Submission

Returning the oyster shells back home

Valuable oysters by the thousands are ending up in our landfills here in Austin; instead of returning them back to the ocean.

We will function as a 501 c 3 non profit and currently the subscription price will be from $300 to $800.00 per month as we have been consulted by a consulting service regarding how to gauge that cost.
https://savethesea.github.io/oysters/index.html
The cost will include training the kitchen staff to properly dispose the oyster shells and explaining the benefits of the oyster shells filtering of water, preventing the of erosion of shorelines, providing habitat to countless dolphins, crab, shrimp, and fish.

This business model is scalable due to the fact that
there are over 25 seafood restaurants in the Austin area.
Here is the letter from Texas Park and Wildlife
https://savethesea.github.io/oysters/TPD.png
These restaurants depend on the livelihood of reviving sea life.

According to Texas Park and Wildlife this industry has a 35 million dollar annual impact on the State of Texas.

We would use the oyster shells from Quality Seafood plus the many other seafood restaurants in the Austin and surrounding areas to pick up the oyster shells from their restaurants by placing a 55 gallon drum next to their composting bins.
The kitchen staff would fill the drums and the composting company we would subcontract would pick up the 55 gallon drums once or twice a week since it is already on their route to pick up in these areas.

We need to pay the rent for one acre per month at $500.00 per month per acre.
Once one acre is filled we will need another acre at another $500.00 per month.

The services of an attorney and a CPA would be needed to assist us in forming the non-profit and the cost is $500

We would also need to sustain ourselves with building the subscription business model with advertising and marketing. This cost is $18 according to data provided by City Of Austin.

The idea is attractive because the Universal Recycling Ordinance is going into effect very soon and restaurants will need to comply or face penalties of up to $2000.00 per incident, per day. Therefore, restaurants would be assisting in the oysters not becoming completely extinct to overall revive the ocean life. Plus, the restaurants already pay for waste. They could just allow us to pick up the oyster shells and pay us instead. Hauling the oyster shells would be paid for by Texas Park and Wildlife. A letter is provided on this link. We would also ask for donations from the restaurants and grants from Texas Park and Wildlife. Once we begin the process of filing for non-profit we would also begin crowd funding.

Our business model is highly scalable because we are out sourcing the pick up from the restaurants by compost haulers in Austin who have the people, trucks for hauling, and they are on these routes already.

This business model is scalable due to the fact that there are over 25 seafood restaurants in the Austin area. The benefit for the restaurant is that the universal recycling ordinance coming into affect soon would need restaurants to not dispose of the oyster shells in landfills.

The Violations of these restaurants not complying could be punishable by a fine of up to $2,000 per deficiency, per day.
​
We would be helping the restaurants by becoming aware of this ordinance going into affect and also helping the City of Austin avoid getting bombarded by questions regarding this ordinance.

Our business model would be non-profit and we would use a subscription model for the restaurants to have us pick up their oyster shells.
​
The overall impact of picking up the oyster shells from restaurants and sending them back home; would help the livelihood of dolphins, fish, crabs and shrimp from going extinct, shorelines from eroding, filtering water, providing a solution for restaurants to abide by this ordinance and have zero waste.
Here is the link to Organics by Gosh letter
https://savethesea.github.io/oysters/OrganicsByGosh.png

We need to pay the rent for one acre per month at $500.00 per month per acre.
Once one acre is filled we will need another acre at another $500.00 per month.

The services of an attorney and a CPA would be needed to assist us in forming the non-profit and the cost is $500

We would also need to sustain ourselves with building the subscription business model with advertising and marketing. This cost is $18 according to data provided by City Of Austin.

The idea is attractive because the Universal Recycling Ordinance is going into effect very soon and restaurants will need to comply or face penalties of up to $2000.00 per incident, per day. Therefore, restaurants would be assisting in the oysters not becoming completely extinct to overall revive the ocean life. Plus, the restaurants already pay for waste. They could just allow us to pick up the oyster shells and pay us instead. Hauling the oyster shells would be paid for by Texas Park and Wildlife. A letter is provided on this link. We would also ask for donations from the restaurants and grants from Texas Park and Wildlife. Once we begin the process of filing for non-profit we would also begin crowd funding.

Our team is comprised of a web developer and a published author who have participated and won countless hackathons including one that helps Veterans with PTSD and another hackathon helping children with an educational virtual reality application. This project is dear to our hearts because we lived in Houston for 15 years and experienced the hurricane evacuation which took us 15 hours to travel from Houston to Austin while only having one 16 oz Dasani water bottle, during the 15 hour trip.
Oyster shells helps with the depletion of reefs that prevent flooding.

Our non-profit will impact the Austin economy by us creating partnerships with 2 composting companies established already here in Austin by subcontracting out their hauling service and by leasing their land which is already used for composting by The City of Austin, The subscription service would create 2 jobs for the individuals who are passionate about reviving the ocean life and educating the restaurants on how much of an impact they will have in this project in the years ahead. The job would entail supporting the front and back of the house in the restaurant with any questions they may have regarding our oyster shell collection process and to also train them in disposing of the oyster shells in the 55 gallon drums which are provided to them by the compost company that we subcontract.

The overall environmental and zero waste impact of the operation is that our mission would be to return every oyster shell back home by picking up from restaurants and placing them in a stock pile. Afterwards, Texas Park and Wildlife has already agreed to return them back to the oyster reefs to benefit the sea life, and overall impact how we can continue to have seafood in our shores. TPW would incorporate any shell from the stockpile into an existing oyster restoration project. TPW has several locations located within each of the major oyster producing bay systems that have been permitted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and TPW holds a TX General Land Office Surface Lease for the submerged bottoms. Each of these sites are 20-30 acres in size. Once TPW accumulates enough funding to cover the cost of an oyster restoration project, they put together bid specifications and allow companies who do this type of work to provide them with cost estimates to accomplish the work laid out in the bid specifications. The lowest bidder is awarded the contract. Everyone wins with us returning each and every oyster shell to the ocean; The restaurants, the environment, the ocean life, City of Austin, The Universal Recycling Ordinance, and the people who depend on their living while working with the ocean life.
Our utmost gratitude go to all of these passionate people who helped us give life to the idea of returning the oyster shells back to their homes from Austin.