Clean Car & Clean Bay
Everyone loves a clean car. Everyone also loves a clean bay. We can have both.
Throughout the month of August, the City of Tacoma will be launching a social media contest and reaching out to residents to share three simple rules for washing cars in a way that helps keep Commencement Bay free of pollutants:
- Wash your car on your lawn or a non-concrete area because grass and gravel filter the dirt and soap out of the water before it gets to the bay. (Diluted soap doesn’t harm lawns by the way.)
- Use soaps or detergents without phosphates because phosphates lead to water with less of the oxygen that fish need to survive.
- Sweep driveway and street gutters before washing to keep dirt, leaves and trash from getting into storm drains and ending up in the bay.
To “drive” home these points, each day in the month of August the City is giving away a free cars wash on twitter. Follow the City @CityofTacoma. Why? Because using a commercial car wash is also good for Commencement Bay; the wash water use by these businesses gets treated – and sometimes recycled too.
City Environmental Services staff will also attend community events throughout the month of August with information, shammies and additional car wash certificates redeemable at a variety of local car washes to give away. Watch for them at the August LeMay drive-in movie, local car shows and Rainier baseball games (yes, that’s Rhubarb washing a car on the grass) and other events.