Santa had some green elf helpers this year: Jenna and Sierra, two Grades of Green Youth Corps students, who helped inspire and empower over fifty people to shop for the holidays without plastic or paper bags by handing out reusable bags. Their efforts were part of a a Los Angeles County wide promotion called “Day Without a Bag”, to encourage holiday shoppers to go without all the extra paper and plastics bags. In all, over 25,000 reusable bags where handed out in an attempt to reduce the 6 billion disposable plastic bags that are used in the Los Angeles County every year. This is an important message, since less than 5% of the disposable bags are recycled each in year in Los Angeles, the rest ending up in landfills or as litter in public places or our oceans where they can harm marine animals. To read more about this event click here.