A Bay area man is doing his part to make sure people keep a small part of Florida with them.
Scott Allen loves to collect shells at Florida beaches and use his treasures to make jewelry. He then gives his creations away for free to tourists, as well as locals. Allen said his love of beaches and shell collecting began when he was young and would collect shells with his grandmother.
"I remember as a young kid my grandmother and I would collect shells," Allen said. "I wanted to do something that would help out in a small way and my small way is making jewelry out of shell pieces and giving them to people as a random act of kindness."
Allen makes his jewelry wherever he travels.
Once the jewelry is made, he looks for random people and offers them his trinkets, as he did on a recent day in Pass-A-Grille. Allen says he has given out more than 200 pieces of jewelry and has no plans to stop anytime soon.
"It does make me feel good to do something good for others and often they get the feeling that they can do something nice for others too," Allen said. "The 'pay it forward' or so they call it.
"I think it works to make humanity a better place."