CREATIVE PARTNERSHIPS FOR HOUSEHOLD HAZARDOUS WASTE PUBLIC EDUCATION

摘要

The Los Angeles County Department of Public Works Household Hazardous Waste Public Education Program set a goal of reaching ten million Los Angeles County residents with messages about household hazardous waste (HHW) designed to encourage responsible purchasing, safe use and storage, proper disposal at free weekly HHW collection events and the use of less toxic alternatives. One of the methods used to achieve this goal was to establish partnerships with local businesses and media to enlist their aid in spreading the message. Partnerships were strategically pursued in order to reach our target audiences at the appropriate times and in the appropriate manner to maximize the effectiveness of the outreach. These partnerships led to significant increases in participation at HHW collection events, calls to our County environmental hotline, and visitors to our website. The increase in the number of Spanish-language calls to the hotline prompted us to develop additional content in Spanish for our website and we saw a corresponding increase in visits to these pages. The purpose of this paper is to describe the strategies used in identifying potential partnerships and developing and implementing them.