The name came from a Surfrider Inn in Santa Monica, California. One of the founders, Glenn Hening, first stayed at the Surfrider Inn when he was eight-years-old while visiting the west coast with his family. The founders initially became aware of the environmental threats when they noticed all the coastal development at their favorite surfing area.The foundation’s main focus is to restore the coastline and to make the ocean life a better place for the marine animals. The organization wants to persuade individuals to protect the ocean from harmful garbage. Due to that, the motto of Surfrider Foundation is, “Our vision is as simple and straightforward as the picture in your mind when you think of a beach, in our minds that translate to two words, healthy coasts.” Over the past 30 years, the Surfrider has accomplished numerous of things to help benefit the coastlines such as passed laws and expanded their branches. Over the years, the foundation was able to help pass bills against plastic bags and bottles in a couple of areas such as Tacoma, Brigantine, Portland, South Padre Island, and Santa …show more content…
A Surfrider volunteer revealed that plastic bags, bottle containers, bottle caps, kitchen utensils are the most common rubbish that is found in the ocean. Due to the mass amount of plastics in the coastlines, Surfrider specifically made small sub-unit of the foundation called Rise above Plastic. The sub-unit mainly focuses on the quantity of plastic in oceans that is harming the marine life. Rise above Plastic’s main mission is to diminish the quantities of plastics in the marine life. They try to raise awareness about the danger of plastic toxic waste. Marcus Eriksen and his colleagues explain in a 2014 article Plastic Pollution in the World 's Oceans, that there is an estimate of 5.25 trillion plastic particles weighing about 269,000 tons are floating in the world 's oceans. Also, according to Renee Cho in the 2011 article Our Oceans: A Plastic Soup, Cho states that an average amount of time for a plastic water bottle to decompose is around 450 years . Those fishes and other marine animals will be around the plastic waste for years before it decays or when someone removes it from the ocean. Surfrider and Rise above Plastic states that they strive for the best so that each and every sea creature can have a safe environment to live in and the way for that to be accomplished are to have decreased the amount of plastic in the