{"id":367335,"date":"2026-06-19T16:58:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T16:58:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/367335\/"},"modified":"2026-06-19T16:58:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T16:58:08","slug":"debris-around-long-beach-creates-a-whale-of-a-problem-herald-community-newspapers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/367335\/","title":{"rendered":"Debris around Long Beach creates a whale of a problem | Herald Community Newspapers"},"content":{"rendered":"

On your next stroll down the boardwalk, as you pass Washington Boulevard, try not to be startled by an oversized work of art at the former site of the Hebrew Academy of Long Beach. Susan Gallo, a Long Beach resident and homeschool teacher, along with her Bioswale Club<\/a>, have created a nearly life-size sculpture of a whale in the property\u2019s courtyard.<\/p>\n

The monument was built primarily of plastic bags, bottles and bottle caps that were taken off the beach during cleanups<\/a>, and it was publicly revealed on June 8, World Ocean Day, after nearly two months of assembly.<\/p>\n

Gallo and her daughters \u2014 Avellina, 13, Fiora, 11, and Toni, 6 \u2014 have been making once-weekly patrols along the beach, between Washington and Grand boulevards. They have collected trash and recyclables to either dispose of or incorporate into the whale.<\/p>\n

The bagged debris is being stored inside the see-through sculpture as well, creating a visible reminder of the scourge of littering. At the reveal, the whale already displayed four bags of refuse. \u201cEvery week, when we clean the beach, you\u2019ll see the belly fill up,\u201d Gallo explained, \u201cso that, by the end of the summer, just this little part of the beach, this is how much we clean up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Two months ago, Gallo worked with street artists and muralists to create artwork on the abandoned building\u2019s exterior, as reported in \u201cMural celebrates \u2018Many Hands, One Earth<\/a>,\u2019\u201d in the Herald\u2019s April 16-22 issue. Gallo\u2019s husband, Darren Gallo, owns the property management company that oversees the building, which helped to make the art a reality. That project improved the aesthetics of the unused structure and dissuaded further vandalism.<\/p>\n

Long Beach resident Alex Zassman was one of the first artists to help create murals after painting the area on his own, spreading his mantra of \u201cNever give up.\u201d Zassman explained, \u201cI was kind of beautifying this building before they were asking for it, so they really liked that. They said it was kind of the inspiration for their kids to want to paint a mural on the wall and start this whole art project, and make this a beautiful place.\u201d<\/p>\n

Susan Gallo has been on a mission to develop a local bioswale \u2014 landscaping that encourages native plant life, manages stormwater runoff and filters microplastics, heavy metals and human-created debris before they enter waterways \u2014 prompted by her children\u2019s curiosity and concern about pollution. Promoting natural ways to improve the environment has become the Gallo family\u2019s priority.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe bioswale is just a name,\u201d Susan said. \u201cReally, it\u2019s just nature. We\u2019re just coining a name to make people more aware that this is what we need.\u201d The murals and the sculpted whale promote public awareness of the issue, and have served as fundraisers for the project.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s beautiful to raise awareness,\u201d said Zasayem Ahmed, a Valley Stream resident who was strolling the boardwalk with her family on the day of the sculpture\u2019s reveal. \u201cEspecially including children, because they\u2019re our new generation. And it should raise awareness with the ocean. They\u2019re animals, they\u2019re a living species, so we shouldn\u2019t just be throwing our garbage and plastic around.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On your next stroll down the boardwalk, as you pass Washington Boulevard, try not to be startled by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":367336,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[148983,148985,131,148982,133,132,4694,148984,148986],"class_list":["post-367335","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-bioswale","tag-hebrew-academy-of-long-beach","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-boardwalk","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news","tag-new-york","tag-susan-gallo","tag-world-ocean-day"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367335","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=367335"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367335\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/367336"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=367335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=367335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=367335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}