At LuLu’s last week, officials with the Leave Only Footprints program gave a progress report on the one year anniversary of the program’s inception.

President and CEO of Gulf Shores and Orange Beach Tourism Herb Malone told the crowd the program was already making a big impact just one year out, but he asked those in attendance to be sure to keep the energy going into this next year.

“We’re doing this for the direct purpose of getting everybody reenergized for Leave Only Footprints and, for those of you who weren’t part of the process last year, getting you educated as well,” Malone said. “Sometimes, you have things go that have a lot of momentum, and that momentum spreads from everyone in this room to others in the community and our guests.”

Malone encouraged everyone in attendance to use social media more to continue to promote Leave Only Footprints, adding it was the most effective way to reach people these days.

“We’ve got a lot of visitors coming that haven’t been here before and don’t know about this program, so it’s going to take continual education,” Malone said. “And we’ve found the best way we can reach them is through social media. Hashtag ‘Leave Only Footprints’ over and over and over again. Get the word out.”

Malone said the program began when his office and the municipalities began fielding complaints about the clutter on the beaches.

“We began receiving word from visitors and others saying things like ‘I came down here to see the majesty of the beach, but it’s gone. It’s lost. We’re going to look for somewhere else today,’” Malone said. “That kind of got our attention.”

Malone said he and other approached the cities, who had been trying to figure out a way to combat the issue.

“The cities have been talking about this for a number of years, the challenges that exist, and it was starting to threaten our most precious resource we have here on the island - our beaches,” Malone said. “Things had to be changed. Change isn’t always easy, but it happened in a really good way.”

After those conversations, a partnership was born that became Leave Only Footprints, which Malone said couldn’t have worked without the help of the cities.

“Everybody came together and said this absolutely had to be done,” Malone said. “Our cities adopted some very strong ordinances that help protect our environment, and, as we all know, our economy is dependent on our environment. If we don’t take care of our environment, we don’t have an economy.”

Malone also praised the enforcement teams and volunteers that help make the program run.

“It takes a lot of people to make it happen, but we’ve got a good team,” Malone said. “Between the two cities, they removed over 400 tons of material from the beaches the last year, in the form of aluminum chairs and tents, beer cans and Coke cans and other kinds of trash - 406 tons of material taken out.”

Malone said the program had great industry partner engagement.

“In our office, with input from the cities, we developed materials, we developed print ads and online ads and we made it available to all of our industry partners,” Malone said. “We didn’t copyright any of this because we wanted people to be able to use it without any kind of infringement.”

Malone told the group 90 percent of online comments made about the program were completely positive.

“Of the 10 percent that weren’t, I could not find anything other than ‘It’s an inconvenience’ as the basic message,” Malone said. “It might be a small inconvenience to change the way you do things, but it was necessary.”

Malone said there were problems other than just beauty that necessitated a program like Leave Only Footprints. He mentioned lifeguards not being able to navigate through all of the materials to get to and save lives of people in danger, as well as some people getting severe cuts from broken glass in the sand.

Malone said you can also see an almost immediate impact with the program on the local environment, especially with regards to sea turtles, which he said was a cause for celebration.

“In 2012, there was an all time high of sea turtle nests at 148 nests on Alabama beaches,” Malone said. “Last year, with Leave Only Footprints in effect, that number went to 222. This is critical to my good friends the sea turtles.”

Malone then introduced Noel Hand with Gulf Shores and Nicole Woerner with Orange Beach, who had more facts and figures about the program.

Woerner praised the effectiveness of the Beach Ambassadors program started by the city of Orange Beach.

“In 2017, the city of Orange Beach is going to continue its Beach Ambassadors program,” Woerner said. “We feel like the education is invaluable to our tourists and our businesses. Just having these ambassadors talk to people out on the beach and let them know about everything. They educate them and start by handing them a bracelet or Frisbee, and then tell them that glass is not allowed on our beaches.”

Woerner said more than 20,000 promotional items were given out on the beaches this year, helping to spread information and awareness about Leave Only Footprints.

Hand said the continuation of the program helps both cities better take care of the resources they have been blessed with.

“We need to be good stewards,” Hand said. “We know scripture tells us we have dominion over all things, but that doesn’t mean we just get to do whatever we want with it.”

Hand said one aspect of the program is reducing the area’s carbon footprint through recycling, which has quickly become a significant part of Leave Only Footprints.

In the last year alone, 18.5 tons or pure aluminum were collected and recycled.

“If we have 6 millions visitors come to our area and they recycle just three cans, that would pay for the Leave Only Footprints program,” Hand said. “We could be able to pay for the program just for the recycling side with the aluminum alone.”

40 tons of glass has also been collected and recycled, where it was crushed into sand and also used as aggregate thanks to a grant from the Alabama Department of Environmental Management.

All officials said they expect Leave Only Footprints to continue to grow and thrive for many years to come.