Announcing Baykeeper’s 2016 Blue Rivet Award Winners

Feb 22, 2016

Baykeeper is proud to announce our 2016 Blue Rivet Award winners. The Blue Rivet Award honors community members and businesses that believe in Baykeeper’s vision of a safe and thriving San Francisco Bay and that have made significant strides to help achieve that vision.

The Blue Rivet Award includes a plaque with an actual Golden Gate Bridge rivet, representing individual efforts that join together to create a thriving, healthy San Francisco Bay. Past award recipients include Krist Jake, founder of the San Francisco International Ocean Film Festival, and the Dolphin Club, an open-water swim organization that nurtures residents’ relationships with San Francisco Bay.

2016 Blue Rivet Award Winners

Roger Castillo is known as The Watchdog of the River for his tireless volunteer stewardship of the Guadalupe River. The river flows from the Santa Cruz Mountains, through San Jose, and into the South Bay. A self-taught naturalist, Roger is dedicated to cleaning up the river and restoring habitat so that Chinook salmon can be observed spawning on gravel and more naturally functioning streambeds and riverbeds.

He chairs the nonprofit Salmon and Steelhead Restoration Group, studying hydrology and urban planning, reporting fish poachers, testifying at public hearings, and educating kids. After 22 years as a volunteer filing complaints and assisting storm water inspectors to track down polluters, he recently completed training and is now a Certified Storm Water Inspector.

Roger knows how to identify the best spots for salmon to spawn and when the rainbow trout are feeding in the river. He was the first to discover a family of beavers when they arrived, and found the fossil of a Colombian Mammoth nearby. He shares his knowledge, and is credited with connecting the community to the Guadalupe River.

Paul Johnson is the founder of Monterey Fish Market, based in San Francisco and Berkeley. He believes strongly in sustainability and leaving a healthy ocean for future generations. The company buys only from fisherman who catch their products in a sustainable manner, and assists fleets of fishing vessels in converting from fishing practices that harm fisheries to sustainable fishing practices.

Paul also writes, lectures, and educates. He advocates for directed fisheries, catching target species and little else; with minimal waste and by-catch, the catch always fresh, and removed at an age and volume that does not affect the stocks' ability to reproduce at a sustainable rate. Sustainable fishery methods may include encircling seine nets, long lines, hook and lines, jigging, weirs, traps, dipnets, harpooning, gillnetting, diving, and trolling. He is the author of Fish Forever: The Definitive Guide to Understanding, Selecting, and Preparing Healthy, Delicious, and Environmentally Sustainable Seafood.

Levi Strauss & Co. is a San Francisco Bay-based company that has demonstrated ecological stewardship both locally and globally. Through its pioneering sustainability initiatives, Levi Strauss & Co. has directly reduced water waste and pollution from its operations. These initiatives include:

  • Developing Water<Less, to reduce the use of water, energy, and chemicals in clothing production (saving 1 billion liters of water since 2011);
  • Establishing wastewater discharge requirements for worldwide suppliers, limiting contaminant levels entering global waterways;
  • Developing Waste<Less clothing that incorporates 20 percent post-consumer waste (using 11.9 million recycled plastic bottles since 2013); and
  • Promoting a consumer care culture that includes: washing less, washing in cold, line drying, and clothing reuse, repurposing, and recycling.

Levi Strauss & Co. sponsors an annual Community Day for its global employees to spend a day away from the office volunteering in their local communities, including with San Francisco Baykeeper. Baykeeper and Levi Strauss & Co. employees have partnered on several successful cleanup and restoration efforts to improve the health of our San Francisco Bay shoreline. 

These local and global initiatives demonstrate Levi Strauss & Co.’s commitment to ecological stewardship, and directly result in water conservation, reducing waste in our local landfills and keeping pollution out of San Francisco Bay.

Congratulations to our 2016 Blue Rivet Award winners! We look forward to celebrating our awardees at the Baykeeper annual dinner at the Dolphin Club on February 28.

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