On May 13, Seal Beach made a bold commitment to the Pacific Ocean. The city, alongside the counties of Los Angeles and Orange, and the city of Long Beach, signed a Memorandum of Understanding with The Ocean Cleanup—a move that signals a shift from isolated cleanup efforts to coordinated regional action against the plastic choking America's urban waterways.
The agreement matters because it addresses a problem that feels invisible until it washes ashore. Each year, stormwater runoff from neighborhoods and infrastructure throughout the San Gabriel River Watershed carries debris and pollutants downstream through a regional network of channels and waterways, ultimately discharging into the Pacific Ocean and along Seal Beach's coastline. In 2025 alone, approximately 500 tons of beach trash were collected in Seal Beach—a staggering figure that underscores both the scale of the challenge and the urgency of action.
The signing event at the Aquarium of the Pacific brought together federal, state, county, and city leaders alongside environmental advocates, funding partners, and community stakeholders. At its core, the partnership deploys Interceptors—technology developed by The Ocean Cleanup—in both the San Gabriel River and Los Angeles River. The Interceptors are designed to stop plastic from reaching the ocean, creating a technological barrier upstream rather than waiting for the damage to manifest downstream.
This is what regional collaboration looks like when it matters. The Ocean Cleanup, founded in 2013 by Boyan Slat, has already collected over 50 million kilograms—110.2 million pounds—of trash from aquatic ecosystems worldwide as of March 2026. The nonprofit now employs approximately 200 people across operations in 10 countries, headquartered in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Their expansion into Los Angeles represents a scaling of proven methods into one of America's most densely populated coastal regions.
"As we expand our efforts in Los Angeles, we're not just stopping plastic in rivers, we're setting a new standard for urban ocean protection on a city-wide basis," Slat said. The organization is simultaneously working in Ballona Creek, creating a multi-pronged approach across the region's waterways.
Seal Beach Councilmember Joe Kalmick, who helped initiate the effort, framed the moment with clear-eyed optimism. "While there is more work to be done, today we celebrate a significant milestone in the long-term effort to preserve the San Gabriel River and our coastline as clean, healthy spaces for the ecosystems they sustain and the communities that treasure them," he said.
The San Gabriel River Trash Mitigation Initiative represents years of collaboration finally crystallized into action. It protects not only the residents of Los Angeles and Orange Counties but also the millions of visitors who rely on Southern California's beaches and waterways—places that define the region's identity and economy. By choosing to act upstream, before pollution reaches the ocean, these cities and counties are demonstrating that ocean health is not a distant environmental concern but a local responsibility that demands immediate, coordinated response.
The partnership signals something larger: that when communities align around a shared problem, and when proven technology meets political will, change becomes possible. The work of cleaning waterways and protecting marine ecosystems continues, but May 13 marked the moment when Southern California decided to do it together.