Across the country, marine waste plagues our environment, from water pollution to land erosion and habitat decline. In 2023, the Surfrider Foundation’s Maine Chapter created the Beach Guardian Program as an attempt to minimize plastic pollution. The Beach Guardian program leverages a two-prong approach to address both coastal pollution and climate impacts, primarily from severe weather events. Beach Guardians complete both clean-ups and habitat/infrastructure monitoring and input their data into a national database, used to shape single-use plastic policy reform. Since its inception in 2023, the Program has collected over 15,000 pounds of trash.  In 2025, the Beach Guardian Program has spread across the Eastern seaboard and into the Gulf, where the program is targeting the removal of waste from offshore rigs

Surfrider Foundation's Beach Guardian Program connects community scientists with GIS to track a variety of waste types while monitoring the health of the landscape. It teaches community members the importance of data, as data from clean-ups assist in coastal restoration projects, policy changes, and key information about our changing climate. It allows for collaboration with other environmental organizations and NGOs, state parks and agencies, schools and universities, and more. 

Aside from its astounding success in cleaning thousands of marine debris off of coastal landscapes and documenting the environmental impact for numerous locations across the nation, the Beach Guardian Program empowers community members to make an impact in the places they care about the most.