Yea, my GREEN business story made local news!

Wanted to share this with everybody and thank everyone for your constant and loving support. So many of you have helped me in ways you may never know. Eternal gratitude! I celebrate this milestone in my life with all of you!!! Business is still a bit slow, but the universe brought me free advertisement to aid in boosting 'awareness' of community health and that of our environment by cleaning GREEN. This business has helped tremendously to keep me "grounded" here, by having to keep my mind on such earthly matters. For those of you who've not seen my site yet, here it is... hvnonerth.webs.com

Abundant Love and Blessings, Michele

"Bonita woman aims to make area playgrounds cleaner"
By MATT CLARK
Monday, September 15, 2008

Children aren’t the only things hanging from the monkey bars on Southwest Florida’s playgrounds.
Just ask Charles Gerba, also known as “Dr. Germ,” a professor at the University of Arizona who has studied germs for decades.
“Basically, we see it as a good germ transfer point,” says Gerba. “If you were a germ, where would you want to be? You’d want to be where little kids are playing all the time.”
But if you’re Bonita Springs resident Michelle, 35, you don’t need to be a scientist to notice dirt on area play places. She’s a mother of three, and it was the grime she spotted that led her to start a new business and encourage operators of area playground equipment to clean them up. It began 10 months ago.
“I’ve gone to the park with my older ones for years and it just so happened when I went to the park that day, it was dirty and I was like ‘Oh, wow,’” said Haszard, who has worked as a professional cleaner for years. “That’s when I saw the mold and the mildew and it was just not clean.”
It turns out the problem goes beyond dirt. In a four-year germ study done on public places across the country, Gerba and others found playgrounds had more urine, sweat, mucus and saliva than all but day care centers. Fifteen of the team’s 42 samples tested positive for the bodily secretions, or about 36 percent of the time.
The team also found the contaminants on the surfaces will be transferred to the individuals touching them 86 percent of the time and will be present hours later on personal belongings and the homes of those individuals 82 percent of the time.
Gerba has also conducted studies for media companies in Arizona. In those studies, he has found fecal matter getting transferred to children’s hands from playground equipment, especially at playgrounds in fast food restaurants. Outdoor playgrounds, it seems, have gone to the birds, Gerba said.
“Birds use the playgrounds — particularly the monkey bars — as public rest rooms,” Gerba said.
And then there is recess. Though playgrounds have seen less and less use due to the increased pressure put on teachers to improve student performance on tests, when recess does happen, it happens for each grade level in a particular school.
“By the end of the day, you manage to have everyone sharing the same playground,” Gerba said.
So, when Haszard contacted the Lee County Department of Parks and Recreation and the Lee County School District, the reception was warm. Especially, she says, because she uses non-toxic, environmentally-friendly cleaning products to clean and disinfect the playground equipment children use. Haszard has already cleaned three Lee County playgrounds and school district Superintendent James Browder thanked her for contacting him. Haszard is in the process of being signed up as a vendor for the district, she said.
“It’s just a matter of getting people informed and aware of the effects,” Hazsard said, noting that it’s not just germs that need to be removed from the equipment. “You have the mold, you have the mildew. It causes respiratory problems, allergies, runny eyes, sneezing, coughing, and these are the effects that the children are in contact with.”
Her service is simple. Haszard powerwashes the whole playground and then disinfects the areas that get touched using her special “green” chemicals. The name of her company is Heaven on Earth Green Cleanse and Disinfect.
“The disinfectant is what cleans up any potential bacteria and fungi,” Haszard said. “Kids, mouth, hands, face, I mean, they touch everything. When you have a vast amount of children on a regular basis, there is just an array of different germs that spread that way.”

http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2008/sep/15/bonita-woman-aims-make-area-p...