocates.

Key Points: Affordable – High impact, low-cost step to manage resources, be fiscally responsible, and promote tobacco cessation & tobacco-free outdoor spaces., Environmentally Friendly –Cigarette butts constitute the majority of litter on beaches, parks, playgrounds and sidewalks. Sustainable – Supports the economy, protects the environment and promotes social equity. Tobacco-Free does all three.

Educational Experience: Create awareness of the variety of environmental issues caused by cigarette butts and to inform on ways to help. Be Green... Be Smoke-Free County Litter Control Officers in the WV counties of Monongalia & Marion partnered with other Environmental & Tobacco Control advocates for a Regional “Butt Out” Campaign.

Activities: Networking Event & Open House at the County Recycling Center Big & Small Litter Scavenger Hunt – A Boy Scout Troup collected 12 55 gallon bags of litter. Butt Audits- Students at a studio picked up 2,700 cigarette butts on 2 Morgantown city blocks. Butt Out Educational/Teacher Lesson Plan on county education websites. Butt Out Tri-fold Brochures distributed at community events and schools. Radio PSA’s on butt litter facts & 30 sec. Rap jingle “Keep your Butts off the Ground” Bus Ad - Keep Your Butts ..OFF the Ground sign on Transit Authority Bus.

Benefits: Millions of dollars are spent on “street scaping” to provide an esthetically attractive living environment. Cigarette butt litter “trashes” that effort. Butt Litter campaigns make a natural transition to tobacco cessation and tobacco-free policies. .