It’s a shore thing

Head to Hollywood & join March for the Ocean.

In honor of Friday’s World Oceans Day, a sea of humanity will form at Broward County’s March for the Ocean walk and beach festival today from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. The march will begin at the Charnow Park Hollywood Beach Broadwalk, 1500 N. Broadwalk.

The event is being hosted by the Surfrider Foundation Broward Chapter, a nonprofit that works to protect the ocean, and Free Our Seas, an organization that works to address the environmental threats of plastic pollution.

Organizers are asking attendees to wear blue to the march, which will begin the trek towards the Marine Environmental Education Center at 10 a.m. led by Fort Lauderdale High School’s drum line.

Once the event ends at 1 p.m., participants will take a “Hands Across the Sand” photo next to a 7-foot-tall replica of an oil rig to oppose offshore drilling.

Catherine Uden, chair of the Broward Surfrider Foundation, says in an email that people will march to “raise awareness for the threats to marine animals, coral bleaching and disease, offshore drilling, plastic pollution, Lake O discharges, ocean acidification, sea-level rise, and climate change.”

Twenty-one nonprofits will participate in the event, whose main theme is plastic-pollution awareness. Therefore, it will be a plastic- and foam-free event. There will be live reggae and a costume, poster and cleanup-bucket art contests alongside educational tables.

“All of South Florida is invited,” Uden says. “We expect about 1,000 participants, including local lawmakers.”

Broward’s march is a sister event to Washington, D.C.’s March for the Ocean, which aims to put pressure on the Trump administration to stop putting the environment, economy and health at risk for the profit of polluting industries such as Big Oil. March for the Ocean comes from the same efforts that inspired the March for Science and the Women’s March since President Trump took office.

Parking will be available at the blue-and-yellow Charnow parking garage and at Margaritaville Resort’s parking garage. For more information, visit the event’s Facebook page.

JENNIFER LETT/STAFF FILE PHOTO Save Our Seas, which hosted the Environmental Arts Festival in April, is co-hosting March for the Ocean with the Surfrider Foundation. The event will be centered on the march, but will also have educational tables, live music and games.